First Love (1939)

"First Love" is a slight reworking of the Cinderella tale--updated to 1939 and starring Deanna Durbin. As a Deanna Durbin film, you can be sure there is a lot of her singing. While Miss Durbin had an incredibly powerful and operatic voice, it is not at all the style I like nor would it appeal to a lot of folks today--though it made her immensely popular back in the day.The film begins with the graduation of Connie (Durbin) from a girls school. Sadly, she has no family at the graduation--her parents are dead and her aunt, uncle and their family just doesn't want to be bothered. However, she is invited to come live with them. Once Connie arrives, she sees that her family is too self-absorbed to make her feel the least bit welcome. What's worse is that her vain cousin Barbara (Helen Parrish) feels threatened by Connie and does nothing but demean her. Fortunately, like Cinderella, Connie is so sweet that by the end of the film she gets her own happy ending. However, unlike Disney's Cinderella, Connie gets help from the nice servants that work for her aunt and uncle--not a bunch of cool animated mice! This is a highly enjoyable film from start to finish. It did, however, feature a lot of singing--during which time I usually fast-forwarded the DVD! The ending also was a tiny bit weak but still enjoyable. Overall, this is fun--at least as much fun as the animated version. Plus the use of a lot of wonderful supporting actors really helped as well as the film's nice sense of humor.

This has to be my very favourite Deanna movie. One or two critics at the time sneered that "First Love" was a return to the Cinderella story but had she ever really left that formula!!! It was a revamped "Cinderella" story complete with the slipper left at the ball as the clock strikes 12 and having all the horrible, ugly stepsisters rolled into one supremely nasty cousin, Barbara, played by Helen Parrish who that same year had played one of Deanna's sisters in "Three Smart Girls Grow Up". Poor Helen having to be nasty to Deanna, no wonder her career didn't recover.Like all the best Durbins it was directed by Henry Koster, a film maker of charm and taste and as Deanna's first adult vehicle (much publicity was given to her first screen kiss by Robert Stack) it was a smooth transition away from her "little Miss Fixit" roles, probably because she had grown into such a beautiful young lady. The movie also borrowed from "My Man Godfrey" by dropping Deanna into the midst of a family of rich eccentrics complete with a very selfish daughter who makes Connie's (Durbin) life miserable and with Eugene Palette reprising his role as the exasperated father. A lot of Deanna's popularity with the depression era public was her warm rapport with the working class and the hired help and this movie was no exception.Most popular student at the young ladies academy, Connie Harding breaks down during a rendition of "Home, Sweet Home" knowing that as an orphan she doesn't have a home of her own. Crotchety old principal (with a heart of gold of course) (Kathleen Howard) urges her to go to New York and make it her own. She arrives at her uncle's doorstep feeling very small but after her soaring vocals of the beautiful "Amapola" immediately has all the staff entranced and ready to help her in every way. Her Uncle Jim (Pallette) is flabbergasted - "You like being here, you've met your aunt and your cousins and you actually like being here"!!!Following the Cinderella story, Connie is beside herself with excitement at her first ball but nasty Barbara thinks Connie is just too excited and also that Connie's dress is a bit too beautiful and doesn't believe it when Connie innocently says that the cook just fixed up her graduation dress (that's what the staff told her - in reality they all chipped in to buy her a beautiful lacy gown). At the last minute Connie is told she can't go - but in the best Cinderella tradition and with the help of her fairy godmother, I mean the butler and Uncle Jim, Barbara's car is held up and Connie gets to the ball, dances with her "handsome prince", sings a medley of Strauss waltzes (a very funny sequence) and leaves on the stroke of midnight, being careful to leave her shoe on the grand staircase.By the end everyone has had their comeuppance but Connie doesn't know - she has fled back to her old school, determined to become a teacher and an old maid. But after a beautiful rendition of "One Fine Day" from Puccini's "Madame Butterfly" and seeing all the "old maids" crying their eyes out she is more than happy to live happily ever after with her Prince Charming.Leatrice Joy who during the twenties had been married to John Gilbert played the addled Aunt but something about her showed, to me, that she was just too smart for the part. I started to wonder why she hadn't succeeded in talking movies, she had clear diction and really handled the speedy delivery of the dialogue. Peggy Moran played one of Connie's pals at the beginning of the movie (the other one was Marcia Mae Jones). Peggy soon retired to marry the director Henry Koster.Highly Recommended.

Reviewers before me have ably stated the performers and crew who have contributed to this timeless presentation of the Cinderella story.I join with a previous enthusiast who identifies the Strauss medley sung by Miss Durbin at the Royal Ball as being singularly excellent. The third melody which was unidentifiable at that time turns out to be a waltz from Strauss' little known operetta "A Night in Venice". Thus we have: 'Life is sweet and gay. . .' the Schatz waltz from the "Gypsy Baron"; 'This is Maytime. . . .' from the "Southern Roses"; and finally, 'Spring in my heart.. . .' from " A Night in Venice". It is the 'Gondellied' or Venetian Boat Song from that operetta. And yes, the accompaniment flourish at the end includes a few bars of the '1001 Nights' from the "Gypsy Baron" before finishing with 'Voices of Spring'. The medley has been seamlessly sewn together by Hans J. Salter, and Ralph Freed supplied the lyrics. A joy to listen to.The success of the movie is first and foremost the performance of Deanna Durbin, of course, but turning her rendition of "One Fine Day" into a happy ending is to be recognized as an achievement by the producers and writers. All in all, a movie for everyone.

This 1939 take on 'Cinderella' works like a charm, and I honestly would never have guessed as much. I found myself being continuously bewitched by it, its sincerely touching and funny script and dialogue, the wealth of small character parts from the laconic spinster teacher ("Old maids are only happy when they cry, you'll find out") and the personable servants to the zany rich family that Durbin's orphan girl has to stand up to.And of course, over and above everything else, there is Deanna Durbin, a full-fledged young leading lady with a miraculous voice and loads of screen presence and pathos (listen to her sing 'Un bel dì' from 'Madame Butterfly' at the end!). Blonde hunk Robert Stack has his first part ever as the Prince Charming who is left with the empty slipper, but only after a gorgeous series of incredibly romantic encounters.