Customer Reviews

The Shirley Temple Collection: Volume One

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am so glad that they decided to bring Shirley Temple FINALLY to DVD- and this time the quality is amazing on the DVD considering how old the films are. Both versions are available to watch on the DVD- black and white or the new colorized version based on your own liking....

There is a wide range of Shirley from those adorable years when, Shirley was nothing more than a bundle of joy that sung and dance her way into America's heart to those tween years when Fox was trying to show her off as a real actress. Still there is not a BAD movie in this set.

In Curly Top you see all that remarkable charm as she performs that classic "Animal Crackers In My Soup" and does that sweet tap dance on the piano at the end to the title song. The movie plays out as Shirley is an orphan at orphanage- beloved by all there... well, when she catches the eye of an investor of the orphanage when he visits. He falls in love with Shirley and decides to adopt her. Only problem- her older sister will not allow the adoption to take place unless he adopts her as well. Well, he makes the decision to adopt them both-only secretly even making up a character "Hireman Jones"- so that they both can come to expect the pleasures in life. Well, when he starts falling for Mary- Shirley's sister things get complicated. But, finally work their way out so that they can become one big happy family. "Curly Top" showcases off some amazing tap numbers and a ton of charm when Shirley was just a youngster starting out.

"Little Miss Broadway" is full of song and dance- and has my personal favorite tap dance scene at the end to the title number. Filmed during those difficult tween years for Shirley. The movie is set in NYC Shirley is a recently adopted orphan who now, lives at a hotel full of under-appreciated actors. Well, their landlord is not thirlled with the colorful characters working at the hotel from a band, to a magician who has a pet penguin, to a miget dance trio... Well, the land lady who Shirley refers to as "Ms. Pumpkin" trys to close down the hotel and throw out all the actors on the street she is one for one HUGE legal battle which ends up with a ton of memorable song and dance numbers. One of Shirleys under=appreciated movies this one NOT to miss!

Heidi based upon the classic book is a movie that any non-Shirley Temple fan will enjoy. The acting is increadiable in this movie and Shirley shows off some real acting strengths the scene in which she is begging the police not to take her grandfather away always makes me want to cry.

This is a PERFECT gift for any little girl in your family. Sit down with your family and enjoy the magic of Shirley Temple.

I wish the people complaining about the trailers would stop being so trivial and take the time to enjoy the films themselves. Sheesh! We ought to be grateful that Shirley Temple is now being appreciated by the studio and her films are appearing on DVD in small bunches, and even better, in RESTORED form! "Heidi" which was previously reissued on DVD a couple of years ago, wasn't THAT bad on DVD, but now it's even better and improved, albeit in some scenes it's hard to tell the difference.

I've already commented before about how Shirley is a national treasure and it's a shame that it's taken this long for her films to be taken seriously and be released on DVD. Hopefully, ALL of her films are eventually going to be restored for DVD.

I love Shirley Temple movies, and had VHS tapes of a few. But when the tapes started degrading, I went in search of DVD editions. I prefer the original black & white, and when Fox released a few DVDs a couple years ago (with both colour and black & white), I bought "Heidi". The black & white quality was awful! In fact, it looked like they'd just used the badly colourized version and removed the colour. I was very disappointed.

So when I heard that these movies were being rereleased, I eagerly (but a little warily) ordered them. The quality on these is amazing! The black & white versions have been restored very well (which you can clearly see when you compare them with the included old black & white trailers for other Shirley Temple films). Even the colourized versions are quite acceptable. Whereas in the olden days (the 1980s) the colourizing process often left inexact coloured halos around people and objects, this new process is very precise. I noticed individual hairs that were coloured, without any of that nasty halo. The whites of people's eyes are actually white, too, not flesh-toned.

"Little Miss Broadway" is one of my favourites, and I was thrilled with the quality of the film. The older colourized versions were too bright (as if someone had turned up the brightness and contrast on them), almost obscuring facial features in places. This new release is very much how I imagine the original must have been. Clear, a little grainy, and perfectly charming.

I don't care much about the trailers, but what I would like to have seen (especially for this set) was the deleted scene from "Little Miss Broadway". I believe it is available on a compilation DVD somewhere, but it would have been nice to see it included in the actual movie it was taken from.

I've already ordered the second 3-disc set for my collection. These movies are great!

Its great to have these titles on DVD now. All great classic films. The quality of the source material really isn't bad, but Fox never seems to go the extra mile with older classic film titles, giving us the extras that most people really love to have. The trailers are of very poor quality and as far as the colorized version is concerned, its of very average quality, when you compare it to other more recent black and white titles that have been converted to color (like the first season of bewitched, it really looks fantistic). But you can always enjoy the classic black and white version if your not happy with the color. But no matter its great to see Fox release these classics on DVD for young and old alike to enjoy.

I saw this collection siting up in Walmart, and I couldn't resist. After paying about $10 for all of Shirley's other movies, I just couldn't resist! The whole box has a "pink" theme to it, which may turn off potential buyersm especially male ones. There are three discs inside "Heidi", "Curly Top", and "Little Miss Broadway". Each movie has a new cover design, an insert, and a charm. Packaged inside "Heidi" a little ziplock baggie holds a bracelet of charms of Wooden Shoes(Heidi) a Tiara(Little Miss Broadway) and a pony(curly top) This isn't very big, and would fit the wrist of probably a four year old, still a cute little bonus. The movies all have the colour and black&white versions. I compared the DVD's to the Videos, and from my opinion, both colour versions are exactly the same. The Black&Wgite versions are the same as the colour ones in terms of quality, only in black and white. No extra's disc-wise are in here, but they do have the theatracal trailers for the three movies, very bad quality, old, aged...They're were no attempts to restore them. The box is labelled "Volume One" so I'm hoping that they will eventually release all the movies on DVD's like this. They are avalible individual also. I'm guessing Box Two will have "Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm" "Baby Take a Bow" and "Bright Eyes" seeing as they are all said to be released on the same day as the box. I think they are releasing the movies all over again, only onto DVD. hopefully with a forward from Miss Temple herself.

here is a set of Shirley's CURLY TOP, HEIDI, and LITTLE MISS BROADWAY and,these have both the black and white and brand new color versions, and, this new color has really knocked me out!!

HEIDI has such beautiful color, it truly looks like it was truly filmed in color!!!! The colors are so vibrant, they jump right off the screen! Shirley has never looked this beautiful on film before, its as if this color has made her features come much more to life!!

The mountain scenes are beautiful, where when we see The grandfather or Shirley outside of the cabin, the trees and the sky are so beautiful. The tress are beautiful green, and the sky is beautiful deep blue!!

The clothes that Shirley wears are beautiful with the color and, wait till you see the christmas tree and all its colors!

One of the main reasons as to why HEIDI looks so good is because it was remastered and its truly flawless,its so clear and sharp!! Again, Shirley has never looked so good ,and her adorable beauty truly shines strong!The skin tone is done to perfection and, truly this great Shirley movie has never looked as good as this before!!

CURLY TOP is great too, but not as good looking as HEIDI because the print they used is the only print that Fox appears to have so, there is the touch of grain to the film but the color still shines thru beautifully.
Shirley looks so adorable in this, and, when she sings "Animal crackers" she is soooooo very adorable and as you know she as well as the other little girls wear the jean overalls and the color looks super ,they are very blue colored,and look honest to goodness like this movie was filmed in color!


LITTLE MISS BROADWAY is another winner with the color again looking as if it was filmed in true color!!its so outstanding!

Thank goodness theres more of Shirley's films to come in this fantastic awesome color on November 22nd 2005 with BABY TAKE A BOW, BRIGHT EYES and REBECCA OF SUNNYBROOK FARM, I am very excited and anxious for them and in time all Shirley's Fox films will be available on DVD in this great color!


You will enjoy this collection very much and, they will make you fall in love with little Shirley all over again!!


ENJOY!

Why can't Fox release their classic films like Warner Bros do? The trailers for Heidi, Little Miss Broadway, Curly Top and Dimples are included, but are of extremely bad quality. One misses the audio commentaries, behind the scenes and special features. I'm hoping that Volume 2 will be better.
As for the colorizations .. I don't know, some scenes echo back to the tacky, false coloring of the 1980s versions. Heidi looks fantastic though, it seems to have had the most time and attention to detail. And it's great to have a copy of the black and white versions, the films as they were back in the day.

I received my set today(Sept 13) from Amazon. Originally rescheduled from May, I love the packaging and the colorized versions look good. Some Fox colorized versions have been bad and the original set a couple if years ago had an atrocious colorized Bright Eyes. The recent Australian releasee of this title in PAL is colorized only(no b&w versions)even worse. Many have been issued in Australia in prices varying from A$8.62 to A$18.99. What is a disappointment is that I was under the impression that The Shirley Temple Storybook series was to start appearing in this new series and although two of the 3 titles have, in Special Features, the line The Shirley Temple Theatre there is no episodes from this series which I saw on Sunday evenings when they were new. What happened to those extras. The Little Miss Broadway trailer is has not titles or cast dialogue but the music track has been included. I asume(it is noted that this the case on the menu)that the footage has been lost but then it could have been ccarefully(the dialogue that is) from the original film tracks. Heidi was originally issued in Septiatone that was popular then and the NTSC laserdisc edition did preserve this version but there is a rare freeze frame at the start of the laserdisc)the scene where Shirley is being taken to see her granddad.

The Animal Crackers song in Curly Top has a noticeable splice that is in all versions I have seen including TV, Video, etc and also and records and cds from the original films of Shirley's films. Zanuck, for some reason, did not like his stars making commercial records and thus some Fox items appear on records as soundtracks in recent years reissues.

they put shirley on the dvd. Finally, i'm happy they put her on dvd. It's so cute and everything that happened to shirley in these movies. Shirley will always be America's (true/real) sweetheart. she's the true star. Every single girl has tried to imitate her, but she always was/is number #1!

Curly Top- is adorable. It's about this little orphan, who likes to be a nuisance to everyone. With memorable songs like A.C. en mi S.
Heidi- Is a great character and she makes that girl walk and everything. The monkey was cute.
Little Miss Broadway- awww this is so cute.

I always loved Shirley Temple movies as a child. I actually purchased this movie package for me, however, my grandchildren love it too.