The Little Match Girl: Disney’s Little-Known Short Film Beautifully Illuminates the Spirit of Christmas
Editorial
First of all, let me begin by wishing you all the merriest of Christmases! From our MouseEars TV family to yours, we hope you have a day full of warmth, laughter, and fun!
From Christmas lights to Christmas carols, Christmas is one of our favorite times of the year. The world seems aglow with happiness.
So, it might seem strange, then, for us to be looking at “The Little Match Girl” today. Those familiar with the story (spoiler alert!) know that it doesn’t exactly have a happy ending. In fact, it is a prime example of a bitter-sweet conclusion.
And yet, in the flickering flame of a little girl’s matches, the spirit of Christmas was revealed, and we see, for her, that revelation brought true joy.
From Andersen’s Anthology: The Little Match Girl
Hans Christian Andersen is probably best known for his fairy tale, “The Little Mermaid,” which is by far one of Disney’s most popular adaptations. He also authored “The Snow Queen,” which was the starting point for Disney’s Frozen franchise. (Hans, Kristoff, Anna, and Sven were named in tribute to him. Trying saying their names in quick succession, and you’ll hear it!)
Tucked away in Andersen’s repertoire of fairy tales is a rather special short story, only three pages long, called “The Little Match Girl.” Though overshadowed, perhaps, by the figures of Ariel and Elsa, the little match girl still burns brightly, and those who have stumbled upon her story are still drawn to the blaze.
The story is set, not on Christmas, but on New Year’s Eve; the death of the old year and the birth of the new. And yet, the elements of the story are undeniably imbued with Christmas spirit…
The unnamed match girl spends the day, “bareheaded and barefoot,” wandering through town to sell her matches. Not a single person gives her a single cent.
When night falls, she shelters in the corner between two houses, too afraid to go home and face a beating from her father for her lack of sales. In the face of bitter cold, darkness, and hunger pangs, she lights a match to give herself a little warmth.
In the firelight, she sees a vision of a welcoming stove where she basks in the glorious heat. The match goes out, and so does the vision.
She lights another, scraping it against the wall beside her, which turns the brick into a transparent veil beyond which is a table laid out with a Christmas goose to satiate her hunger. But this match also fizzles out, and the delicious goose disappears with it.
She lights yet another and finds herself seated beneath a beautiful Christmas tree adorned with thousands of flickering lights. As the match gutters, the Christmas tree’s lights rise into the sky to become stars over her head, and one falls to earth.
Shivering, the little match girl remembers something her grandma had told her, “that when a star falls, a soul was going up to God.”
In the light of her next match stands the grandmother herself, a soul who had gone to be with God some time ago, and “the only one who had ever loved her.”
Desperate to keep her grandmother with her, to keep her from fading like the other visions, the girl lights all of her remaining matches.
Now, this light was brighter, more beautiful, and more abundant than anything she had seen before. The little match girl entered the warm embrace of her grandma, “and they both flew upwards in brightness and joy far above the earth, where there was neither cold nor hunger nor pain, for they were with God.”
In the morning, passersby, the same who had refused to buy any matches, found her huddled, lifeless, in the snow. Upon observing her used-up matches, they coldly said she must have been trying to warm herself.
But they were ignorant of the wonderful things she had seen, and of the wonderful place she had gone that New Year’s Day.
Am I the only one using up a bunch of Kleenex right now?
For Andersen, this was an incredibly important story. Not only was it an appeal for compassion, but it also was a memorial to the real match girl he knew in the streets of Copenhagen.
Tragically, his bleak fairy tale was based upon truth.
During his own time as a destitute street person, he had met a little match seller who perished. “It is said his memory of her was so upsetting that, to the end of his life, he could not speak of the circumstances that inspired this story without coming to tears.”1
Writing her story was both a release for him and a legacy for her.
Disney’s Little Match Girl
If reading the story wasn’t heart-wrenching enough, you can also watch the 6-minute Disney adaptation on Disney+.
Disney’s take on the story is true to the original, sad ending and all. The animation of both the Russian city and character of the match girl has been beautifully done, and, released in 2006, is the last Disney picture to have been made with the Computer Animation Production System – the software responsible for digitally coloring some of our favorite movies from the “Disney Renaissance.”2
The nostalgic style of the picture is yet another element to tug on the heartstrings.
Interestingly, Disney’s “Little Match Girl” is also a silent picture. Not a single word is spoken; the strains of a violin from Borodin’s “String Quartet No. 2” gives voice to the narrative.
This was a masterful creative choice. The music is powerful and touching, while also evoking the culture of the girl’s Russian city. That it plays over her voice, even when she is evidently speaking, fits thematically, because no one pays heed to her plea – for a sale, or for kindness.
This story might seem like a strange one for Disney to have adapted, or at least, to have adapted without changing the ending. After all, “happily ever after” is sort of their thing.
And there isn’t any happiness in “The Little Match Girl.” Is there?
Christmas Joy in New Year’s Sorrow
“The Little Match Girl” is certainly bittersweet, for with death always comes sorrow.
But there was also joy found by the match girl, and in her joy, we can find a poignant reminder of where to find ours, too.
In her visions, the little match girl experienced warmth, good food, and even the beauty of a well-decorated tree. The warmth and food were needed for survival, and the tree a wondrous extra. And yet, it was for none of these things that she desperately lit every match to keep the vision alive. It was none of these worldly things that she truly desired.
It was the vision of her kind-hearted grandmother, gone to be with God, that the little match girl desperately craved. She even called to her grandmother, “take me with you!”
In the grandmother, we see love and kindness – and even joy – personified. She is described as smiling and incredibly beautiful; bestowing love is just as much a fountain of joy as receiving a kind word or gesture can be, and in fact, often more so. Hence, both grandmother and match girl were smiling and warm at the end.
The other element of the little match girl’s joy can be found in her glorious rebirth. Her suffering upon the earth, and even her visions of earthly good (like a happy Christmas) were temporal. Knowing that our lives are temporary puts everything, both good and bad, into perspective. It helps direct our focus onto what is lasting – the things that bring true joy – faith, and loving our neighbors, as taught by Christ who was born in Bethlehem on the first Christmas morning.
Indeed, I find “The Little Match Girl” resonates with the same themes as Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, but condensed into a shorter, harsher vignette, told from a different perspective: that of the beggar rather than the miser.
But whether you relate more to the match girl or more to Scrooge (if I’m being honest, Scrooge is who I relate to oftentimes), their basic need was still the same: a glorious rebirth.
The little match girl received her rebirth in heaven, whilst Scrooge’s heart was reborn while still on this earth. In both instances, true joy was found in striving to keep the spirit of Christmas – whether in the form of a loving grandmother or in the form of lessons from three Christmas ghosts.
This Christmas, let us light all of our matches and keep the Christmas spirit burning brightly in our hearts – today, tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that.
Merry Christmas and God bless us, everyone!
Recommended Gear for this Adventure
Disclaimer: We earn a commission if you click any of the links above and make a purchase at no additional cost to you.
