It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) - film review

On the death of his father, George Bailey has no choice but to take over the management of the family’s loan and savings business.  Instead of following his dream – to travel the world and make a career as an architect – he ends up settling down and starting a family in the small American town in which he grew up.  His honest and generous approach to business brings him into conflict with the town’s banker, Potter, a mean-spirited old man who is determined to ruin George.  One year, just before Christmas, Potter gets his opportunity when George’s uncle loses the money that George desperately needs to balance his accounts.  Facing financial ruin, with no one to bail him out, George contemplates suicide.  A strange old man suddenly appears from nowhere and introduces himself as Clarence Oddbody, his guardian angel.  Having failed to convince George of the value of his life, Clarence shows him an alternative reality – one in which George never existed.  It is a much darker world than the one George knew....

There probably has, and never will be, a film that deserves the label "heart-warming" more than Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life – the definitive Christmas film that has become an all-time classic of American cinema.  When the film was first released it was panned by some critics for its sentimentality, but Capra was unfazed by this and was adamant that this was his greatest film and, in his view, the best film ever made.  Judging by the high esteem in which the film is held today, and the high placing it consistently achieves in "best film" polls, he wasn’t far wrong.

Capra’s cosy view of the American way of life is certainly idealistic, but this is more a reflection of the director’s deep-seated faith in human nature than a failure of imagination.  What the film shows us is two interpretations of the American dream, the one that Capra believed in, the other which he perhaps feared.  The first is where people live happily together, supporting one another and building a community where everyone can thrive and live fulfilled lives.  The other is one where individualism runs amok, rampant capitalism takes control, and whilst every vice is catered for, no one is happy.  Capra, the trenchant optimist, believed that the former of these realities would prevail.  The sad truth is that the world we inhabit increasingly resembles the latter.  This may partly explain the continuing appeal of the film.  It shows us what might have been – the path not taken, a lost Utopia.  

The film originated from a story entitled "The Greatest Gift", which was written by Philip Van Doren Stern in 1939.  When he failed to find a publisher for the story, its author had it made into a Christmas card, which he sent to family and friends in 1943.  RKO bought the rights to the story in 1944, seeing that it had potential as a vehicle for their star actor Cary Grant.  The project was dropped when Grant was unavailable and RKO sold on the rights to Frank Capra in 1945.  The film that Capra made would be one of Hollywood’s best received Christmas cards.  Although it barely made a profit (on account of its enormous production cost), the film proved to be an instant hit.

Admittedly, It’s a Wonderful Life does get a little schmaltzy in places, but it is one of those rare films that manages to get away with it.  Capra’s meticulous direction, coupled with an excellent screenplay and some highly effective photography, guides rather than controls our emotions, so that what we feel is a genuine sense of engagement with the subject, and an immense relief when the happy ending (predictable as it may be) is delivered after an utterly bleak thirty minutes in the grim "what might have been" scenario.  The film also has a great cast who put in some stunning performances.  James Stewart is at his absolute best as the sympathetic Mr Everyman, a role that he was clearly destined for, Lionel Barrymore makes a terrific villain (don’t forget to boo and hiss every time he appears on the screen) and Henry Travers is an inspired choice for the part of the doddery old angel, Clarence.  It’s a Wonderful Life is a joy, the one film you can watch every Christmas without feeling ashamed of yourself.

© James Travers 2008

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