My Foolish Heart (was Re: What's the big fuss?)
Stephen Foskett (sfoskett@slf.gweep.net)
Mon, 22 Feb 1999 08:45:05 -0600
>From: david <dsalinas@leland.stanford.edu>
>there was a movie made of a salinger story- "my foolish heart" based on
>"uncle wiggily in conneticut", made in about 1950 or so. It wasn't the
>best movie though, and introduced a whole slew of ideas i don't think
>salinger intended. well, after that he more or less shut out the movie
>industry....
I happen to have gotten a copy of that film for Christmas from my very
thoughtful sister...
I wrote a little on the Bananafish page about it, but here's more:
The film uses "Uncle Wiggly" as a starting point and goes way into the
cannon of '40s cinema for the rest. It starts like the story, but quickly
cuts back in time to show all the incidents mentioned in the story and more.
Positives: It's not a bad film, and the acting and directing are slightly
better than par for the era.
Negatives: It completely ignores Ramona's character and focuses instead on
a "love triangle" type thing that I don't remember getting from the story.
I thought the point of the story was contrasting Eloise's desire to be a
"nice girl" with Ramona's childish attempts at growing up. Or something
like that...
Plus, My Foolish Heart borrows so much from non-Salinger sources, I wish
they had just changed the names and made an unrelated screenplay. It would
have been a decent film without the Salinger connection.
Stephen
(and I don't care who makes a web page about what! Hahahaha!)