Daddy Long Legs

The first sound version of this movie stars Janet Gaynor, of course, with Warner Baxter as Jervis Pendleton, the rich man who sends the spunky orphan to college and comes to realize he loves her. As the first movie starring two people who had already won Oscars, it was a major undertaking for Fox, and they filled out the cast with some fine players: Elizabeth Patterson, Claude Gillingwater, Billy Barty, and a favorite of mine, Una Merkel, as Baxter's impish niece and Gaynor's college room mate.

Director Alfred Santell takes his time getting Miss Gaynor out of Miss Patterson's orphanage and into college, and we are treated to 25 minutes of Miss Gaynor quietly defying the old harridan, telling stories to the other orphans, and drawing unflattering caricatures of Edward Maxwell. Meanwhile while Baxter plays football with the boys. I thought this went on a bit too long, but at 80 minutes this is not a particularly long feature, and what could have been put in to bring it up to length? That one cavil aside, I found it a very satisfaction version of Jean Webster's story.

. This is the second version of "Daddy Long Legs" I have seen and the previous one I saw was the silent version with Mary Pickford...and it's one of her best movies. There' are also several other versions, including 1950s version with Fred Astaire and Leslie Caron, as well as "Curly Top" with Shirley Temple...though that version has changed the plot slightly to remove the romance between the benefactor and the orphan.

The story begins at a rather crappy orphanage. The mistress in charge (Elizabeth Patterson) is great at ordering the kids about but very short on love. When a rich donor, Jervis Pendleton (Warner Baxter) visits the place, he's not pleased with how much the place is like an institution and not a home for the kids. He also is impressed when he sees the oldest resident, Judy (Janet Gaynor), stand up to the other trustees and complain about their treatment...especially when being CONSTANTLY reminded how thankful the kids should all be for even the least little thing. Jervis is so impressed by her and sees great promise...so he decides to be Judy's secret benefactor. He's going to send her to college and help her out...without expecting her to also say how thankful she is for his help.

Time passes and something weird happens. Both Jervis AND Judy start to fall in love...something a tad creepy since he's so much older than her. Plus, she still doesn't know that this man is her benefactor. What happens when and if she does learn? See the movie and find out for yourself.

The problem with all the versions of this story (aside from "Curly Top") is that many will find the idea of an older man who is not just a father figure but a romantic one as well. This certainly is a valid concern...though the story still is well worth seeing.

By the way, the 'toddler' in the bed in the beginning of the film is 7 year-old Billy Barty. Barty specialized in playing toddlers because full grown he was only 3'9"...and that was at adulthood. He also played Mickey Rooney's baby brother in the Mickey McGuire films because of his size.

"Daddy Long-Legs" was originally a best-selling novel by Jean Webster, filmed in the silent era (starring Mary Pickford) and then remade several times in the sound era, notably as the Shirley Temple movie "Curly Top" (1935) and ultimately as a 1955 Fred Astaire musical. All the different versions have the same plot, with minor variations.

Here's the plot: a well-to-do older man is beguiled by a girl in an orphanage, and he arranges to sponsor her education. The orphan girl doesn't know the identity of her benefactor, but another orphan catches a glimpse of him and says that he has long legs, so the orphan girl refers to her anonymous sponsor as "Daddy Long-Legs". Years later, as a young woman, she meets him. They fall in love and marry. Happy ending.

There are two basic problems with this plot, in all (except one) of its various film versions: the girl is attracted to a man who's old enough to be her father, and he IS her father in a surrogate sense. Even worse, Daddy Long-Legs first becomes attracted to the girl when she's a minor: perhaps his original interest in her is genuinely paternal, but it definitely acquires a sexual tone by the time she reaches the brink of adulthood. Basically, the hero marries his own stepdaughter. Maybe this sort of daddy's-little-girl relationship was acceptable back in the Gilded Age, when Jean Webster's novel was written, but nowadays it's in bad taste.

Janet Gaynor was an extremely popular ingenue in the late silent era and early talkie era, but her appeal has dated badly, and she's too bland for modern audiences. This 1931 remake of "Daddy Long-Legs" is possibly the worst of all this story's many versions: the film suffers from Gaynor's pale performance and a weak cast. By far, the best film version of "Daddy Long-Legs" is "Curly Top", starring Shirley Temple. That film is faithful to the original novel, but it deflects the Lolita issue by splitting the stepdaughter into two characters: the little-girl orphan played by Shirley Temple, and her (adult) older sister played by Rochelle Hudson. The hero (John Boles) directs all his romantic attentions towards Rochelle, while maintaining a fatherly relationship with little Shirley. Much better all round.

Avoid watching the 1931 version of "Daddy Long-Legs", and rent a video of "Curly Top" instead. It's got the same basic story with a much better cast, and without the unpleasant Lolita undertones which all the other versions possess.

TRIVIA NOTE: About 45 years ago, I saw (but didn't read) a hardback edition of Jean Webster's novel "Daddy Long Legs" with a cover illustration rendering the novel's characters as tiny figures, dwarfed in the immense shadow of a gigantic daddy-long-legs ... thus creating the weird (and false) impression that this is a science-fiction novel about giant arachnids or shrunken humans. I'd love to find another copy of that particular edition. Anybody seen it?

In the actual novel, Jarvis is only maybe five/seven years older than his protégée. I've had my copy for maybe 60 years and have reread it many times. I never had the icky old man/young girl vibe. It's a charming story, if you can find the original book.