The Little Princess
About The Little Princess
In 1899 Captain Crewe leaves Sara at Miss Minchin's school and goes to the Second Boer War. During Sara's birthday party a solicitor reports him dead and the money gone, and Minchin puts Sara to work as a servant with Becky. Sara keeps searching London hospitals. She finds him able only to say her name, and her voice brings him back. Queen Victoria is in the hospital as they leave.
Cast & crew
More about The Little Princess
Walter Lang directed. Ethel Hill and Walter Ferris wrote the screenplay from Frances Hodgson Burnett's 1905 novel, and moved the story onto the siege of Mafeking. Gene Markey was the associate producer. Arthur C. Miller and William V. Skall shot it in Technicolor. It opened on 10 March 1939.
Themes
Background
Fox set Burnett's Victorian story against the 1899–1900 siege of Mafeking so Sara's father could vanish into a current-history war.
Making
Charles Maxwell, Cyril J. Mockridge, Herbert W. Spencer, and Samuel Pokrass are credited with the music. Louis Loeffler edited.
Look
Arthur C. Miller and William V. Skall shot the three-strip Technicolor, the first time Temple carried a whole feature in color.
Music
Temple and Arthur Treacher perform "Knocked 'Em in the Old Kent Road."
Preservation
Public domain in the United States since 1968, after the copyright was not renewed.
Notes
- Shirley Temple plays Sara. Ian Hunter plays Captain Crewe. Richard Greene plays the riding master Geoffrey Hamilton, not the father.
- Mary Nash is Miss Minchin. Arthur Treacher is her brother Bertie. Cesar Romero is Ram Dass. Sybil Jason is Becky. Beryl Mercer plays Queen Victoria.
- It is the first Temple feature shot entirely in Technicolor, and her third film with Romero, after Wee Willie Winkie and Ali Baba Goes to Town.
- Temple and Treacher sing "Knocked 'Em in the Old Kent Road." There is also a ballet sequence.
- The ending, with the queen in the hospital, is not the ending of the novel.
- The copyright was not renewed. The film entered the public domain in the United States in 1968.
Scenes
- The solicitor stops Sara's birthday party with news that her father is dead.
- Sara and Bertie sing "Knocked 'Em in the Old Kent Road.
- She finds Captain Crewe in the hospital, repeating her name, while the queen is visiting.
Influenced by
- Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel A Little Princess (1905)
Also available
- Internet Archive (little_princess)
