StunnaKrypto Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Sexylocher Masterful Movie

Keira Brennan The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

mark.waltz Still, as Stephen Sondheim wrote in "Follies", someone said she's sincere, so she's here! She's been through Heidi, the Blue Bird, and Reagen, gee how crazy that was. When you've been through Heidi, the Blue Bird, and Reagan, can't you get some applause? As Shirley Temple reached the end of her movie acting career, one thing became very apparent. She wasn't transitioning very well into becoming a mature leading lady, still relying on old tricks from 15 years before. What worked at 8 didn't work in her mid 20's, and even she had to admit that it was time to throw in the towel. In "Adventures in Baltimore", a period comedy set in the early 20th Century, she is still playing a teenager, facing typical problems but utilizing what is up there in her brain to become a "modern", fighting for women's rights and getting into all sorts of trouble as a result. The unfortunate thing is that her character takes everybody around her down with her, and that includes her preacher father (a very good Robert Young), a candidate for Bishop of Maryland, and her object of affections (real life husband John Agar) whom she embarrasses at a public meeting where he reads a speech she wrote for him where he keeps referring to himself as a woman! (Hey, Johnny, proof read!) Then, there's Shirley's mother (Josephine Hutchinson) who is the perfect housewife and mom until Temple gets the bee under her bonnet over women's lib which results in a riot and a black eye for the well-dressed matron. Veteran character actress Norma Varden has an amusing small role as Helen Hadley Hamilton with the very Irish Albert Sharpe adding flavor as an eccentric older man Temple encounters while painting. Shirley does score in a dance contest sequence with papa Young, but her baby-faced, pouty acting makes it appear that she is still a teenager playing dress-up rather than an actress playing a part.

vincentlynch-moonoi When I first began watching this film I was nonplussed. But the further I got into it, the better it got. Unfortunately, Shirley Temple -- the little girl who saved the studio when she was a child -- wass becoming an adult, and fairly or not the public wasn't buying it...literally...this film alone lost nearly a million dollars at the box office. In other words, Shirley's prominence was fading and fast. It's too bad, because I thought she should have had a place in movies for years to come. I enjoyed her, for example, in "The Bachelor And The Bobby-Soxer" with Cary Grant, filmed just 2 years earlier. But, apparently the public was tired of Shirley Temple.The plot, particularly as it advances, is actually quite good -- a young lady has an eye on equality and clumsily pursues it, sometimes to the detriment of others...included her father, who may or may not become the Episcopal Bishop of Maryland. Earlier in the film her escapades are a little more frivolous, but as time goes by the topics get more serious. Temple does fine here.Her co-star, as dad and minister, is Robert Young, and I would have to say this is one of his better roles. And you begin to see in young a transition to the type of character he undertook in his greatest success which began just 5 years later -- "Father Knows Best".John Agar is fine as the boyfriend, but I really enjoyed Josephine Hutchinson as the mother. I have never been disappointed by her film performances, though she is a woefully underrated actress.Some will say this film is dated. I would assume so -- it takes place at the turn of the 20th century! Recommended, just give it a little time as the plot matures.

David (Handlinghandel) It is beautifully filmed by Robert de Grasse. And Robert Young's character is appealing and even admirable. This seems like a dry run for his most famous role, the title character in "Father Knows Best." Here he is a father in two ways: He has children, including Shirley Temple. And he is an Episcopal priest (under consideration for Bishop of his Diocese.) Shirley Temple is the main character. She is meant to be saucy and ahead of her time. But she's very hard to like. The escapade in which her boyfriend, John Agar, borrows a speech from her for a debating contest isn't admirable. And right here, it's hard to imagine that a priest would laugh off his daughter's involvement in such dishonesty.Then she paints Agar. She promises she will just use his body as a starting point -- no face. But the painting is exhibited in a show and everyone sees that she has painted him in a bathing suit. That would have been extremely risqué for 1905. What would be the equivalent 101 years later? Something on the Internet or in an X-rated video.All this while her father is being considered for Bishop. I wonder what Christopher Isherwood's original story was like. Maybe she was a forerunner to Sally Bowles. Here, however, she is sullen, pampered, and selfish.

Neil Doyle After a few successful teen-age roles (and a couple of ill-fated ones), Shirley's uneven career as a young lady was not helped by this routine romantic comedy of the early 1900s in which she plays a rebellious daughter of a minister (Robert Young) with shocking ideas about love. As a crusader for women's suffrage, Shirley seems more petulant than feisty, playing a girl who crusades for women's suffrage. Nice to see Robert Young in his pre-Father Knows Best days. The film has an attractive look with handsome photography and a good feel for the period atmosphere, but the script is too lightweight to carry much conviction. Pleasant enough if you want to see what Shirley Temple looked like at this stage in her career. She had three more "clinkers" to go before quitting the screen.Her then-husband John Agar wasn't much help--here he comes across as a wooden actor, not well suited to comedy. Pleasant enough film, but just a trifle.