Little Lord Fauntleroy **** (1921, Mary Pickford, Claude Gillingwater, Joseph J Dowling) – Classic Movie Review 5227

Directors Alfred E Green and Jack Pickford’s 1921 children’s film Little Lord Fauntleroy finds Mary Pickford starring in a double role and the silent film superstar was a big hit playing both little 12-year-old Cedric Errol (‘Ceddie’), aka Little Lord Fauntleroy, and Mrs Errol, aka ’Dearest’, the widowed mother he lives with.

Pickford shines in this once famous silent film based on the 1886 classic Frances Hodgson Burnett novel, written for the screen by Bernard McConville. Cedric and his mom live in America, in New York City, but they go to stay with the boy’s grumpy and aloof granddad, the Earl of Dorincourt (Claude Gillingwater), in an English castle when he inherits a title after the Earl’s son dies in a riding accident. The Earl greatly dislikes the widowed mother.

The film is long drawn-out (at 112 minutes) and embarrassingly sentimental, but plucky Pickford and the plush production still come through. The story’s themes of a fish out of water, a culture clash, and the class differences are profitably pursued, and it is interesting to see Pickford in the dual role, though it is also a bit creepy to watch a 12-year-old boy being played by a grown-up woman.

The trick photography is spectacular for the time, allowing Pickford to play both her parts together in several scenes. Indeed it is incredibly technically adroit for the era: the three-second scene in which the boy is seen to kiss his mummy and jump into her arms took 15 hours to film in multiple exposures.

Also in the cast are Joseph J Dowling, James A Marcus, Rose Dione, Fred Malatesta, Colin Kenny, Arthur Thalasso and Kate Price.

The film is co-directed by Mary Pickford’s younger brother, Jack, who died at 36 of progressive multiple neuritis precipitated by his chronic alcoholism and bouts of syphilis.

It was remade in 1936 as Little Lord Fauntleroy (with Freddie Bartholomew, C Aubrey Smith and Mickey Rooney) and in 1980 as Little Lord Fauntleroy (with Ricky Schroder and Alec Guinness).

Charles Rosher is the cinematographer in both the 1921 and 1936 films.

Its US box office was $900,000. It was distributed by United Artists, founded in 1919 by D W Griffith, Charles Chaplin,  Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks.

The cast are Mary Pickford as Cedric Errol and his mother Mrs Errol, Claude Gillingwater as Earl of Dorincourt, Joseph J Dowling as William Havisham, James A Marcus as Hobbs, Kate Price as Mrs. McGinty, Fred Malatesta as Dick, Rose Dione as Minna, Arthur Thalasso as The Stranger, Colin Kenny as Bevis, and Emmett King as Reverend Mr Mordaunt, with Milton Berle in an uncredited role.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5227

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