YOUNG PEOPLE
US, 1940, 78 minutes, Black and white.
Shirley Temple, Jack Oakie, Charlotte Greenwood, Arleen Whelan, George Montgomery, Mae Marsh.
Directed by Alan Dwan.
Young People is a pleasant Shirley Temple vehicle. At the time of its production, she was 10 - and growing up nicely. A little less cute than when she was young.
The film has pleasant leads with Jack Oakie and Charlotte Greenwood - doing her lanky leg-kicking and splits routines to great-comic and musical advantage. A young Douglass Montgomery is the romantic lead.
The film is the old story about the vaudeville couple with the adopted child going to live in the country, alienating the inhabitants who set them up to ridicule. Father helps during a storm and rescues children - and all is well, with the crusty people changed. The political implications of this are spelt out in the screenplay - the people of Stonefield are against New Deal politics. By the end of the film they have embraced Roosevelt's vision for America - as had people in earlier Shirley Temple films like Stand Up and Cheer.
There are some pleasant songs by Harry Warren and Mack David including Fifth. Avenue. Direction is by Alan Dwan who directed Shirley Temple in Heidi.
1. An entertaining Shirley Temple vehicle? musical comedy of the time?
2. 20th Century Fox production values: black and white photography, the stars, the vaudeville choreography, the country town and the farm, the storm sequences? Musical score, songs, insertion into the plot, vaudeville routines? The musical finale?
3. The title and the focus on youngsters, crusty older people and their intolerance of the young, the new generation, the need for America to have some vision for younger people? 1938 - and in retrospect?
4. The focus on vaudeville, the shows, the wandering families, the young child entering the parents' act? The plans for retirement? The vaudeville show even in retirement? The youngsters aping the adult vaudeville style?
5. The Ballantyne family - Joe as good-natured, leading the family, making decisions, buying the farm? 'Kitty and her support, decision to take Wendy, bringing her up, introducing her into the act? Wendy as the little baby, the old lady with the note, the Ballantynes adopting her, her growing up with them, stealing the limelight with her Hawaiian dance, joining in the act? The bonds between the three, their decision to tell Wendy the truth, their not doing it, her finding out hurtfully, their discussing it in the car, the bonds, strengthened? The decision to go to the town, the arrival, the cold shoulder, the seeming welcome, their believing it, Joe and his plans and their being ridiculed? The concert and its disaster? The teacher telling them the decision to leave, the storm, the rescue, the reconciliation, the grand finale - with Joe running the town?
6. Shirley Temple's style as Wendy, skill at song and dance, precocious, love for the family, helping in the town, befriending people, the musical and its failure, the drink In the soda fountain and her telling the people off, the flood and the storm, telling old Dakin off, a happy-and cheerful character?
7., The people in the town - the school teacher and her crustiness, running people's lives, old songs, her influence? Her change of heart? Dakin and the other parents, their suspicion of strangers? Their being against the new deal? Their nastiness? Dakin meriting Wendy's telling him off? The children and the enjoyment of the show, their parents taking them home? The change of heart?
8. Mike and his paper, standing up for the young people, the democratic views, Judith and her not responding to him? Falling in love and the happy ending?
9. Traditional styles of the American musical, American comedy of the '30s, the light reflection of the political situation?
