Anne of Green Gables (1934)

Expected more

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

A different way of telling a story

NOTES: This is a re-make of the 1919 version directed by William Desmond Taylor, which starred of course Mary Miles Minter, whose mother is alleged by some Hollywood insiders to have murdered the director on the night of 1 February 1922. The murder - second only to the Roscoe Arbuckle case as Hollywood's most sensational true-life scandal - is still officially listed as unsolved. Until quite recently, I'd never seen a film directed by William Desmond Taylor. You'd think his notoriety alone would guarantee frequent airings on TV. But Unknown Video have now come to the rescue with a fine Kodascope copy - condensed to 5 reels, of course, but tinted - of Tom Sawyer (1917) starring a too-old-for-the-role but otherwise highly plausible Jack Pickford.Anyway, getting back to this movie, it was Big Box-office everywhere in 1935, and did particularly well in city and urban areas. PRINCIPAL MIRACLE: After avoiding this movie for years, I found it quite charming.COMMENT: Refreshing! One of the most remarkable things about the film is that it has dated very little. Montgomery's central idea of making her orphan-sent-by-mistake a dreamy chatterbox, is a strong one. And when that little heroine is so winningly played by an accomplished actress who can manage the transition from girlhood to womanhood with such ease, this movie certainly starts with much in its favor. Aside from Tom Brown who as usual is a bit of a pain, Miss Shirley receives solid support all the way down the line from the beautifully judged portraits delivered by Helen Westley and O.P. Heggie to Sara Haden's irredeemably nosy Rachel and Charley Grapewin's surprisingly brief cameo as a rustic physician. For the most part, the obligatory sentimental scenes are both dramatically effective and commendably restrained. Although production values are moderate, technical credits are extremely able. George Nicholls leads the way with his forceful but almost wholly unobtrusive direction, his skill revealed in such sequences as the introductory close-ups of the wagon wheel turning which serve to punctuate and break up Anne's chattering, the long tracking shot with Anne and Tom, and a few crane shots above the stairs. Deft film editing in which steady patterns of long shots, two-shots and close-ups are not allowed to grow monotonous, must also be commended. As must Lucien Andriot's accomplished lighting which gives the photography such an attractive sheen. Max Steiner's melodious score which the composer cleverly uses to underline selected scenes rather than to drown out the sound track at every opportunity, is yet another major asset of this restrained but movingly realistic play.

In old Prince Edward Island in Canada, country folk O.P. Heggie and Helen Westley are awaiting the arrival of a young boy to help them out on their farm. When Heggie gets to the station, he finds only a teenage girl waiting. It is Anne Shirley (character name AND actress), a freckled, redheaded ball of fire. Heggie instantly takes to her, but Westley is none too happy and demands her return. She allows her to spend the night, which causes her to soften towards Shirley. When she sees the woman who has agreed to take her off her hands, Westley changes her mind. Shirley remains feisty, telling off obnoxious neighbor Sara Haden, who instantly judges her by appearance. Westley makes Shirley apologize, which she does, on her own terms. In school, Shirley gets the attention of handsome Tom Brown whom she spars with at first, and tries to play little miss fix-it upon learning that her foster mother has a resentment against Brown's family. As Anne grows up, she matures into a lovely young woman, yet all the while keeping the spark that added so much life to Heggie and Westley's home.Made the same year Shirley Temple began her reign as the Little Miss Fix-It over at 20th Century Fox, "Anne of Green Gables" was RKO's hope of having another "Little Women" on their hands with a peppy young girl changing the lives of everyone around her. Anne Shirley, formerly Dawn O'Day, is excellent in the title role, and it doesn't get any better than when she tells off Sara Haden ("Andy Hardy's" Aunt Millie), then apologizes while repeating her earlier tirade in politer terms. She would remain an RKO contract player for 10 years. Haden,it must be noted, doesn't play the gossipy neighbor as a one-dimensional character, using Shirley's apology too to admit she might have been wrong about her. Helen Westley and O.P. Heggie are absolutely perfect as her foster parents, and young Tom Brown makes an appealing young beau. Charley Grapewin (Uncle Henry of "The Wizard of Oz") is a local doctor. A sequel with Ms. Shirley as an adult Anne (now a teacher) was made by RKO 6 years later. It has also been remade for TV and adapted several times as a stage musical. An enjoyable light-hearted drama that makes one long for simpler times before life, and the world, got overly complicated.

In "Anne of Green Gables" (1934), Marilla Cuthbert (Helen Westley) and Matthew Cuthbert (O.P. Heggie), middle-aged siblings who live together at Green Gables, a farm in Avonlea, on Prince Edward Island, decide to adopt a boy from distant orphanage to help on their farm. But the orphan sent to them is a precocious girl of 14 named Anne Shirley (Dawn Evelyn Paris-a veteran of Disney's series of "Alice" shorts who later would adopt her character's name). Anne was only 11 in Lucy Maude Montgomery's source novel but the same actress could not credibly go from 11 to college age during the course of the story. The movie suffers somewhat from this concession, as many of Anne's reactions and much of what she says would be far more entertaining coming from an eleven-year-old than from a teenager. As in the book, Anne is bright and quick, eager to please but dissatisfied with her name, her build, her freckles, and her long red hair. Being a child of imagination, however, Anne takes much joy in life, and adapts quickly to her new family and the environment of Prince Edward Island.In fact Anne is the original "Teenage Drama Queen" and the film's screenwriter elected to focus on this aspect of her character. Which transformed the basic genre from mildly amusing family drama to comedy. A change that delighted audiences and that continues to frustrate reader purists. Since the comedy is very much in the spirit of Montgomery's story I can see no reason to take issue with the changes, but let this serve as fair warning to anyone expecting a totally faithful adaptation. The comedy element is the strength of the film as it is one of the earliest self-reflexive parodies of Hollywood conventions. The actress Anne Shirley was one of Hollywood's all- time beauties and the film is in black and white. So much of the amusement is in seeing the title character's endless laments about her appearance and hair color contradicted by what is appearing on the screen. Anne regularly regales her no nonsense rural companions with melodramatic lines like: "If you refuse it will be a lifelong sorrow to me". Perhaps the funniest moment is when she corrects the spelling of her name on the classroom blackboard. Tom Brown does a nice job as Anne's love interest Gilbert Blythe and Sara Haden steals all the scenes in which she appears as the Cuthbert's pompous neighbor. Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

As a big fan of the books before I even saw the 80's versions of the movie, I think that the 1934 movie is a fairly good depiction. There is one deviation that they made which bugged me throughout the whole movie. Diana Barry's mother was Miss Rachel in the movie instead of them being 2 separate people. Also Diana had blonde hair, but that I could get past. I'm amused that the actress who played Anne Shirley (with an "e") just so happened to be named Anne Shirley, and she does an excellent job playing the character...it's almost as if the character Anne was modeled after the actress Anne. This movie sticks to the storyline very well, so as to quote many lines from the book. Also, Gilbert is still fairly handsome :)