The Hideaways

Many years ago, I think when I was still in elementary school, we read a book called From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. The book was turned into a movie a few years later, but I never saw the movie being only a year old when it was first released. So when I saw the movie on the TCM schedule, I decided to record it. When I watched the movie, I noticed that it had a re-release title, The Hideaways, and it was that title that showed up on screen. But the story was mostly the same, at least not much more in the way of changes than you normally get from Hollywood adaptations.

Sally Prager plays Claudia Kincaid, a girl of about 12 who lives with her overbearing parents and bratty kid brother Jamie (Johnny Doran) in one of those fairly well-to-do Connecticut suburbs. Claudia for whatever reason doesn't think she can stand to live at home any more. And she's got a really brilliant (rolls eyes) plan to run away and live at the Metropolitan Museum. She needs money, however, and convinces Jamie to come along, because he plays cards on the bus to and from school and is a whiz, having earned a fair bit of money at least by early 1970s kids' standards.

So the two set off for New York, and Sally enjoys all the exhibits and being able to have the museum mostly to herself (well, and her kid brother) at night, sleeping in various beds that are part of the vintage furniture exhibits. I know it's the early 1970s, but didn't the museum have security cameras even in those days? The pair also make a bit of extra money by removing all the change that other museumgoers throw into the fountains, something else that you think would get noticed since such change generally gets collected and given to charities.

Claudia takes an interest in one of the new exhibits, that being a statuette of an angel that was donated by the titular Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, a notoriously reclusive widow. There'a a suggestion that the statuette may have been sculpted by none other than Michelangelo himself, but there's also a lot of controversy as to the provenance of the sculpture and whether Michelangelo or one of his students made it.

Claudia seems to think she knows better than all the art historians, so she takes it on herself to do as much research as she can to try to figure out whether Michelangelo is the real sculptor or not. Rumor has it that Mrs. Frankweiler knows the answer but is keeping it a secret. Claudia's research gets her in contact first with the museum's art experts and then with Frankweiler herself (played by Ingrid Bergman in a long cameo), although Mrs. Frankweiler knows the kids are runaways and is planning to send them back home.

In the book, Mrs. Frankweiler's getting in touch with the kids' parents is what sets up the climax, as the kids have to go through those mixed-up files to discover the secret before they have to go back home. In the movie, Mrs. Frankweiler simply tells Claudia the secret, and it's a change for the worse. (I will admit however, that a climax of having two kids go through filing cabinets may not be very cinematic.) The rest of the movie is reasonably well done, being a story for kids with a sense of adventure. As an adult, I can see the flaws of course, starting with the two child actors who are expected to carry the movie. That, and the sense of unreality since none of this could ever happen in real life. But kids probably won't notice this stuff.