Little Miss Marker (1934)

When I heard this morning that Shirley Temple had passed away, it occurred to me that the only one of her movies I had ever seen was Fort Apache, done when she was an adult and near the end of her film career. So I knew I had to watch one of her earlier films in salute. Being a Damon Runyon fan, Little Miss Marker was the natural choice.

Little Miss Marker concerns a bookmaker who goes by the name of Sorrowful Jones, so named due to his most unhappy disposition. Mr. Jones lays a G on a race that is somewhat fixed by the gambler Big Steve. Big Steve is planning another, bigger fix which will net him 10 to 1 on a $10,000 bet. During the course of the first fix, a gambler leaves a marker with Jones in the form of a small doll named Marthy. Marthy's mother went to the Big Racecourse in the Sky already and when the gambler loses the bet, he decides it would be more advantageous to him to join her than to attempt to come up with the $20 he owes Jones for Marthy. So Jones and his friends find themselves stuck with the little doll whom they end up nicknaming Marky. The big plan seems to be to make the authorities think that Marky owns Big Steve's horse so that Big Steve can place his bets and win his money. But while Big Steve is in Chicago placing bets, his doll Bangles starts to fall for Little Miss Marker and Sorrowful. Sorrowful himself falls for the kid and starts to change his ways. Unfortunately, Sorrowful's friends are a not very good influence on Marky and she starts to become more than somewhat cynical and tough. So it comes that Bangles and Sorrowful conspire to turn Marky back into the nice doll she once was so she can eventually end up with a good family.

My apologies for my attempt at Runyon-speak, but it seemed appropriate for the movie.

Temple, of course, is Marky and it takes all of five seconds of her on the screen for one to realize why she was such a big deal in the 1930s. She absolutely bursts with personality in a way that no child star before or since her has. At the age of five, she could do everything a veteran adult performer could do: sing, dance, and act. Not mug--act. Her antics could crack you up, but when she turned on the dramatic moments, she could break your heart. The scene of her telling Bangles (Dorothy Dell) about the death of her mother is particularly touching. She switches gears mid-scene frequently and does it effortlessly. I have no idea how directors got the performances out of her that they did, but those performances are a marvel to watch. What's doubly surprising is that this is one of her earlier films.

On the adult side of things, we have Adolphe Menjou as Sorrowful. Menjou was a talented actor best known for this and the 1931 version of The Front Page. Ironically, Walter Mathau would star in remakes of both movies, both times in Menjou's part. Menjou doesn't play Sorrowful as sad-faced as Runyon described him, but he does marvelous in the part. Dorothy Dell is Bangles. This was one of only four movies she was in before she was tragically killed in a car accident at the age of 19. That's a shame as she had a great singing voice and shares a fun duet with Temple. Charles Bickford is de facto villain Big Steve. He's not in the movie a lot, but his final scene makes the character. And Lynne Overman's character Regret steals scenes whenever he shows up.

Anyone who has read Runyon's stories and watched the movies made from them know that most of the movies simply take the short story as a jumping off point and make huge changes to them. Part of that comes from the fact that many of Runyon's tales are more tragic than they are funny. The short story of Little Miss Marker in particular is a heart breaker. However, there were certain things you didn't do in 1930s Hollywood and the tearjerker ending to Runyon's tale was one of them, especially with Shirley Temple in the lead. The changes to this one are good and at least the germ of the story was there.

Ultimately, this is one of the best Runyon adaptions, especially as it isn't a pure comedy like most of them. It has a pathos to it which showed an understanding of the source material. A large portion of that pathos is set by it's irrepressible star.

Rest in peace, Shirley Temple and thank you for films like Little Miss Marker. Your films helped make the world a better place in the 1930s and they still do today.