Movie Review: It’s a Wonderful Life – 1946, Frank Capra

Frank Capra’s 1946 film It’s a Wonderful Life is not only a holiday classic but is also one of the greatest films of all time.

We’ve all probably seen it or at least know its gist.  James Stewart plays George Bailey, an ambitious, charismatic young man eager to take the world by storm but bound by blood and principle to his small hometown of Bedford Falls.  Bailey reluctantly places his dreams of higher education, world travel, and entrepreneurial adventure on hold to protect Bedford Falls from the monopolistic ambitions of the heartless banker Henry Potter.

As noble as Bailey’s cause is, he never fully overcomes his remorse of dreams shelved and ambitions abandoned, and one dreadful day, when the futility of his life appears to cave in on him completely, he makes a tragic decision.  Until his guardian angel intervenes and opens his eyes to just what his life has meant to the world.

It’s a heavy film, in many ways ahead of its time.  It is Laden with issues as applicable today as they were seven decades ago, and Capra’s direction in blending humor and tragedy, reality and surreality, and non-linear time structure rival even the great Citizen Kane, released five years earlier.

If you haven’t seen It’s a Wonderful Life already, take the time this weekend to do it.  It just might help you see this broken world in a different light this Christmas!

It’s a Wonderful Life score: 5 Falcone Rings!!!