about to embark on my maiden voyage aboard the U.S.S. Wee Willie Winkie

Victor McLaglen just handed Shirley Temple this photo saying "That's me when I was a little baby" so I'd say the movie is perfect so far

well, I loved it. The British troops and Khoda Khan and are Fordian "Good Bad Men"

a child unspoiled by cynicism and bigotry must be the peacemaker hero.

A noble parable about the non-inevitability of war in the years before WWII

it's free here

The Irish Republican Ford doesn't see the British Imperialist soldiers as the manichean good guys. As Tag Gallagher points out Ford is an Augustinian.

There are no evil villains in Wee Willie Winkie. The Islamic insurgency, and its leader, are portrayed w/ respect. Everyone has their reasons.

Using language familiar to us in this century of US middle eastern imperialist wars that don't seemed designed to end, Colonel Williams explains the British must fight Khoda Khan to make the way safe for trade. The Queen wants all her subjects to be free and rich, he says.

When Priscilla shares this capitalist, colonial logic with Khan he and his comrades break into mocking laughter. That nonsense can never bring lasting peace. What can? It takes the the Fordian hero who mediates between seemingly irreconcilable opposites.

Like Henry Fonda in Young Mr. Lincoln, Sean Thornton in The Quiet Man, or Ringo Kid and Dallas in Stagecoach, Priscilla's encounter with death and suffering gives her mystical insight into the stupidity of the status quo.

Key that Priscilla and her mother are Americans. Is this about the hope that young America, relatively unstained by the rivalries of the old world, must be like Priscilla and mediate between the communists, fascists and liberals all alike rearming and preparing for war in 1937.

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The scene where Priscilla sings Auld Lang Syne to MacDuff on his deathbed is beautiful. I found the love between Mrs. Williams and Coppy moving as well, especially the dance scene.