Retro Cinema: It's a Wonderful Life

Published: December 25, 2007, 1:30 pm

Tags: donna reed, donnareed, every time a bell rings another angel gets its wings, everytimeabellringsanotherangelgetsitswings, frank capra, frankcapra, it s a wonderful life, it sawonderfullife, james stewart, jamesstewart, zuzu s petals, zuzu spetals

Filed under: Classics, Family Films, Home Entertainment, 12 Days of Cinematicalmas, Retro Cinema It is easy to dismiss It's a Wonderful Life, and indeed, people have been doing so since the film's release in 1946. Too sentimental, too hokey, too loaded with Frank Capra's hopeful humanism -- all these complaints, and more, have been fired at It's a Wonderful Life over the years. People still watch It's a Wonderful Life, sure, but you have to ask how much of this is based in the two most corrosive reasons to watch a film -- camp and tradition. Watching a film only so you can dissect it with the sharp blades of irony can blind you to its real virtues; you look for stereotypes, not performances; listen for often-quoted lines of dialogue without ever hearing them; see scenes in the context of their pop-culture parodies instead of as what they are. So, the virtues of It's a Wonderful Life are often ignored by detractors. I'd also put forward that the virtues of It's a Wonderful Life are,

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