cricket30 Review of That Hagen Girl

That Hagen Girl (1947)

LITTLE MISS MARKER takes a stab at Shakespeare . . .

[8/10 · 10 March 2014]

. . . before marrying dear old Dad. Structured something like a Greek tragedy, complete with a clucking chickens-style chorus (which would become even more literal a few years later in THE MUSIC MAN), THE LITTLE PRINCESS herself tackles the role of "Juliet" in THAT HAGEN GIRL's brief snippets from its play-within-a-movie. BRIGHT EYES always was discovering fathers in the weirdest ways during her child star heyday, but finding a husband in her supposed "Dad" as THAT HAGEN GIRL may put a capital "Y" in "Yuck Factor" (as in, "Tom, aren't you my Daddy?" "Heck no!" "Great! Now we can get married!"). However, we've always been pretty open around here, and Shirley Temple's "trashy" Mary Hagen character would fit right in now. The majority of our babies are NOT born to wedded parents (opposite sexed, or otherwise), and many of the marriages that DO occur are between blood relations of some sort. Most states are similar to ours, but maybe "Mary Hagen's" Ohio is an exception, then and now. Personally, I was thinking all along that Mary's drama teacher was grooming Mary for a career in Shakespeare, so it came as a real shock to suddenly learn that this mentor was setting her up to become the first female Oedipus Rex. It is too bad THAT HAGEN GIRL was a rare exception to Shirley Temple's usual type-casting as a "goodie two-shoes." She could have fit right in with the stock company of Baltimore film director John Waters (PINK FLAMINGOS) if only she'd stuck around in the movie business long enough.