lasttimeisaw There is a simplistic naiveté in this fictive family fare telling the story of Danish fairy-tale fabricator H.C. Andersen (Kaye) that lends the movie a tenderness even for the most hard-boiled souls. Charles Vidor's picture gallantly beefs up hooky singing snippets (composed and lyricized by Broadway songwriter Frank Loesser) spawned out of Andersen's world-famous stories (The Ugly Duckling, Thumbelina and The Emperor's New Clothes) with a main through-line of Andersen's infatuation of a prima ballerina Doro (Jeanmaire), which begets the genesis of The Little Mermaid and then is transmuted into a spectacular ballet choreographed by Parisian danseur Roland Petit, grafted onto the climax. In its not-so-complicated story-line, Andersen is dumb-ed down as a happy-go-lucky cobbler, and saddled with a sidekick, the orphan boy Peter (Walsh) who becomes increasingly protective towards him as he fears that Andersen is over the moon with an ungrounded idea that he is the knight-in-shining-armor for Doro, who is married to Niels (Granger, even so bratty and uppity), the troupe's stroppy choreographer. Their marriage comes off as habitually vacillating between lovey- dovey show-off and fiery squabbles, but is far from on the rocks as Andersen postulates, Peter witnesses and understands Doro and Niels' folie-à-deux, but fails to disabuse a hot-to-trot Andersen of his wishful thinking, so a slipshod break-up ensues, the only time Andersen appears as a heartless bastard, although in the end the hatchet will be buried in an equally rash fashion because no one should set feet in between Peter and Andersen, hooray! Danny Kaye has a soothingly mellow voice like a balm to a jaded ear, although his earnest performance is not a showstopper but his congenial amenity is a boon to its family audience, but indeed the money shot here are the ballet sequences, melded with cinematic bravura (its ravishing setting and montage dexterity) without an overarching pomposity and indulgence à la Powell & Pressburger's THE TALES OF HOFFMANN and interlaced with a basic narrative structure, they are condensed to light up the screen within a none-too-wearing allotted screen-time which can at once impress rubberneckers and intrigue balletomanes, for this reason alone, it has a decisive edge over other screen commodities touting the high-brow one-upmanship!

Lee Eisenberg Yesterday would have been Hans Christian Andersen's 206th birthday, and I just watched Charles Vidor's musical about the famous Danish storyteller. The movie of course is not a biography but rather a fairy tale interpretation of the man's life. Danny Kaye plays Andersen, telling stories to schoolchildren while the teacher gets annoyed. Forced out of Odense, Andersen moves to Copenhagen, where he gets a job with the Royal Danish Ballet and falls for one of the dancers.I saw "Hans Christian Andersen" when I was about six, but only interpreted the scene where he turns his thumb into Thumbelina. Now that I'm old enough to understand the whole thing, I can say that the line "sometimes a king is just a queen with a moustache" sounds as if it refers to a man in drag! Anyway, it's the sort of movie that might make you say the sorts of things that the characters on "Mystery Science Theater 3000" say, but for the most part it's pretty enjoyable. Also starring Farley Granger (who died a few days ago) and Zizi Jeanmaire.

Petri Pelkonen This is a movie that's based on the life of the Danish storyteller, H.C.Andersen (1805-1875).Except that it's not.It's more like a fairy tale of his life.Hans is a cobbler living in Odense, a small town in Denmark.He keeps telling fairy tales to local children, which makes the schoolmaster furious, since they rather listen to those fairy tales than attend classes.They then decide Hans has to leave.Hans' apprentice Peter doesn't tell him this, but awakes his old dream of going to Copenhagen.The pair sails off to big city, where he meets a beautiful ballerina, Doro.He falls in love with her immediately.Later he finds out she's married to her tyrannical impresario Niels.But he still keeps his dream alive of having her.Also, one of his tales, The Ugly Duckling, gets published in the Gazette newspaper.And The Little Mermaid is made into a ballet.It is Doro who gets to dance the lead.Hans Christian Andersen is directed by Charles Vidor.It's writers are Myles Connolly, Moss Hart and Ben Hecht.Samuel Goldwyn is the producer.This was his final production for RKO Radio Release.Danny Kaye is just the right man to play the lead.He was a great comedian, and he could nail the more serious roles, as well.The part of Doro is played by the now 85 years old ballet dancer Zizi Jeanmaire.This is her first film role.Farley Granger plays the husband Niels.Also her real life husband, Roland Petit, is in the movie as The Prince in The Little Mermaid ballet.The part of Peter is played by Joseph "Joey" Walsh.Philip Tonge is Otto.John Brown plays Schoolmaster.John Qualen is Burgomaster.Ex-dancer Sylvia Lewis is seen as Danseuse/Corps de Ballet.This is a wonderful film for kids and for the inner kids of us adults.It's a great musical with lots of brilliant songs that bring you in a good mood.Wonderful Copenhagen is very catchy.As are many other songs, including The King's New Clothes and I'm Hans Christian Andersen..It's a sweet moment when Hans sings the song of Thumbelina to the little girl outside the jail.The song was nominated for an Academy Award.Also a sweet moment is when he sings the tale of The Ugly Duckling to a friendless boy, who's head has been shaved due to illness.This is a positive movie, that shows us there's nothing a fairy tale can't fix.Of course life's not like that most of the times, but in a fairy tale anything is possible.

bkoganbing A lot of the comments previously made here are true and this certainly isn't any kind of real biographical film of Hans Christian Anderson. But one must remember that Samuel Goldwyn was primarily making this film as children's entertainment. And on that level he succeeded brilliantly.In fact at the age of 5 in the cinema in Brooklyn this was the first movie on the big screen I ever remember seeing. My father was a big Danny Kaye fan so the whole family went to see it. And of course one of the first long-playing records we had in our house was the soundtrack to that film. Another reviewer said that Frank Loesser's score was the highlight for him in the film. I don't think Danny Kaye ever had better material to sing with on the screen. Up to this point he got by with stuff especially written for him by his wife Sylvia Fine. He proved here in Hans Christian Anderson that he could definitely succeed without it.Anyway when I view this film I'm five years old again. You will be too if you see it.