Amid the competitiveness of classic era cinema, whenever one studio had a big success the others would inevitably roll out their copycats. These were invariably inferior knock-offs, but they often fared reasonably well because they cashed in on the popularity of whatever it was they were imitating. But imagine, if you will, a rip-off movie so appalling that it failed at the box office, even with the attachment of a popular star. Just such a thing is The Blue Bird. It's making was a particularly pertinent bit of point-making by 20th Century Fox, since its star Shirley Temple had lost out to Judy Garland for the lead role in The Wizard of Oz. However, the fantasy movie Fox gave to Temple got wrong everything The Wizard of Oz got right.
The failure of The Blue Bird is usually blamed upon the fact that Temple plays a mean-spirited little girl, and it's true this is at least part of the problem. It's not that she isn't good at being the snooty brat – I can well imagine her being like that in real life – it's just that it's wrong for the movie. The story arc is all about Temple's moral development through her adventures, but she's so convincing as the little madam we have no starting point with which to sympathise with her. Ironically though it's the deliciously evil Gale Sondergaard who I find myself routing for, especially since the "good guys" in this movie are so flimsy (or in the case of Fairy Berylune, downright rude).
But there are still deeper flaws running through The Blue Bird. Its joyless, po-faced moralism becomes tiresome incredibly quickly. Its fairytale concepts may be a little different but they don't really inspire much delight. Admittedly a little poignancy has been eked from the scene with children waiting to be born, but the concept of unborn babies being love-struck teenagers is a little too weird even for a fantasy movie. And plot-wise it doesn't really have much else to offer. There is a tacked-on "daddy going to war" subplot, very much a Shirley Temple staple, but it falls flat because unlike in The Little Princess an emotional bond between father and daughter is not established.
And when one compares The Blue Bird to its predecessor The Wizard of Oz, its woeful banality reaches depressing proportions. Like The Wizard of Oz, it begins in monochrome and turns to colour, but as oppose to the unforgettable transition in Oz it's an almost arbitrary switch between two scenes. Essentially it steals the idea but has learnt none of the grace. And, for want of a better word, it's not movie-fied enough. A frumpy Jessie Ralph in her patchwork cloak is very much as the character might appear in a book of fairy tales, but The Blue Bird could benefit more from the glamour of Billie Burke and her sparkles. And Helen Ericson as "Light" is simply too bland to be a replacement. Also bland is the music, the special effects, the set design I could go on, but there doesn't seem much point. The Blue Bird shows classic Hollywood at its least enchanting.
The failure of The Blue Bird is usually blamed upon the fact that Temple plays a mean-spirited little girl, and it's true this is at least part of the problem. It's not that she isn't good at being the snooty brat – I can well imagine her being like that in real life – it's just that it's wrong for the movie. The story arc is all about Temple's moral development through her adventures, but she's so convincing as the little madam we have no starting point with which to sympathise with her. Ironically though it's the deliciously evil Gale Sondergaard who I find myself routing for, especially since the "good guys" in this movie are so flimsy (or in the case of Fairy Berylune, downright rude).
But there are still deeper flaws running through The Blue Bird. Its joyless, po-faced moralism becomes tiresome incredibly quickly. Its fairytale concepts may be a little different but they don't really inspire much delight. Admittedly a little poignancy has been eked from the scene with children waiting to be born, but the concept of unborn babies being love-struck teenagers is a little too weird even for a fantasy movie. And plot-wise it doesn't really have much else to offer. There is a tacked-on "daddy going to war" subplot, very much a Shirley Temple staple, but it falls flat because unlike in The Little Princess an emotional bond between father and daughter is not established.
And when one compares The Blue Bird to its predecessor The Wizard of Oz, its woeful banality reaches depressing proportions. Like The Wizard of Oz, it begins in monochrome and turns to colour, but as oppose to the unforgettable transition in Oz it's an almost arbitrary switch between two scenes. Essentially it steals the idea but has learnt none of the grace. And, for want of a better word, it's not movie-fied enough. A frumpy Jessie Ralph in her patchwork cloak is very much as the character might appear in a book of fairy tales, but The Blue Bird could benefit more from the glamour of Billie Burke and her sparkles. And Helen Ericson as "Light" is simply too bland to be a replacement. Also bland is the music, the special effects, the set design I could go on, but there doesn't seem much point. The Blue Bird shows classic Hollywood at its least enchanting.