The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm

The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm
Souvenir program cover
Directed by	Henry Levin George Pal (fairy tale sequences)
Produced by	George Pal
Screenplay by	Charles Beaumont William Roberts David P. Harmon
Story by	David P. Harmon
Starring	Lawrence Harvey Claire Bloom Karlheinz Böhm Barbara Eden Walter Slezak Oscar Homolka Yvette Mimieux Russ Tamblyn Jim Backus Beulah Bondi Terry-Thomas Buddy Hackett
Music by	Leigh Harline Bob Merrill (songs)
Cinematography	Paul Vogel
Edited by	Walter A. Thompson
Production company	George Pal Productions
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Cinerama Releasing Corporation
Release dates	August 7, 1962 (1962-08-07)
Running time	135 minutes
Country	United States Germany
Language	English
Budget	$6.25 million[1]
Box office	$8,920,615[2]

The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm is a 1962 American film directed by Henry Levin and George Pal. The latter was the producer and also in charge of the stop motion animation. The film was one of the highest-grossing films of 1962. It won one Oscar and was nominated for three additional Academy Awards. Several prominent actors — including Laurence Harvey, Karlheinz Böhm, Jim Backus, Barbara Eden, and Buddy Hackett — are in the film.

It was filmed in the Cinerama process, which was photographed in an arc with three lenses, on a camera that produced three strips of film. Three projectors, in the back and sides of the theatre, produced a panoramic image on a screen that curved 146 degrees around the front of the audience.

Plot

The story focuses on the Grimm brothers, Wilhelm (Laurence Harvey) and Jacob (Karlheinz Böhm), and is biographical and fantastical at the same time. They are working to finish a history for a local Duke (Oscar Homolka), though Wilhelm is more interested in collecting fairy tales and often spends their money to hear them from locals. Tales such as "The Dancing Princess" and "The Cobbler and the Elves" are integrated into the main plot. One of the tales is told as an experiment to three children in a book store to see if publishing a collection of fairytales has any merit. Another tale, "The Singing Bone", is told by an old woman (Martita Hunt) in the forest who tells stories to children, while the uninvited Wilhelm secretly listens through an open window. The culmination of this tale involves a jeweled dragon and features the most involved usage of the film's special effects.

Wilhelm loses the manuscript of the Duke's family history while writing down this third story - he is supposed to be collecting additional information for the family history - and the brothers cannot meet their deadline. They are required to pay their rent, which was waived while they worked. As a result of wading through a stream in an effort to retrieve the manuscript (which fell into the water after his briefcase broke open), Wilhelm becomes critically ill with potentially fatal pneumonia. He dreams that at night various fairytale characters come to him, begging him to name them before he dies. In the dream, Russ Tamblyn reprises his role as Tom Thumb from the 1958 film. His fever breaks and Wilhelm recovers completely, continuing his own work while his brother publishes regular books including a history of German grammar and a book on law. Jacob, shaken by his brother's experience, begins to collaborate on the fairy tales with Wilhelm.

They are ultimately invited to receive honorary membership at the Berlin Royal Academy, which makes no mention of the tales in their invitation. Jacob prepares to make a speech deliberately insulting the Academy for snubbing Wilhelm. As their train pulls into the station, hordes of children arrive, chanting, "We want a story!" Wilhelm begins, "Once upon a time, there were two brothers." The children cheer, and the film ends with a caption card that reads "…and they lived happily ever after."

Cast

• Laurence Harvey - Wilhelm Grimm / The Cobbler ("The Cobbler and the Elves")
• Karlheinz Böhm - Jacob Grimm (as Karl Boehm)
• Claire Bloom - Dorothea Grimm
• Walter Slezak - Stossel
• Barbara Eden - Greta Heinrich
• Oskar Homolka - The Duke (as Oscar Homolka)
• Martita Hunt - Anna Richter (Story Teller)
• Betty Garde - Miss Bettenhausen
• Bryan Russell- Freidrich Grimm
• Ian Wolfe - Gruber
• Walter Rilla - Priest
• Yvette Mimieux - The Princess ("The Dancing Princess")
• Russ Tamblyn - The Woodsman ("The Dancing Princess")/ Tom Thumb (in Wilhelm's Dream)
• Jim Backus - The King ("The Dancing Princess")
• Beulah Bondi - The Gypsy ("The Dancing Princess")
• Terry-Thomas - Sir Ludwig ("The Singing Bone")
• Buddy Hackett - Hans ("The Singing Bone")
• Otto Kruger - The King at Ludwig's Trial ("The Singing Bone")
• Arnold Stang - Rumplestiltskin (in Wilhelm's dream)
• Hal Smith, Mel Blanc, Pinto Colvig, and Dal McKennon Voicing The Puppetoons - The Elves ("The Cobbler and the Elves")
• Peter Whitney - The Giant (uncredited)
• Tammy Marihugh - Pauline Grimm
• Cheerio Meredith - Mrs. Von Dittersdorf

Reception

Box office performance

The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm grossed $8,920,615 at the box office,^[2] earning $6.5 million in US theatrical rentals.^[3] It was the 14th highest-grossing film of 1962.

Accolades

The film won an Academy Award and was nominated for three more:^[4]

Won

• Best Costume Design, Color - Mary Wills

Nominated

• Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color - George Davis, Edward Carfagno, Henry Grace, Dick Pefferle (Lost to John Box, John Stoll, and Dario Simoni for Lawrence of Arabia)
• Best Cinematography, Color - Paul C. Vogel (Lost to Freddie Young for Lawrence of Arabia)
• Best Music, Scoring of Music, Adaptation or Treatment - Leigh Harline (Lost to Ray Heindorf for The Music Man)

Cinerama

The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm was produced and exhibited in the original 3-panel Cinerama widescreen process. It was the first Cinerama feature that attempted to tell a cohesive story, unlike previous productions, which had all been travelogues. It was followed a few months later by a second such film, How the West Was Won, after which single-lens Cinerama was used for narrative films.

Comic book adaption

• Gold Key: The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (October 1962)^[5]

See also

• List of American films of 1962
• The Brothers Grimm (2005)
• List of stop-motion films

References

External links

• The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm at the Internet Movie Database
• The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm at the TCM Movie Database
• The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm at AllMovie
• The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm at Rotten Tomatoes
• John Mitchell interview