When given the choice of an 80's movie to watch, OF COURSE i chose Annie for obvious reasons. I find it ironic however that my sister, who was born in 1975 was obsessed with Annie when she was a little girl, owning an Annie dress and a red curly wig. Little did she know what would come along in the next few years. Because of this, I figured I owed it to my sister, Sarah, to discern her fascination with this little orphan. She did however have an obsession with Strawberry Shortcake dolls also, so we'll see where this goes.
Annie which was released as a musical film in 1982, however, it was based on its musical version that showed on Broadway in 1977. The Broadway musical ran for nearly six years, but was originally based on a popular comic strip called Little Orphan Annie, which was written by Harold Gray.
In the story, Annie is one of several girl orphans that live in an orphanage run by a drunken lady by the name of Miss Hannigan (Carol Burnett). Burnett is hilarious as her love to hate character and provides most of the comedic relief for the film. Miss Hannigan forces the girls to scrub the orphanage clean, and a scene depicting this is where the well-known song "It's a Hard-Knock Life" originated. I'm sure most of are familiar with the scene from Austin Powers Goldmember where Dr. Evil does a remake of it in the prison. Or if you're not, you can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDJ1Z5DuuF8
Things begin to look up however, when a billionaire named Oliver Warbucks (or Daddy Warbucks as Annie calls him) decides he wants an orphan to come live with him for a week as a publicity stunt. He sends his secretary, Grace, to the orphanage to pick out an orphan, and grace falls in love with Annie. Miss Hannigan vehemently objects however because she realizes that Annie isn't just an ordinary little girl, and Mr. Warbucks (Albert Finney) protests at first too because he says that he wanted a boy orphan. Annie eventually wins over the cold-hearted Mr. Warbucks but Miss Hannigan is still so opposed to the idea that she gets her brother and her girlfriend to pretend to be Annie's parents so that they can fake-adopt her and get the money Mr. Warbucks is promising Annie's biological parents if they come forward. The crooks are exposed just in time, however, and Annie dog Sandy are allowed to go and stay with him. During her stay, Annie gets to do exciting things she never thought were even possible like going to see a movie.
At the end of the film "Daddy" Warbucks ends up adopting Annie, much to the chagrin of Miss Hannigan and everyone lives happily ever after. I'm not quite sure was my sister was utterly obsessed with this movie, but it was pretty good and I would recommend it. Who wouldn't want to watch an hour and a half of this adorable redhead singing catchy songs like "Tomorrow?" It did make $57,000,000 at the box office in 1982. If you're still not sure, here's a sneak preview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLIsgxV7-xw
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My own personal connection with this film is that Warbuck's mansion was actually the main administrative building of Monmouth College, where my mom worked. After the movie came out they did this big fund raising thing and had dinner in the same place where a lot of the movie was filmed. My connection was that I got to valet park the cars of a bunch of rich New Jerseyites who tipped awfully poorly.
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