The Children's Hour (1961)

Despite the provocative subject matter, I found The Children's Hour a flawed movie with some individual good scenes but a general tendency to excessive emotion and not only scenery chewing but blatant hammy overacting of the rankest sort.

The Children's Hour is a courageous film for the time, exposing current views towards homosexuality; lesbianism actually, yet managing to fall short of being convincing because of the highly strung manner in which it is presented. Everybody seems to be playing to the cheap seats with grotesque facial expressions and overwrought ranting line delivery.

Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine play a pair of teachers who run an exclusive girls boarding school for pre-teens. One girl in particular (Karen Balkin) is a trouble maker who, when sent home with her rich grandmother (Fay Bainter), concocts a lie to cover her mischief. The girl claims that the two school marms are lovers and the busybody grandma is too dull to see through the little girl's obvious manipulations. She spreads the word to all the families and soon all the girls are pulled out of the school, leaving the two women pariahs with no source of income. When confronted, the little girl implicates another girl in her lie to cover a slip up and it's given because she threatens to reveal the girl's hidden secret.

SPOILER

The women's world is shattered and as time goes on even they believe the lie may have some truth to it after their libel suit fails because the prize witness, MacLaine's ditzy aunt (Miriam Hopkins), who could refute the lie, fails to appear in court. Audrey Hepburn abandons her upcoming marriage to her long term boyfriend played by James Garner and finally the truth comes out when the corroborating girl is found by her mother to be a kleptomaniac and supporting the liar because of fear of exposure. The old busybody grandmother apologizes and tries to make things right but too many feelings have been wounded. MacLaine ultimately makes a half hearted confession of "feelings" for Hepburn and hangs herself in remorse.

END SPOILER

William Wyler directed this remake of his original film These Three because he felt it would be better with a more explicit story. I’m not sure he was successful as I found the movie stagy, talky, and excessively histrionic. The cinematography, by Franz Planer, was fairly good but I was not impressed by the shot matching where the camera cuts between two views of the same situation and the people do not match up with how the were before the camera cut. There were actually some sloppy cuts where the character was in mid sentence and they put two takes together with the same camera angle, yet it was obvious they were spliced.

The screenplay was adapted from the Lillian Hellman play by the author. The story tries to deal with a very explosive issue but just cannot try anything subtle; it is continually banging you over the head or flinging it in your face. Many of the developments are illogical, like the women's reactions after being vindicated. In addition, the dialogue is mainly unrealistic and sounds like people are reciting dialogue. Sentences you'd never hear in a real conversation spring from the characters lips quite often. Apart from a few scenes that really hit their marks, the average scene is over the top and unrealistically emotional, not to mention the usually excellent Alex North has written a score that hammers on every point excessively.

Audrey Hepburn is as cute as she always is and does fairly well with her part, while Shirley MacLaine plays a fairly unsympathetic woman who is also drab and shrill. James Garner usually appears befuddled once the cat is out of the bag and really is not the best actor for the strange situation depicted. The little girl (Karen Balkin) overacts to an incredible extent giving her performance almost unintentional hilarity. The supporting cast are also gullible and overly dramatic.

The MGM DVD clocks in at 107 minutes. The movie is in black and white and presented in 1.66:1 theatrical format. The only extras are subtitles and the theatrical trailer.

While The Children's Hour covers a controversial topic, it does not do it very well. I noticed all the reviews here are by women and all give it high marks so I am led to believe that this will appeal more to women than men.

You may want to rent it before you decide to buy.

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: None of the Above