The Little Princess (1939)
“They told her father was gone. She believed otherwise, and never stopped searching.”
Streamed free from the Internet Archive · no signup, no cost — this film is in the public domain.
Synopsis
Wealthy young Sara Crewe is left at Miss Minchin's exclusive London seminary when her beloved father, Captain Crewe, is called to fight in the Second Boer War. When word arrives that he has been killed and his fortune is lost, the cruel headmistress strips Sara of her finery and reduces her to a servant in the attic. But Sara refuses to believe her father is dead, and she scours the military hospitals of London in search of him. With a little help from a kindly neighbor and his Indian servant Ram Dass, her faith is rewarded in one of the most heartwarming finales of Hollywood's golden age. It remains the most beloved of Shirley Temple's films.
Cast
About the Director
Walter Lang — Walter Lang was a dependable 20th Century-Fox craftsman who specialized in lavish, good-natured entertainments and would later helm musicals such as The King and I and There's No Business Like Show Business. Here he guides Shirley Temple through her first all-Technicolor feature, balancing the story's darker turns with the warmth and spectacle that made Fox's family pictures so popular.
Why It’s Free: The Public-Domain Story
The Little Princess is in the public domain in the United States because 20th Century-Fox did not renew its copyright registration in the required 28th year. Under the copyright law in force at the time, that lapse caused the film to enter the public domain, where it has remained since 1968.
Behind the Scenes
The picture was conceived as a prestige vehicle to showcase Shirley Temple in full Technicolor for the first time, adapting Frances Hodgson Burnett's enduring 1905 novel A Little Princess. Fox surrounded its biggest star with a polished supporting cast, including Richard Greene, Anita Louise, Ian Hunter, Cesar Romero, and Arthur Treacher, and set the tale against the backdrop of the Second Boer War and the siege of Mafeking.
Did You Know?
- It was the first Shirley Temple feature filmed entirely in Technicolor.
- The story climaxes with Sara's encounter with Queen Victoria, played by Beryl Mercer.
- Cesar Romero, later famous as the Joker on the 1960s Batman series, appears here as the gentle Indian servant Ram Dass.
- It proved to be the last truly successful film of Temple's reign as a child star.
Reception & Legacy
Released to strong box office and affectionate reviews, The Little Princess capped the peak of Shirley Temple's stardom and has endured as a holiday-season television staple. Its lush color, its tearjerking search-for-father plot, and Temple's poised performance have kept it among the most fondly remembered of all her pictures.
Gulliver's Travels
Father's Little Dividend
Jack and the Beanstalk
Pollyanna