Summary
In the suffocating propriety of post-war bourgeois America, antiques collector Bradley West performs a hollow act of charity by adopting French orphan Marie. His neglected wife finds fleeting solace in this porcelain-doll refugee, unaware the child carries grenade-like mischief in her pinafore pockets. Marie forms an electric bond with George Washington Jones Jr.—the Black servant's son—their innocent camaraderie crackling against segregated drawing rooms. Enter Hulda, a governess of glacial intolerance whose Prussian discipline masks a felonious past as 'Chicago Hattie.' When Marie attempts to 'whiten' George with house paint for a scandalous tea party debut, the brittle façade of adult decorum shatters like dropped Limoges. Meanwhile, Bradley's nephew Trent navigates romantic turbulence with sweetheart Phyllis, finding an unlikely strategist in the miniature diplomat. The climax ignites when Hulda's criminal cohort descends upon Bradley's vault—only to be outmaneuvered by Marie's guerilla tactics. Locking gang leader Raymond Brownleigh inside the very safe he sought to plunder, this child-soldier of circumstance secures not just jewels, but finally, a father's love.
Synopsis
Antiques collector Bradley West agrees to adopt Little Marie, a French war orphan, to please his wife. Marie and a servant's son, George Washington Jones, Jr., irritate Bradley with their mischief until he hires Hulda, a governess who objects to Marie's friendship with a Black child. Marie attempts to placate Hulda by whitewashing George, then presents him at a tea party and shocks the guests. Bradley's nephew and secretary, Trent Gordon, befriends Marie and she assists him in overcoming difficulties with his girlfriend, Phyllis Dare. Unbeknown to the West family, Hulda, alias "Chicago Hattie," is in league with a gang of thieves led by Raymond Brownleigh, intent on robbing Bradley's safe. On the night of the burglary, the noise awakens Marie and she locks Brownleigh in the safe. Before the thief can make his escape, Trent captures the entire gang. Marie's courage and resourcefulness win her the love of her foster father.
Review Excerpt
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The Unlikely Anarchist in Lace Socks
Beneath its deceptively saccharine title, The Little Diplomat detonates firecrackers in the drawing room of 1917 American propriety. Director Murdock MacQuarrie (who also stars as the magnificently dyspeptic Bradley West) crafts a subversive cocktail—one part social critique, two parts childhood insurrection—served in a cut-crystal tumbler. The film opens not with orphanage pathos, but with the transactional chill of acquisition: Bradley adopting war re..."
