I've watched this a couple of times, always hoping this time would be an improvement over the last. It hasn't worked. I hate saying that. Not just because there is so much talent invested in what appears to me to be a relative failure -- play by Kaufman and Hart, screenplay by Morrie Riskind, directed by Frank Capra, a cast including Jimmy Stewart, Jean Arthur, and a host of other accomplished performers -- but because my not being able to enjoy it as much as I properly should deprives me of smiles and laughter that there are times I desperately need.
Basically, Jimmy Stewart is the scion of a -- well, a not merely "rich" family, but an immensely wealthy family able to spend a quarter of a million 1939 dollars a year on lawyers alone. They're humorless, driven, and arid. All except Jimmy, who falls in love with his peppy blond secretary, Jean Arthur.
She's normal, but her family and their friends are outlandish. A visit to their household is like a child's fantasy of a mad house. There is the cheerful, tolerant patriarch, Lionel Barrymore, who hasn't paid income taxes in 20 years because he doesn't want to own any battleships. There is his daughter, Ann Miller, imitating a clumsy would-be ballerina who, under the tutelage of her lunatic Russian instructor, dances wildly to Hungarian dances played prestissimo on a wooden xylophone by her sulky husband. One old man poses as a discus thrower for a lousy painter. Another builds fireworks in the basement, which we know are bound to explode sooner or later.
It all sounds hilarious, and it must have been a considerable success on the stage. I understand there were a number of changes in the adaptation designed to introduce "serious" ideas into the story.
Yet, it comes across as thoroughly schematic. The peasants are lively, spiritual, loved by their neighbors, generous, proud of their independence. Their goal is to "have fun." The rich are materialistic and emotionally bankrupt. Until the predictable end, when they are converted to the First Church of Epicurus and its pursuit of ataraxia.
If you haven't seen it before, you might not want these comments to discourage you. Evidently a lot of people have gotten more out of it than I have. Maybe I've mistaken profundity for silliness.
Basically, Jimmy Stewart is the scion of a -- well, a not merely "rich" family, but an immensely wealthy family able to spend a quarter of a million 1939 dollars a year on lawyers alone. They're humorless, driven, and arid. All except Jimmy, who falls in love with his peppy blond secretary, Jean Arthur.
She's normal, but her family and their friends are outlandish. A visit to their household is like a child's fantasy of a mad house. There is the cheerful, tolerant patriarch, Lionel Barrymore, who hasn't paid income taxes in 20 years because he doesn't want to own any battleships. There is his daughter, Ann Miller, imitating a clumsy would-be ballerina who, under the tutelage of her lunatic Russian instructor, dances wildly to Hungarian dances played prestissimo on a wooden xylophone by her sulky husband. One old man poses as a discus thrower for a lousy painter. Another builds fireworks in the basement, which we know are bound to explode sooner or later.
It all sounds hilarious, and it must have been a considerable success on the stage. I understand there were a number of changes in the adaptation designed to introduce "serious" ideas into the story.
Yet, it comes across as thoroughly schematic. The peasants are lively, spiritual, loved by their neighbors, generous, proud of their independence. Their goal is to "have fun." The rich are materialistic and emotionally bankrupt. Until the predictable end, when they are converted to the First Church of Epicurus and its pursuit of ataraxia.
If you haven't seen it before, you might not want these comments to discourage you. Evidently a lot of people have gotten more out of it than I have. Maybe I've mistaken profundity for silliness.