OVP: Little Women (1949)

Film: Little Women (1949)

Stars: June Allyson, Peter Lawford, Margaret O'Brien, Elizabeth Taylor, Janet Leigh, Rossano Brazzi, Mary Astor, Lucille Watson, C. Aubrey Smith

Director: Mervyn LeRoy

Oscar History: 2 nominations/1 win (Best Cinematography, Art Direction*)

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2024 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the women who were once crowned as "America's Sweethearts" and the careers that inspired that title (and what happened when they eventually lost it to a new generation).  This month, our focus is on June Allyson: click here to learn more about Ms. Allyson (and why I picked her), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Last week we missed June Allyson, because I was in the office all week & it was the Oscars (which as you can imagine, is quite the event around my house), so today you're going to get a double dip of Ms. Allyson, both films from 1949.  Circa 1949, you'd be hard-pressed to find a bigger name in Hollywood than June Allyson.  Allyson's lack of an Oscar nomination relegates her to a category of actress that isn't super discussed today (we'll talk about this in a couple of weeks, but a few decisions late in her career also contributed to this decline in stature), but she was a big deal on the MGM lot, rivaling figures like Judy Garland or Joan Crawford (at a competing studio) as one of the most noteworthy actresses in Hollywood.  One of the biggest films she made at the time was the all-star rendition of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, one of four big-screen studio incarnations of the story, and arguably the one with the most buzz-worthy cast.  In a lineup that included Mary Astor, Peter Lawford, Janet Leigh, and Elizabeth Taylor, it was Allyson who got top billing & the leading role.

(Spoilers Ahead...though do you really need a spoiler alert for Little Women?) The movie is about the four March sisters: headstrong Jo (Allyson), dutiful Meg (Leigh), vain Amy (Taylor), and sweet Beth (O'Brien) who used to be rich, but now live in relative poverty (relative being the operative word here given their house is pretty swanky in this film) with their nurse mother (Astor), while their father is out away fighting for the Union in the Civil War.  The film unfolds with these four women trying to live their lives, at the center of it a love square between Jo, Amy, handsome-and-rich Laurie (Lawford), and handsome-and-studious Professor Bhaer (Brazzi).  Love, tragedy, and even death ensue (we all know that Beth dies), but it's a family drama with all of the trimmings...I could go into it more, but let's be honest, you've either seen one of the movies or read the book if you're on this blog.

I will own that I've never really gelled with this story.  Even the recent critically-acclaimed movie by Greta Gerwig I was just in the middle of (let me tell you-my 3-star review of that picture stands OUT compared to my friends on the platform).  But watching this, I get why Gerwig's film enchanted so many, as it takes a relatively formulaic story and gives it life, particularly through the performances from Timothee Chalamet & Florence Pugh.  The 1949 film has no such luck, giving us little invention, and as a result, playing all of the characters as flat.  Star power will get you a little bit (Elizabeth Taylor is delicious if nowhere near as good as Pugh, playing pretty Amy), but the rest is a struggle.  Jo March is a tricky heroine (she bucks convention, frequently makes somewhat cruel mistakes about people, and spends much of the film not knowing what she wants), and Allyson doesn't know how to land her.  The first and second halves of the film feel like separate Jo's entirely.

The movie won several Oscar nominations, and here I'm onboard.  The technicolor cinematography looks divine, with all of these beautiful actresses framed perfectly in snow-covered houses and richly-detailed libraries.  The art direction in generally is also strong-I get why this, with these houses that actually have personality, won the statue.  I'm surprised, honestly, that it didn't get in for costuming too, which is fun (particularly Elizabeth Taylor's gown in the film's final scene) and lovely.  But there's not enough life in this film to make any of these lush decorations truly sing.