DIMPLES
US, 1936, 82 minutes, Black and white.
Shirley Temple, Frank Morgan, Helen Westley.
Directed by William A. Seiter.
Dimples is considered one of Shirley Temple's best mid-'30s vehicles. In the Depression, she was at the top of the box office with her cuteness, brightness and exuberance. (This film has a Depression setting - the 1850s but the message is the same.) Shirley's co-star is the genial Frank Morgan who was to become the Wizard of Oz. As in so many of the Shirley Temple films, there is an emphasis on the role of the blacks. Choreography is by Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson (with whom she danced in The Little Colonel and The Littlest Rebel) and there is a dramatisation of scenes from Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Again, Shirley sings and dances, acts her heart out with supreme confidence and professionalism.
1. An entertaining Shirley Temple vehicle? The popularity of this kind of film in the 1930s? The needs of audiences at the time? Later generation?
2. Production values: black and white photography, old New York of 1850, the streets and the poverty, the luxurious homes, markets, theatres? The musical score? The choreography?
3. The focus on Shirley Temple as Dimples? Her song and dance routine at the opening? Her love for the professor? Believing the best about him? The encounter with Mrs. Drew? Her honesty? Her being welcomed into the family and her dilemma? Staying with the professor? The tangles about the play? About the money? Her going to Mrs. Drew to get the money? Her performance - and the precociously talented interpretation of Little Eva in Uncle Tom's Cabin? The happy ending? The cute American heroine?
4. The genial Frank Morgan as the professor? A more genial version of Fagin with his urchins and their robberies? His honesty with the family? Devotion to Dimples? His tangles about the money, being given the $800, the confidence trick about Napoleon's watch, his trying to sell it, with Mrs. Drew? The police coming for him? His disguise as Uncle Ton? The happy release? His attentions to Mrs. Drew?
5. The children and the urchins of New York, stealing, performing? The theatre? The contrast with affluent families?
6. The hero and the heroine - and his desire to put on the play? The social sentiments of Uncle Tom’s Cabin? His failure, the loss of the money, the actress walking out on him? The play and the reconciliation? His aunt and the family being moved by the play?
7. The social themes - especially of race issues worked into the film?
8. Popular family entertainment of the '30s? The perennial ingredients of the attractive child, the genial adults, crises? Happy resolution?
