The Little Prince (1974)
Picture:
C+ Sound: B- Extras: D Film: B-
After a
sixteen-year hiatus, Stanley Donen decided to make another Musical, which would
be his last one. The Little Prince (1974) is Frederick Loewe and Alan Jay Lerner’s
mixed musical adaptation of the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry book about stranded
pilot Richard Kiley discovering a little kid (British-accented Steven Warner)
who is more than a mirage and starts to have what is almost a semi-intellectual
conversation with him.
This
leads to a journey through other worlds (via outer space) where
(unconvincingly) animated doves take the boy from place to place. All whom he meets is eccentric, with Bob
Fosse and Gene Wilder particular standouts.
The film gets better as it goes along, and the later songs are better,
but it does not have the impact Donen’s better films do. Considering the book was thin to begin with
and the film runs 88 minutes, that is unfortunate.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image is hurt by colors that do not always
look like the Technicolor of the era.
Christopher Challis, B.S.C., did a nice job of shooting the film in his
uniquely vivid way, but this print is a tad too grainy and even has some spots
of artifacts. Challis has worked with
Donen before on films like Arabesque. Whether this film was produced in
dye-transfer print or not was not known at post-time, but the color at its best
is not bad. The Dolby Digital 2.0 is a
big surprise, with very healthy Pro Logic surrounds. Though not listed on their film sound list,
the credits identify this as a film using “Dolby System” and we can assume this
was one of the first (likely the first) Dolby Stereo analog film. This is a few years before The Song Remains The Same, Logan’s Run, the Barbra Streisand A Star Is Born and the first Star Wars, but the mix is surprisingly
clear and accurate. Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange was originally a
monophonic release and the first to use any kind of Dolby noise reduction at
all, but was not a multi-channel stereo film.
The remastered DVD’s 5.1 sound debuts on that DVD.
That is a
nice surprise, though why Dolby never notes it is odd, then they created the
wacky AC-3 compression scheme we at the site dislike, so we will continue to
give up trying to figure them out. There
are no extras either, not even a kid’s section or a trailer. This is yet another missed opportunity for Paramount to establish a back catalog title
with a new group of filmgoers. We
recommend it for young children and fans of the various artists involved, but
do not expect much else. I also liked
the credits by Donen alumnus and James Bond main titles creator Maurice Binder,
which is some of the best, most colorful footage in the film.
- Nicholas Sheffo
