The Blue Bird

In childhood, I adored it. Seeing it after serious decades, the emotion was the same. The memories were only small crumbs. The larger - impressive presence of Ava Gardner. Today, the freshness of old play by Maurice Maeterlinck redivivus. The acting, the cast, the development of familiar story, the children, the balet moments. And, sure,the Soviet - American coproduction , în direction of George Cuckor. In short, just lovely, especialy for not so young public, a fantaisy respecting the play spirit and a seductive rediscover of a Hollywood age. Superior to version from 1940, în competition with seductive version of 1918, the nostalgia remains its basic gift.

The Blue Bird (1976)

** (out of 4)

George Cukor directed this USSR/USA co-production of the classic story about two children who set out to find the Blue Bird of Happiness. The all-star cast includes Elizabeth Taylor in four roles including the Mother, Witch and Queen of Light, Jane Fonda as The Night, Cicely Tyson as Tylette and Ava Gardner as Luxery. THE BLUE BIRD has been filmed countless times over the years and this one here has the reputation as being one of the worst. It's strange to see all the talent that is wasted here but at the same time I think fans of the weird and surreal will probably want to check this out and they might get a few kicks out of it. This version here is completely weird from the opening scene to the last but I think this here is what keeps it entertaining. For the most part the performances range from poor to average but with a cast like this you expect much better. Taylor seems out of place in all four of her roles but I will admit that I got a kick out of her playing the witch. Fonda seems like she's caught up in a bad dream as she never feels in place. Gardner is wasted in her small role as is Robert Morley. Poor Tyson comes off the worst with a rather embarrassing performance. I'd say that the majority of the visuals are quite nice and we're given some good cinematography but all of this is pretty much wasted since the story never fully takes off. The dance sequences really don't add anything either and in the end this here is just a strange mix of fantasy and drama.

I loved this movie as a child. I would love to see it again and share it with my children. It is a wonderful movie for children and the young at heart. I like it much better than the Shirley Temple version.

The first co-production between USSR and Hollywood would have to be this strange kiddie film that is so icky sweet, it makes "Barney" look like "Penthouse Forum" in comparison! Some kids meet up with their fairy Godmother (Elizabeth Taylor dressed like a Mafia wife gone insane). With a wave of her magic wand, household pets, and inanimate objects come to life. The most disgusting has to be what happens to a pitcher of milk! It turns into a ballerina. To remind audiences of its milk origins, whenever the ballerina dances, we hear milk splash in a pitcher. It sounds as if the poor ballerina has a stomach disorder! The story goes that the production of this film was very rough. It went on forever. Jane Fonda supposedly kept on pestering the Russian workers, and it became an expensive mess.

When my son was approximately 7-8 years old, he loved watching this movie. At that time he was really into watching the Saturday afternoon monster movies, Ultra man etc. My daughters watched it a couple of years later and they both loved it too. Elizabeth Taylor is beautiful, but the storyline was nice too. Actually anything that held my son's attention had to be really good. As an adult, I watched it with the kids a couple of times and then that was enough for me, so I think it is really for the kids. I'd like to get a DVD of this movie because now I have two granddaughters. The four and half year old would really enjoy it. It would probably be another year before my other grandchild would sit still to watch it. I recommend this story for children, if you let them watch make believe and magical movies.