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Heidi Movie Review

Heidi is a 1952 Swiss family drama film directed by Luigi Comencini and starring Elsbeth Sigmund and Heinrich Gretler. It’s the best adaptation of this source material.

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“We came here because we all

want to shake hands with you“

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This is what the American Shirley Temple version should have been, but unfortunately never was. The fact that that movie is more famous than this one goes to show how biased toward American and against foreign movies audiences still are as this is by far the best adaptation of the titular Johanna Spyri novel so far.

I love the book. It’s a children’s classic that has endured as such through many decades, and until now only the anime series adaptation could hold a candle to it. But now, I have to add this Swiss classic to the list too. This is a great example of how even the extremely faithful choice at adapting a book for a movie can turn out superb as here all of the major plot points are adapted without ever feeling like too much.

The highlight here was the grandfather’s arc. It was wonderful to witness him getting back into society in the final scene that was incredibly emotionally rewarding. He is an amazing character here and Heinrich Gretler’s acting in this role is fantastic and he made him really click.

To be honest, I didn’t find Elsbeth Sigmund all that great in the main role, which is important, but the movie works because she is fine. Had she been bad, it wouldn’t have worked, but she was good, so we are fine here. I just expected more from my Heidi, though the look and characterization are both on-point without any doubt.

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Klara is wonderful as expected and all of the scenes with the two girls are reliably endearing and cute. The two have a great friendship here, important for any Heidi movie for sure. I also really liked all of the other characters, especially Peters who was so much fun and Miss Rottenmeyer who is reliably annoying and bitchy.

The one thing that differentiates this movie from the aforementioned US version is the emphasis on the village part of the story. That is my main reason why I prefer this film over that one. Whereas before we got only a couple of scenes in the Alps, here we get to see a solid third of the movie in the mountains. The scenes between Heidi and Peters were particularly strong and imbued with such a dashing sense of adventure and a whole lot of fun. They were so wonderful that I wanted even more of those.

Heidi is very well directed by Luigi Comencini and every actor did a good job while some did a great job as is the case with Gretler in particular. Apparently, they employed famous European actors from the period and it shows as the performances here are very professional and elevating the characters successfully.

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But the character development is great, the score is good, the pacing is fine and the cinematography is striking as the movie portrays the Swiss Alps in such a glorious, unforgettable fashion that it is bound to make you wish you were there with Heidi and others in an instant. This sense of charm and adventure was so amazing that it clearly made the city scenes inferior, though they are fine themselves.

The 1952 Swiss version of Heidi remains the greatest movie adaptation of the iconic Johanna Spyri classic that is impressively faithful and adventurous in its approach. The cinematography is gorgeous that it manages to make the Swiss Alps an instant must visit place while the characters are wonderfully developed and acted. All of the plot points were very well adapted and especially the beginning and ending are superb.

My Rating – 4.5