23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting Temple film, April 21, 2001
"Our Little Girl" is a lesser Shirley Temple film, but it's still pretty good. Quite different from the musical spectaculars Temple was known for, "Our Little Girl" gave her a chance to show off her acting skills.
The storyline is surprisingly contemporary. If you changed the costumes and cars, it could be a modern TV script.
One interesting thing about this film is that Shirley plays a very normal American child--not a waif, an orphan or someone's long-lost granddaughter. She's Molly Middleton, the only daughter of a doctor and a housewife. She has a splendid house, an adorable Scottie dog and a room furnished with anything a 6 year old could want. Her parents take her on outings, have pinics at the river and spoil her rotten.
However, there's trouble in Paradise. Molly's father (Joel McCrea), a brilliant researcher, begins to neglect his family and put in long nights at the lab. Molly's mother (Rosemary Ames), who grows bored of sitting around the house by herself, takes up with a dashing new suitor, Rolfe Brant (Lyle Talbot). The marriage falls apart, and Mrs. Middleton plans to seek a divorce and run away with Brant.
Caught in the middle of all the chaos, of course, is Molly. She stresses out over her parents and tries to sabotage her mother's new relationship. As she is increasingly ignored, Molly worries that her parents don't love her anymore, and, eventually, runs away from home. Since this is a Temple film, there is a happy ending, but not before her parents are given a scare and a chance to re-evaluate their situation.
Molly's fears about the divorce and her parents are honest and realistic, and they are played out well in the script. In one scene, she cries while her parents fight in the next room. In another, she confronts her mother's boyfriend Mr. Brant with some biting, but painfully polite, retorts (Molly, on being asked to call the boyfriend 'Uncle Rolfe': "can't we just talk without my calling you anything...sir?"). When Molly meets her father, right after discovering that Mrs. Middleton and Mr. Brant plan to marry, she is too grief-stricken to speak.
Temple handled the role well. She was not given a showcase for her musical talents in this film (excepting one short song), but she did prove that she was just as gifted in acting. Her interactions with McCrea and Talbot were especially strong.
Among the other actors, the dapper Lyle Talbot was phenomenal. Cast as Rolfe Brant, he did a good job of portaying the film's closest thing to a villain. He also had a great speech at the end of the movie.
The material isn't always top-notch, however. There are a few other scenes that are extremely sappy, and some of the lines and later plot twists are a bit implausible. The action also tends to drag a little. However, this is still an interesting find and worth watching.
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