Figure 1.--The French film "Jacquot de Nantes" (1991) is a very wll made film, with very accurate costuming showing what French boys wire in th 1930s. Note the berets and sweaters that the boys wear. |
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Made for TV biography stressing Jack's early dalliances. I didn't see the beginning which may have shown him and his brother in 1920s outfits. The part I saw has Teddy in a sailor suit with blue shorts and white knee socks. It also showed him in a grey suit with knee socks and school-boy cap. Teddy's scenes are fleeting among all of Jack's assignations which the film focuses on.
The kids in this film wore a variety of shorts typical of the mid-90s as well as jeans. Most of the shorts were of the longish variety.
Bobby Riha
The film begins with Charlie (Joseph Cross), an 11-year old boy, getting out of school for the Christmas break and doing in the school buly. He has wonderful parents, but the father, an aspiring musisian, Jack Frost (Michael Keaton) is unable to make much time for him. After promising to come to his son's hockey game--he forgets. To make up for it, he decides to decline a Christmas Day opportunity to spend more time with the family, but is killed on his way to their mountain cabin. A year later, a troubled Charlie makes a snowman, like he used to with his dad. Charlie dresses the snowman in his dad's clothes and blows a note on Jack's harmonica. Suddenly his dad is back as a talking snowman! He thus has has a second chance to get close to his son. A rather tritepremise, but the film is nicely done. Joseph plays his part beautifylly and has a wondeful infectous smile. Some scenes with Charlie in hockey gear and a lot of cold weather outfits.
Darryl Hickman
Tommy Rettig
A band of youngsters sets out to protect themselves from grow-up tyranny.
Film describing the boyhood of French film maker Jacques Demy. It depicts experiences with his brother and school chums and their games; a visit of an aunt from Rio, and childhood love. It also depicts his budding interest in film after seeing "Snow White." Bitter sweet view of growing up in a French village before television. We know nothing else about this French movie, other than it was made in 1991. It appears to made a well made film with great attention to detail asin the costuming. It was set in Nantes during the late 30s. A lot of youngsters appear in the film dressed in the styles of the period. Hopefully our French readers will provide us some information about this film.
Film based on the popular children's book by Roald Dahl. A young English boy (who I think wears shorts) is orphaned by an accident and lives the miserable life of a male Cinderella with two shrewish aunts. The action shifts to puppets when the giant peach appears taking him across the Atlantic to New York. The clips I've seen are mostly of the animated scenes in which James is in very long shorts. Freckle-faced James has a charming English accent.
After his family moves across the country, a home sick teenager vows to return home to his sweetheart. Lance Kirwin was still rather boyish when he made this.
This is another interesting film set in East Germany. We might classify this as an Eastv German film. East Germany, of course, no longer existed. This film was, however, made in East Germany, we think with many East German personnel and actors. Of course the East German censorship was gone so political issues could be addressed honestly. The film is about a teenage couple who fall in love and face an uncertain life in the new Germany just after the Berlin wall has come down. The film is extremely grim and
pessimistic. The plot is quite simple. Jan, a boy in the GDR in the fall of 1989. has just been arrested for attempting to escape to West Germany. He is incarcerated in a grim institution for juvenile
delinquants where he is humilitated and forced to do menial work. He is a very alienated teenager. Jana, only slightly older, engages in a wager with other girls of the institution that she can't seduce the
newcomer, and she succeeds. But what began as a sexual game turns into genuine love and the two lovers run away from the juvenile detention facility, fleeing on a stolen motorcycle.
Based on Charlotte Bronte's novel about a young orphan who becomes a governess. The focus is on Jane who is looked down on by the wealthy family and friends. Little attention is given to her charge who is a girl. The costuming is excellent. Jane becomes attracted to her brooding, enigmatic employer whose wife is mad.
A new wife faces the difficulties of earning the respect and love of a widower's two children.
The village's valuable water jar is broken . One woman and her son brave the neighbor's sarcasm and the authorities' indifference to find a way to solve the children's problem.
A lot of boys are in the backgound giving a good idea of casual clothing popular with boys during the 1990s. The police chief's son has a small role.
Terrible Western set in Civil war Kansas. A boy has a small part.
A loner in the American wilderness takes in Caleb, a boy whose parents are killed by Indians. He also acquires an Indian wife.
A white boy raised by a poor black family helps the course of true love.
Toby Scopes
A French reader tells HBC that younger boys might wear their smocks after school. But this was less common on thursday and rarely on sunday wich were day to
wear the "L'habit du dimanche". He indicated that A French movie of 1953 explains this fashion. It is a classic French film and know to most French people--"Jeux interdits"
with Brigitte Fosset and Jean Claude Poujouli.
Jim is pictured briefly at the beginning of the film as a boy about 11-years old on the farm by (???, the boy on "Father Knows Best). His farther, belt in hand, threatens to strap him if he doesn't go to school. He finally relents telling the boy that he knows he can't force him to go to school by strapping him. He wears longs.
Darryl Hickman
A teenager whose father enjoyed brief musical success in the 1950s tries for stardom while dealing with his father's mixed envy and support. Neil Barry or James Quinn
It is the year of the coronation and two children plan a journey of over a hundred miles to see the event. They are penniless, but that
doesn’t stop them from achieving their goal to witness first-hand the pomp and ceremony of the crowning of Queen Elizabeth II. Lesley
Dudley played Julie while Colin Gibson was cast in the role of John. He is typically dressed for the period and wears a short trouser suit
and schoolboy cap.
Roddy McDowall has a bit part.
Cast included an aging George "Spanky" McFarland and Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer. Also includes 15-year old Bobby Breen.
"Johnny Gets His Gun" was the working title for "Straight from the Shoulder" released in 1936. I know nothing about the film except that David Holt plays Johnny--Ralph Bellamy's son. A still show Bellany showing Johnny out to box.
"Johnie get your hair cut,' was a highly publicized silent movie where popular child star Jackie Coogan gets his trade mark page boy bangs cut when he turned 12 years old, all captured as part of the film. It was an event of great intetest to the movie going public. The film was directed by B. Reeves Eason (Sr.) and Archie L. Mayo. Jackie played Johnnie O'Day. The cast in addition to Jackie included Mattie Witting [Mother Slap], Maurice Costello [Baxter Ryan], Pat Hartigan [Jiggs Bradley], James Corrigan [Pop Slocum], Bobby Doyle [Bobby Dolin], Knute Erickson [Whip Evans], [?] Harry Carey. Harry Carey and James Corrigan were both importnt stars. It was a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures production.
The film was a vehicle for Jckie and the screen story was written by Gerald Beaumont. Jackie's fathet was the Production supervisor, a way of keeping the parents happy. The plot is about an orphan who is adopted by a kindly elderly racehorse owner. Johnnie attemps to pay back his benefactor by training to become a jockey ride so he can win an important race.
The film was shot at Tanforan Race Track (now Tanforan Shopping Center), just south of San Francisco.
A schoolteacher risks her life to save a student whose father's criminal colleagues have marked to death.
True story of John Lincoln Clem, an 11-year old by who ran away from home to become a drummer boy in the Union Army. A typical insipid but well made Disney movie. Keven Corkin? plays his part well. The movie is entirely set around the boy. There is a very discrete bath scene. Johnny got a package from some nice ladies that had heard of him. It was a uniform.
Boy's involvement in the Revolutionary War. Hal Stalmaster.
This is a well done biographical film about famed singer Al Jolson. I do not know enough about Al Jolson to comment on how accurate it is. A good bit of the film pictures the young Asa Asa Yoelson. The depiction of the period seems reasonably accurate. Asa is the son of a Synagogue cantor. The home scenes and the costuming seems reasinably accurate. Asa wears knickers suits with long black stockings. There is a scene wherevhis parents are surprised when Asa sends them a portrait of his first long pants suit. Asa is ably played by Scotty Beckett. I believe that it is one of his better pergormances. Scotty was born in 1929, so he would have been about 16 years old when he made the film. The part requires a good bit of singing which Scotty does very well. (At least I assume that was his voice.) The Robert Mitchell Boy Choir makes a brief appearance at a Catholic boys' school choir. A rather uneasy Asa sing with them.
A troubled youngster with divorced parents takes his younger brother to Canada and concocts a tall story about his true parentage. They both usually wear longs, but the younger brother appears in long shorts at the end.
A warm and funny story of a writer and television personality who spends a day reflecting on his turbulent life and the two people he loves the most.
A young boy's attachment to his father's new girlfriend leads to heartbreak after the relationship between the adults is ended.
A reader writes, "I have just been to see the classic french Jaques Tati movie "Jour de fete". A very well done film. The film is set in the 1940s and the costuming is very accuarte. The boys wear smocks and short cut short pants."
One of those wonderfully done Halmark TV movies. This is the one about two children abandoned by their mother and cared for by their grandparents. Journey is the title character, a 10-11 year old, wonderfully played by his Max Pomeranc. He always appears in casual long pants. His buddy, a slightly older boy, is briefly shown in shorts. The show has a well throughout plot and beautifully written script and not the typical outlandish plot and action/violence routinely seen in American films. A realistic show about the problems faced by real people. Well worth seeing.
A foreign correspondent adopts two English war orphans and brings them home to his childless wife.
A courageous young girl in the 1930s attempts to overcome extraordinary odds when she travels across the country in search of her father. The main character is a girl. Several boys are involved in the story, a few wear knickers. A rather well done movie.
While awaiting the results of a dead girl's operation, Lassie is lost on the streets of Los Angeles. I don't know if any boys are involved.
A French director uses staged events from her husband's past, as well as snippets from his films, to recreate his spirit. The film is set in War-time France at the sea-side town of Nantes. Philippe Maron, about 9 or 10, plays the young Jacquot. In the only still I have seen he wears a beret and suit, presumably with shorts.
One of Mickey Rooney's Andy Hardy films.
Another Mickey Rooney Andy Hardy movie.
Surrealistic Italian movie where the heroine loses her husband on their honeymoon. Six years later she drive through a fog and miraculously has her husband back as well as a 6-year old boy. She bounces back and forth between the two realities.
A boy is reared by wolves in the jungles of India. Based on the Rudyard Kipling novel. The boy is played by Sabu.
Remake of the 1942 film. Jason Scott Leigh wears a loin cloth.
Arne Sucksdorff is a Swedish film maker. He shot "Jungle Tales" about 1959 in Central India. We do not know much about the film. We have noted a book written by his wife Astrid Sucksdorff who is the daughter of Sten Bergman, a noted Swedish explorer. She apparently wrote this book while her husband was in India making "A Jungle Tale". An Indian boy Chendru appeared in the film. He and a tiger became the center piece for her book. The photographs for the book was taken by the author. The book is beautifully illustrated with 60 color photographs. It was subsequently published in the United States as Chendru: The Boy and the TigerThe book was published in 1960. It was first published in France with the title Chendru et Son Tigre. The story of a boy and a young tiger, lavishly illustrated throughout with interesting photographs, taken on location in central India. Chendru belonged to the Muria people. They are a sub-caste of the Gond tribe living in the Naraysanpur and Kondagoan Thesisls Plains in the Bastar District roughly situated in central India.
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This blockbuster Steven Speilberg adventure film includes two children, one a boy about 10 or so. He wears khaki casual shorts, although they become a bit dirty after the dinosaurs chase him around a bit. The boy boy has a plesant personality. He is a energetic, curious little fellow and not a bratty child star.
Trevor Morgan wears cutoff jeans all through "Jurassic Park III". James Neubauer
David Hollinder
Five young campers become the prey of machete-wielding mutant twins.
A lesser known Bing Crosby film is "Just for You". Bing plays a show-biz dad who hasn't had time for his family. It's a 1952 film that Turner Classics shows now and then, much less commonly than some other films they show. There's nothing of the Father O'Malley character there that Bing brought to "Going My Way"
and "Bells of St. Mary's". The costuming in "Just For You" was much as we'd expect for that time. Bing's son wore a long pants suit or a sports coat and long pants for some scenes, long pants and shirt in others.
Complications arise when a teenage boy (Corey Haim) masquerades as a girl to avoid a confrontation with the school bully. The actual title is "Anything for Love".
A high school girl poses as a boy so she can get into an intern program, but she never planned on what happens in the boys' locker room. Clayton Rohner, Billy Jacoby.
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Movie based on the classic Just William books about the antics of a British school boy. Lots of shorts. Roddy McDowall has a bit part.
Quite a number of English films have been made on perhaps the quiensencial English boy--William Brown, better known as Just William. The first actual view that the British had of William and the Outlaws was at the movies. HBC does not have a great deal of information about Just William movies. One movie was appropriately enough titled Just William and was made in 1939. I believe this was the first one. Another film was William Himself, I'm not sure when it was made. Another film William at the Circus was made about
1948.
One of a series about an English schoolboy. All wear short pants school uniforms. I've seen a still from this movie. Most of the boys wear shorts and school caps.
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