I was a teenager in the 1970s when I caught “Three Wishes for Cinderella” (also called “Three Nuts for Cinderella”) on the CBS Children’s Film Festival hosted by Kukla, Fran, and Ollie (Fran was an actress, Kukla & Ollie were puppets).
I fell in love with this feminist Czech-made Cinderella. In the film, Cinderella beats the prince in a bow hunting competition. She rides her horse to the ball, and makes the prince answer a riddle before she’ll accept his hand in marriage. The stepmother is the mistress of hamlet where they live. Instead of a fairy godmother, Cinderella gets three magic hazelnuts, which grant her the wishes. (One of her wishes was a hunting outfit!).
The actress playing Cinderella is so spunky & pretty, and the prince, of course, is handsome. I fell madly in love instantly with this version of Cinderella. It first came out in 1973, and I managed to catch it two or three times in reruns as a teenager. Alas, this was in the era before VCRs, before computers, before the internet. I taped the music from the movie with a reel-to-reel tape recorder. But after watching the film those first few times, I was never able to see it again.
Over the years, I kept an eye out on TV listings, hoping for a rerun, and when the internet came into being, I Googled it. I never could find it again.
And then this past December, probably 40+ years after I last saw it, author Sandra Sookoo asked readers to share their favorite Cinderella movie version on Facebook. I mentioned “Three Wishes for Cinderella” and how I was never able to find it. Resa Haile replied to my post and said a DVD was available on Amazon and posted a link.
OMG. I couldn’t click fast enough. I bought the DVD from someone in the UK. The video is in Czech, but came with English subtitles (I think when I saw it on the Children’s Film Festival, English had been dubbed in).
Anyway, thanks to the miracle of the Internet and few Facebook friends, 40+ years later I was reunited with my favorite Cinderella. It was just as wonderful as I had remembered. However, the actress playing Cinderella looks so young! She was 19 when the movie was made (and looks even younger to me now).
By the way, the version I bought is HERE. I paid $15.28 US, plus a few bucks for shipping. There are other ones available, but watch the price! Also, I could not make DVD work with my DVD player, so I watched it on the computer. It worked fine.
What was your favorite movie version of Cinderella?
Did you ever see “Three Wishes for Cinderella?”
I saw it when I was a kid also on the CBS Children’s Film Festival. I never thought of her as a feminist though. She simply made herself more interesting, by not throwing herself at him. I’ve always had our girls watch it with the German dubbing (They grew up bi-lingual as my wife is German). My wife (Who is a successful businesswoman) always watched it with the girls telling them, that’s how you get a guy worth having. Make him want you.
Interesting note: The original was filmed with the actors speaking the lines in their mother language. Example: The Queen, King, and Evil Step Mother were Germans.
It would be great if the English dubbed version I remembered watching on “CBS Children’s Film festival.” could be found.
Another fan of this version of Cinderella! Thanks for writing.
Oh my word! I was 10 when this came out and saw it on the Film Festival once and it stuck with me always! I loved the owl and the wooden box of treasures and the nuts which my 10 year old self thought were acorns. Acorns grow in 2’a normaly so I have been searching for magical acorns in threes ever since. 2 years ago I found a twig with 4 and this year, 2020 the acorns have been growing in 9’s and 10’s! What magic is this! I am so happy to have finally found this again.
It was magical, wasn’t it?
I was thrilled to get DVD! When it first came out, it was pre VCR, pre DVR, and there was no way to record it. I did make an audio recording (on my reel to reel tape recorder) of the music way back when.