The Blue Bird

The Blue Bird is a 1940 American fantasy film directed by Walter Lang. The screenplay by Walter Bullock was adapted from the 1908 play of the same name by Maurice Maeterlinck. Intended as 20th Century Fox's answer to MGM's The Wizard of Oz, which had been released the previous year, it was filmed in Technicolor and tells the story of a disagreeable young girl (played by Shirley Temple) and her search for happiness. Despite being a box office flop and losing money, the film was nominated for two Academy Awards. It is available on both VHS and DVD. Plot The setting is Germany during the Napoleonic Wars. Mytyl, the grumpy daughter of a wood cutter, finds a unique bird in the royal forest and selfishly refuses to give it to her sick friend Angela. Her mother and father are mortified at Mytyl's behavior. That evening, her father is called on to report for military duty the next morning. Mytyl is visited in a dream by a fairy named Berylune who sends her and her brother Tyltyl to search for the Blue Bird of Happiness. To accompany them, the fairy magically transforms their dog Tylo, cat Tylette and lantern into human form. The children have a number of adventures: they visit the past (meeting their dead grandparents who come to life because they are being remembered), escape a scary fire in the forest (caused by Tylette's lies to the trees in a treacherous attempt to make the children quit their journey), experience the life of luxury and see the future, a land of yet-to-be born children.