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The Blue Bird

The Blue Bird

Family · Fantasy · Adventure · 1940

Peasant children Mytyl and Tyltyl are led on a magical quest for the fabulous Blue Bird of Happiness by the fairy Berylune. On their journey, they're accompanied by the anthropomorphized presences of a Dog, a Cat, Light, Fire, and Bread, among other entities.

Movie details

The Blue Bird

“1001 Wonders in Technicolor”

1940 Family · Fantasy · Adventure 1h 28m

Critical arithmetic

One number, for now.

TMDB

5.8 / 10

Community rating

Peasant children Mytyl and Tyltyl are led on a magical quest for the fabulous Blue Bird of Happiness by the fairy Berylune. On their journey, they're accompanied by the anthropomorphized presences of a Dog, a Cat, Light, Fire, and Bread, among other entities.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over The Blue Bird?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

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Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Walter Lang

Written by

Walter Bullock

Shirley Temple

Shirley Temple

Mytyl

Spring Byington

Spring Byington

Mummy Tyl

Nigel Bruce

Nigel Bruce

Mr. Luxury

Gale Sondergaard

Gale Sondergaard

Tylette

Eddie Collins

Eddie Collins

Tylo

Sybil Jason

Sybil Jason

Angela Berlingot

Jessie Ralph

Jessie Ralph

Fairy Berylune

Court is in session

Put The Blue Bird on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Popcorn Loyalist

“It owes the canon nothing.”

The movie pursues immediacy and audience pleasure without begging institutions to certify its worth.

The prosecution The Cool Ironist

“Easy pleasure, short half-life.”

It moves efficiently through the moment but offers little reason to keep arguing once the credits end.