ANNE OF GREEN GABLES (1934)

I've never read the "Anne" books and I don't think I've ever seen a version of "Heidi" all the way through (though I have seen a couple of Shirley Temple films) so I'm not really an expert on the Orphan Melodrama, but this seems like a perfectly charming example of the genre. The actress Anne Shirley plays the orphan Anne Shirley (the actress's name was Dawn O'Dea but she changed it when this movie came out) who is adopted by Marilla (Helen Westley) and her brother Matthew (O.P. Heggie); they wanted a boy to help out around the farm, and when a whimsical little drama queen (she proclaims that her red hair is her "lifelong sorrow") shows up, they're not sure they want to keep her, but she soon wins them over. The rest of the episodic story follows her adventures living on Prince Edward Island. She has an amusing row with a gossipy neighbor (well played by Sara Haden), gets caught in a lie about being friends with a recent graduate, and, over the period of a few years, has a romance with fellow student Gilbert Blythe (Tom Brown). Their rocky relationship begins when she smashes a slate over his head because he makes fun of her hair. When she decides she wants to get his attention at a hayride, he ignores her, but later he comes to her rescue during a rafting mishap (she's floating along pretending to be the Lady of Shallot). They start seeing each other in secret because Marilla won't allow Anne to see Gilbert (many years ago, Matthew was jilted by Gilbert's mother and Marilla assumes that incident is his lifelong sorrow). Eventually, Anne is sent off to college, and just as she's about to graduate, she learns that Matthew is sick. She comes back home and arranges for Gilbert, now an assistant to a renowned heart doctor, to care for Matthew, leading to a happy ending all around. It's a sweet movie without being cloying or sentimental, and part of the credit for that goes to Westley and Heggie who both nicely underplay their roles. Shirley is fun, Brown is hunky in a mid-1930's way, and Haden does her usual spinster turn to a tee. [TCM]