TV REVIEWS : ‘Little Match Girl’ Has Social Value

“The Little Match Girl” (at 7 tonight on HBO), a new animated special from producer/director Michael Sporn (“Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile”), transforms Hans Christian Andersen’s bleak story about an unloved child freezing to death on a snowy night into a contemporary parable of compassion.

It’s New Year’s Eve, 1999. Angela, the title character, lives with her mother and father in an abandoned New York subway station; she supports her kindly mother and father by selling matches to theatergoers in Times Square.

On her way uptown, Angela, who looks like Ludwig Bemelmans’ Madeline, befriends a stray dog, Albert. As they huddle in a vacant lot against the driving cold, she lights some of the matches, and is rewarded with visions of her favorite aunt, a friendly street musician and her grandmother, who take Angela and Albert on magical adventures in the city.

Angela’s plight touches the hearts of the uncaring rich people, who come to the aid of the homeless families in the subway station, ensuring that “the first day of the new age had a joyful beginning.”

In this unusually atmospheric special, Sporn depicts New York as a cold montage of dull blues and lavenders, with Angela’s red coat providing the only spot of color. F. Murray Abraham’s understated narration and the mournful saxophone solos in Caleb Sampson’s jazz score emphasize the downbeat feeling of the uncaring metropolis.

Its gently didactic social message makes “The Little Match Girl” a more valuable program for children and their parents to watch than the simple-minded tales of furry little animals “saving” Christmas that have become standard holiday fare.