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Daddy Long Legs
A baby is found in a trashcan, wrapped in newspapers, and grows up to be Mary Pickford. <
> The baby, as was probably common for all post-Oliver Twist melodramas, is haphazardly named by the stern mistress of the orphanage after riffling through a phone books and surveying a clump of headstones. <
> The silent DADDY-LONG-LEGS is two movies delicately joined. The first follows the fortunes of young Jerusha `Judy' Abbott (Pickford) in the orphanage. From the second half comes the title of the film. A wealthy benefactor wishes to send Pickford to college, and, importantly, maintain his anonymity. The only glimpse she catches of him is his tall shadow. Hence Daddy-Long-Legs. <
> There's a welcome dose of comedy in the first half. Melodramas set in orphanages, especially silent ones, can be pretty rough going. Fortunately this one only kills one child and burns one thieving hand. It could be worse. The movie offsets the heavy stuff with an amusing scene with an inebriated dog and a cute look at the headquarters of Dan Cupid, un-LTD, replete with a gaggle of winged and diaper-clad toddlers intent on throwing or two at pretty Miss Pickford. The second half is a tale of love finding the delicate heroine with a terrible secret. <
> I enjoyed DADDY-LONG-LEGS quite a bit. Whatever made Mary Pickford "America's Sweetheart" almost a hundred years ago still works today. Watching the movie took a little bit of adjustment, though. The orphanage melodrama was about as thick as Queen Victoria's girdle, and title cards saying "Why did she raise her hair and lengthen her skirts?" confused a bit more than they enlightened. The social stigma associated with being an orphan seems dated, as well. <
> The other film on this disk also features Mary Pickford. WHAT THE DAISY SAID was directed by D.W. Griffith in 1910 and is a very short take on two sisters (Pickford and Gertrude Robinson) being seduced by a gigolo of a palm-reading Gypsy. The moral seems to be to trust flowers more than men who wrap their heads in handkerchiefs. <
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'Little Mary' grows up.
'Daddy Long Legs' is a beautifully crafted film in which Pickford's character, Judy Abbott, grows up. Pickford plays the role of an abandoned child who pits her wits against a child who is born with a silver spoon in her mouth, Angelina.
As a child in an orphanage, the unloved, unwanted Judy skillfully and hilariously outwits both the orphanage mistress and Angelina, by inciting the inmates to rebel against their diet of prunes, stealing Angelina's doll and by delivering it minus an arm to a dying child.
Despite the film's hilarity, it makes a genuine statement about social acceptability. As an orphan, Judy is neither worthy of Angelina's company nor is she her social equal. Even the young Angelina looks down her nose at Judy who wears the orphanage gingham with dignity.
Years later, as a young woman at college, sponsored by a much older gentleman, Judy again meets Angelina who treats her as inferior and lacking social connections. Later, Judy's writing finally enables her to socialise with the wealthy but when this breakthrough occurs, she is mindful of her origins and cannot bring herself initially to wed into the snobbish families she encounters.
Judy arrives at a decision involving which beau to accept after heartfelt thought and agonising. Then a well hidden secret is disclosed, to Judy's embarrassment.
The ending is happy and satisfying. Any Pickford fan would enjoy this film. It is intellectual as well as entertaining and is delightfully photographed.