This film did not do well with audiences in its day, and I think part of the reason is that it was a little too progressive for mainstream movie watchers in 1949. Another picture, 20th Century Fox's THE SHOCKING MISS PILGRIM, in which Betty Grable had played a suffragette, also didn't fare too well. These films lost money, because the lead female character did not conform to conservative ideals about the place of a woman inside the home and in society at large.
A bit of background...the story was devised by Christopher Isherwood, a British writer, though screenwriting duties were handled by someone else. The film itself was produced by Dore Schary, who was embroiled in a huge struggle with RKO's new owner Howard Hughes about the sort of subject matter that should be presented in the studio's stories. Schary would abruptly resign and move to MGM, making this one of the very last RKO titles he helmed in mid-'48.
As for the cast, Robert Young had a multi-picture deal with RKO. Typically, he was featured in a variety of genres but seemed to do best in wholesome family comedies, which explains his taking a paternal role. It's a good warm-up for Father Knows Best. Young had previously collaborated with Shirley Temple in Fox's STOWAWAY thirteen years earlier, so they had a familiarity with each other and that adds to the believability of their father-daughter relationship on screen.
Miss Temple was now 21, though playing a bit younger than her actual age, as a trouble-prone adolescent prone. Her character feels confined by the norms of a rigid community.
In the role of the boyfriend, we have Temple's then-husband John Agar, with whom she had already costarred in John Ford's FORT APACHE. Temple and Agar were both under contract to David Selznick, and their rocky marriage would come to an end a year later. This was their last movie together. Temple would only appear in two more feature films, before transitioning to television followed by a career in politics.
It is sort of interesting that Shirley Temple-Black, as she became known after her second marriage, would become an important political figure. Especially since the political arena in America and abroad was dominated by men. Even more interesting is the fact she ascended the ranks this way not as a liberal Democrat, but as a conservative Republican. I don't know if it was her own emancipation that I find fascinating, but maybe it's more how she was able to self-actualize in segments of society that were sometimes closed off to women.
Playing Temple's mother in the movie is Josephine Hutchinson, an actress who had been a star at Warner Brothers in the 1930s but was now reduced to supporting roles of the maternal type. Hutchinson does well alongside Young, most convincing as a pastor's wife who has serious concerns about the 'wayward' attitudes of their daughter.
Temple's character is shown as rebelling against norms in several ways. There is an altercation with the police in which her arrest will cause embarrassment for her father who is looking to be promoted to a bishop's post. She writes speeches about what women can do and should do. She paints a portrait of her boyfriend, who poses partially in the nude and her artwork becomes a point of gossip in their small town. As if all of this were not enough, she gets involved in a protest where women are being harassed during a public event.
Somehow, despite all the drama and her efforts to prove herself, she manages to snag the boy (Agar) after considerable ups and downs. I am not sure how realistic this particular happy ending is...and it seems obvious that even if female moviegoers secretly wished to have the kind of life this girl has on screen, they would probably have been too petrified to pursue the same goals. At least until Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique gave them the courage to rethink their positions.
A bit of background...the story was devised by Christopher Isherwood, a British writer, though screenwriting duties were handled by someone else. The film itself was produced by Dore Schary, who was embroiled in a huge struggle with RKO's new owner Howard Hughes about the sort of subject matter that should be presented in the studio's stories. Schary would abruptly resign and move to MGM, making this one of the very last RKO titles he helmed in mid-'48.
As for the cast, Robert Young had a multi-picture deal with RKO. Typically, he was featured in a variety of genres but seemed to do best in wholesome family comedies, which explains his taking a paternal role. It's a good warm-up for Father Knows Best. Young had previously collaborated with Shirley Temple in Fox's STOWAWAY thirteen years earlier, so they had a familiarity with each other and that adds to the believability of their father-daughter relationship on screen.
Miss Temple was now 21, though playing a bit younger than her actual age, as a trouble-prone adolescent prone. Her character feels confined by the norms of a rigid community.
In the role of the boyfriend, we have Temple's then-husband John Agar, with whom she had already costarred in John Ford's FORT APACHE. Temple and Agar were both under contract to David Selznick, and their rocky marriage would come to an end a year later. This was their last movie together. Temple would only appear in two more feature films, before transitioning to television followed by a career in politics.
It is sort of interesting that Shirley Temple-Black, as she became known after her second marriage, would become an important political figure. Especially since the political arena in America and abroad was dominated by men. Even more interesting is the fact she ascended the ranks this way not as a liberal Democrat, but as a conservative Republican. I don't know if it was her own emancipation that I find fascinating, but maybe it's more how she was able to self-actualize in segments of society that were sometimes closed off to women.
Playing Temple's mother in the movie is Josephine Hutchinson, an actress who had been a star at Warner Brothers in the 1930s but was now reduced to supporting roles of the maternal type. Hutchinson does well alongside Young, most convincing as a pastor's wife who has serious concerns about the 'wayward' attitudes of their daughter.
Temple's character is shown as rebelling against norms in several ways. There is an altercation with the police in which her arrest will cause embarrassment for her father who is looking to be promoted to a bishop's post. She writes speeches about what women can do and should do. She paints a portrait of her boyfriend, who poses partially in the nude and her artwork becomes a point of gossip in their small town. As if all of this were not enough, she gets involved in a protest where women are being harassed during a public event.
Somehow, despite all the drama and her efforts to prove herself, she manages to snag the boy (Agar) after considerable ups and downs. I am not sure how realistic this particular happy ending is...and it seems obvious that even if female moviegoers secretly wished to have the kind of life this girl has on screen, they would probably have been too petrified to pursue the same goals. At least until Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique gave them the courage to rethink their positions.