This is not a still photo taken from a movie:
General Martial Henri Valin, head of staff of French Air Forces, decorated the American Colonel and actor James Stewart with the Croix de Guerre with palm as a reward for exceptional service rendered for France's liberation on May 19, 1945, in France. Photo: Keystone-France/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images
This article from December 2017 tells us a lot of good stuff about James Stewart (1908 - 1997). It is too bad Stewart is forever tied to the worst piece of crap Hollywood ever produced:
None dare criticize It’s A Wonderful Life except me —— until Michael Graham came along:
First, let’s dispense with the obvious: No, “Die Hard” is not a Christmas movie.
And while we’re on the subject, neither are “Gremlins,” “Edward Scissorhands” or “Returns.” So please — save your faux “hot takes” for Twitter.
(If you’re watching a movie in July and someone walks in and asks, “Whaddaya watching that for? It’s a Christmas movie!” — Bingo! Nobody has ever said that about “Die Hard.”)
If you’re looking for a true Christmas movie “hot take” — a controversial, rarely spoken opinion that, upon consideration, is surprisingly accurate — let’s talk about that Frank Capra classic “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
It’s definitely a Christmas movie. But it’s not wonderful. In fact, it’s awful.
(Pause for gasps of horror).
Yes, I like Jimmy Stewart. Yes, I love Christmas. No, I don’t shout, “Shut up, you brats — Santa’s a fake!” when the kids come around caroling.
I just made the mistake of watching the story of George Bailey and actually paid attention to the message. And in a nation where a majority of young people support socialism over capitalism, it’s a message I can’t ignore.
Not that politics are the film’s only problem. The plot of “Wonderful Life” makes about as much sense as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez explaining the defense budget. The movie should end as soon as Clarence the Angel shows up:
CLARENCE: “It’s old man Potter! He stole the $8,000!”
SHERIFF: [Slaps cuffs on Lionel Barrymore] “Potter, come with me.”
GEORGE BAILEY: “We’re saved, you ol’ Building and Loan!” (Kisses Donna Reed.)
TOWNSPEOPLE CHEER. FADE TO BLACK. THE END.
Instead, we get this 90-minute musing on a life that, even the biggest Capra fan has to admit, is pretty awful. As a kid, George Bailey goes deaf in one ear. Why? Because his brother was showboating on the ice and George had to rescue him.
As a teen, George gets beaten until his deaf ear bleeds. Why? Because he stopped his drunken boss from accidentally poisoning someone.
As a young man, George is stuck with a failing family business. Why? Dad’s heart attack. He can’t have a honeymoon. Great Depression. His kids wear second-hand clothes and get sick from the cold. Why? Because George can’t afford a new house or nice things for his family — thanks to the eternally broke Savings and Loan he has to keep alive for the sake of his neighbors.
When George stands on that snowy bridge contemplating suicide, it’s easy to see why.
What the movie then attempts — and in my mind, fails — to do is make the case that Bailey’s lousy life is actually terrific because his sacrifices made everyone else’s lives better. They have nicer homes and better jobs (and didn’t drown or kill someone) thanks to George’s suffering. And so, when they save him from jail by chipping in their Christmas funds and his brother declares him “the richest man in town!” we’re supposed to feel great.
But why? His life still stinks. He’s not, in fact, rich or even financially secure. His kids are stuck in the drafty house. His business is still struggling. And on top of all that … Potter gets to keep the eight grand!
There are movies with hockey masks and chain saws that have happier endings.
Every time I see a clip of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” all I can think of is the audience for whom it was (apparently) intended: the workers at a Soviet collective circa 1949 who, when the screening ends are told, “See! Who cares that you have no shoes? Back to the factory for Mother Russia!”
The socialist economics of “Wonderful Life” is the same as the Gen-Z powered Green New Deal — limit economic prosperity in the name of a better environment. But all the data show that, as nations become wealthier, their environments become cleaner. It’s America’s carbon emissions that are falling fastest in the developed world, even as our economy hums.
Self-sacrifice is a beautiful thing. It’s at the heart of the Christmas message. But the magic of the American way is that being our best selves creates the best world for the most people.
Somebody needs to make a Christmas movie about that.
So-called classic movies that stink to high heaven really get to me. It’s A Wonderful Life tops the list. Criticizing that “classic” has become synonymous with dumping on motherhood. TV runs that piece of garbage every Christmas Season. I am sick for a week if I happen to be channel surfing and stumble into it. One second of that movie is all that it takes to send me into a deep depression. If I could have one wish I would ask that every trace of that Socialist crap disappear forever.
On previous message boards I connected my opposites to It’s A Wonderful Life to point out their collectivist leanings. They all said they never saw the movie. I always found that humorous. I have not seen that movie in more than sixty years; so I wonder who in hell is watching it every Christmas? I suspect that millions of parents have been convinced it is a family movie; so they tell their children it is a wonderful story. In that way Socialist economics is handed down from generation to generation.
Put it this way, imagine a movie selling non-existent International law in a favorable light generation after generation. It is frightening to think that someday propagandists will weave global government into a movie plot that becomes a “classic.”
That movie revered by touchy-feely sob sisters, but not long ago I did find proof that my critiques are justified:
George Bailey banging Mary Hatch was the only good thing in his sorry life:
GEORGE & MARY
It’s a Wonderful Life is hardcore Socialist crap. The rich guy, Mr. Potter, is a meanspirited cheapskate while the hero, George, is beloved by everyone except Mr. Potter. The overt message is that George’s suicide would be a tragedy. (A strange message coming from the people who later gave the world the Culture of Death.) The subliminal message is that Mr. Potter’s demise would do the world a service.
This “fringe banking” system, and the people who use it, are the subjects of Mehrsa Baradaran’s How the Other Half Banks.
Let’s be clear at the outset: this is not a judicious or balanced analysis of that system and population. It is a partisan work suffused with moral outrage. Baradaran, a law professor at the University of Georgia, at times sounds like a certain Harvard Law professor who recently traded Cambridge for the Senate.
No matter how Mehrsa Baradaran slices it, go to the movie to get the original collectivist crapola. Liberals selling it as “. . . a classic and brilliant movie.” has been partisan bullshit since the day it was released.
Mr. Potter and George Bailey were both bankers.
Bailey ran a Building and Loan Association which is another name for Savings and Loans —— not a savings bank. The screenplay clearly identifies it as a bank founded on Socialism’s political orientation. This scene is a little taste of Hollywood’s liberal crapola:
Incidentally, I am not a big fan of bankers, but I would like to meet one who is loved by angels!
I admit that most movie fans do not analyze a screen play as do I; nevertheless, Clarence the Angel overpowers the Socialist message, but the collectivism is all there.
Parenthetically, there was a 1944 movie titled Arsenic and Old Lace that was also directed by Frank Capra. Cary Grant starred. The plot had two homicidal old maids killing old men with kindness. That gem, based on a play, was Hollywood’s first pitch for euthanasia. At least back in 1944 movies with such terrible messages were the exception. I do not know how Grant and Capra felt about euthanasia:
http://ryanmccormickfilmhistory.blogspot.com/2016/11/arsenic-and-old-lace-1944.html
Hollywood liberals are no different than liberal politicians in that they have to doublespeak the message to get people to listen to them. Politicians look you in the eye and lie, while Hollywood lies in its advertising in order to sell even bigger lies. If the touchy-feely message in any movie would sell more tickets Hollywood would advertise that message. For instance: In 1944 everyone knew what Arsenic and Old Lace was about. If that movie was being made for the first time today it would be advertised as two delightfully horny old maids caring for homeless old men.
Hollywood cannot tell the truth in its advertising because movie producers know they have to con people into sitting still for liberal garbage. It is one thing to have politicians and television shows sneak liberal messages into the public’s thoughts, it is doubly aggravating knowing the public pays money to produce those messages. I will not get into the propaganda output financed by tax dollars. That topic is a large book all by itself.
Regardless of the topic, liberals always wrap themselves in touchy-feely misdirection whenever their horse manure is challenged. In every instance liberals claim moral superiority, while they never say word in defense of Socialist economic failures.
Censorship was not good enough for CNN writer Carol Costello:
Even holiday classics like It’s a Wonderful Life have come under vicious scrutiny in our politically correct, brave new world, with CNN openly questioning whether the beloved film is secretly sexist and should, therefore, be “retired” from American culture.
“Perhaps it is time we retire these dinosaurs and bask in a brighter, more equitable future,” Costello writes.
It’s a Wonderful Life is not alone on Costello’s cinematic chopping block. She would also like to eliminate the Broadway hit The Producers along with the Nutcracker Suite ballet, while other feminists have called for censoring Gone with the Wind for its supposed depiction of “marital rape.”
CNN: ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ Is ‘Inherently Sexist,’ Should Be ‘Retired’
by Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D.
25 Dec 2017
http://www.breitbart.com/big-govern...ful-life-inherently-sexist-should-be-retired/
It never occurs to feminazis to give individuals a choice —— watch or do not watch —— read or do not read.
Socialists laid it on with a trowel. All the good people are like George Bailey, everybody else is a villain.
Liberals always spout their garbage under the guise of making a better world for the future. It is a simple matter for the government to prevent performing a ballet, but I have to ask which method Costello will employ to prevent everyone from listening to the music?
Logically, Costello & Company will have to “retire” every record and record player along with every musical instrument. If that does not work they will have to make infants deaf for life as soon as they are born.
Collectivism is not self-help in a welfare state unless helping yourself to tax dollars counts as thrift and progress. It sure as hell is Communism when everybody else is forced to pay for it. It started decades ago with public housing that turned into crime-ridden slums. The original Socialist scheme evolved into guarantying millions of mortgages given to people who could not pay the mortgages let alone maintain a home.
Millions of new homeowners were supposed to pay property taxes to state and local governments in addition to putting upward pressure on the residential real estate market. What the country got was another failed collectivist scheme when existing homes lost equity, and damn few unqualified buyers paid property taxes with money they earned in the private sector. They got the houses but not the jobs to pay for them. Not even George Baily could bail them out.
Finally, since this thread started about a movie, I suggest everybody watch Major Barbara to get a good dose of G.B. Shaw’s collectivist utopia. George Bailey was a flaming capitalist compared to the horseshit in that one.
General Martial Henri Valin, head of staff of French Air Forces, decorated the American Colonel and actor James Stewart with the Croix de Guerre with palm as a reward for exceptional service rendered for France's liberation on May 19, 1945, in France. Photo: Keystone-France/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images
This article from December 2017 tells us a lot of good stuff about James Stewart (1908 - 1997). It is too bad Stewart is forever tied to the worst piece of crap Hollywood ever produced:
Jimmy Stewart's Fight for a Wonderful Life
Larry Provost
Posted: Dec 25, 2017 12:01 AM
https://townhall.com/columnists/lar...-stewarts-fight-for-a-wonderful-life-n2426745
Larry Provost
Posted: Dec 25, 2017 12:01 AM
https://townhall.com/columnists/lar...-stewarts-fight-for-a-wonderful-life-n2426745
None dare criticize It’s A Wonderful Life except me —— until Michael Graham came along:
First, let’s dispense with the obvious: No, “Die Hard” is not a Christmas movie.
And while we’re on the subject, neither are “Gremlins,” “Edward Scissorhands” or “Returns.” So please — save your faux “hot takes” for Twitter.
(If you’re watching a movie in July and someone walks in and asks, “Whaddaya watching that for? It’s a Christmas movie!” — Bingo! Nobody has ever said that about “Die Hard.”)
If you’re looking for a true Christmas movie “hot take” — a controversial, rarely spoken opinion that, upon consideration, is surprisingly accurate — let’s talk about that Frank Capra classic “It’s a Wonderful Life.”
It’s definitely a Christmas movie. But it’s not wonderful. In fact, it’s awful.
(Pause for gasps of horror).
Yes, I like Jimmy Stewart. Yes, I love Christmas. No, I don’t shout, “Shut up, you brats — Santa’s a fake!” when the kids come around caroling.
I just made the mistake of watching the story of George Bailey and actually paid attention to the message. And in a nation where a majority of young people support socialism over capitalism, it’s a message I can’t ignore.
Not that politics are the film’s only problem. The plot of “Wonderful Life” makes about as much sense as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez explaining the defense budget. The movie should end as soon as Clarence the Angel shows up:
CLARENCE: “It’s old man Potter! He stole the $8,000!”
SHERIFF: [Slaps cuffs on Lionel Barrymore] “Potter, come with me.”
GEORGE BAILEY: “We’re saved, you ol’ Building and Loan!” (Kisses Donna Reed.)
TOWNSPEOPLE CHEER. FADE TO BLACK. THE END.
Instead, we get this 90-minute musing on a life that, even the biggest Capra fan has to admit, is pretty awful. As a kid, George Bailey goes deaf in one ear. Why? Because his brother was showboating on the ice and George had to rescue him.
As a teen, George gets beaten until his deaf ear bleeds. Why? Because he stopped his drunken boss from accidentally poisoning someone.
As a young man, George is stuck with a failing family business. Why? Dad’s heart attack. He can’t have a honeymoon. Great Depression. His kids wear second-hand clothes and get sick from the cold. Why? Because George can’t afford a new house or nice things for his family — thanks to the eternally broke Savings and Loan he has to keep alive for the sake of his neighbors.
When George stands on that snowy bridge contemplating suicide, it’s easy to see why.
What the movie then attempts — and in my mind, fails — to do is make the case that Bailey’s lousy life is actually terrific because his sacrifices made everyone else’s lives better. They have nicer homes and better jobs (and didn’t drown or kill someone) thanks to George’s suffering. And so, when they save him from jail by chipping in their Christmas funds and his brother declares him “the richest man in town!” we’re supposed to feel great.
But why? His life still stinks. He’s not, in fact, rich or even financially secure. His kids are stuck in the drafty house. His business is still struggling. And on top of all that … Potter gets to keep the eight grand!
There are movies with hockey masks and chain saws that have happier endings.
Every time I see a clip of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” all I can think of is the audience for whom it was (apparently) intended: the workers at a Soviet collective circa 1949 who, when the screening ends are told, “See! Who cares that you have no shoes? Back to the factory for Mother Russia!”
The socialist economics of “Wonderful Life” is the same as the Gen-Z powered Green New Deal — limit economic prosperity in the name of a better environment. But all the data show that, as nations become wealthier, their environments become cleaner. It’s America’s carbon emissions that are falling fastest in the developed world, even as our economy hums.
Self-sacrifice is a beautiful thing. It’s at the heart of the Christmas message. But the magic of the American way is that being our best selves creates the best world for the most people.
Somebody needs to make a Christmas movie about that.
‘Wonderful Life’ has a terrible message
By Michael Graham
PUBLISHED: December 21, 2018 at 1:18 am | UPDATED: December 21, 2018 at 7:10 am
https://www.bostonherald.com/2018/12/21/wonderful-life-has-a-terrible-message/
By Michael Graham
PUBLISHED: December 21, 2018 at 1:18 am | UPDATED: December 21, 2018 at 7:10 am
https://www.bostonherald.com/2018/12/21/wonderful-life-has-a-terrible-message/
So-called classic movies that stink to high heaven really get to me. It’s A Wonderful Life tops the list. Criticizing that “classic” has become synonymous with dumping on motherhood. TV runs that piece of garbage every Christmas Season. I am sick for a week if I happen to be channel surfing and stumble into it. One second of that movie is all that it takes to send me into a deep depression. If I could have one wish I would ask that every trace of that Socialist crap disappear forever.
On previous message boards I connected my opposites to It’s A Wonderful Life to point out their collectivist leanings. They all said they never saw the movie. I always found that humorous. I have not seen that movie in more than sixty years; so I wonder who in hell is watching it every Christmas? I suspect that millions of parents have been convinced it is a family movie; so they tell their children it is a wonderful story. In that way Socialist economics is handed down from generation to generation.
Put it this way, imagine a movie selling non-existent International law in a favorable light generation after generation. It is frightening to think that someday propagandists will weave global government into a movie plot that becomes a “classic.”
That movie revered by touchy-feely sob sisters, but not long ago I did find proof that my critiques are justified:
An unnamed FBI agent who watched the film as part of a larger FBI program aimed at detecting and neutralizing Commie influences in Hollywood (fathered by, yes, J. Edgar Hoover) said it was “very entertaining.” However, writes scholar John A. Noakes, the agent “also identified what they considered a malignant undercurrent in the film.” As a result of this report, the film underwent further industry probes that uncovered that “those responsible for making It’s a Wonderful Life had employed two common tricks used by Communists to inject propaganda into the film.”
These two common “devices” or tricks, as applied by the Los Angeles branch of the Bureau, were smearing “values or institutions judged to be particularly American”–in this case, the capitalist banker, Mr. Potter, is portrayed as a Scroogey misanthrope–and glorifying “values or institutions judged to be particularly anti-American or pro-Communist”–in this case, depression and existential crisis, an issue that the FBI report characterized as a “subtle attempt to magnify the problems of the so-called ‘common man’ in society.”
George Bailey, the film’s protagonist, is also a small-scale community bank manager, and seen from one perspective his competition with aggressive tycoon (and Scrooge stand-in) Henry F. Potter, who runs the competing bank, tells a larger story about American business and industry. In the moment of post-war paranoia, even the idea of a community bank could be read as Communist. And George Bailey’s deep unhappiness in a quintessentially American small town life could be perceived as failure, which was broadly portrayed as Communist as well. But the story of the movie is much subtler than that, writes Noakes: “It’s a Wonderful Life depicts a struggle between two bankers, each representing a different vision of capitalism and democracy.”
These two common “devices” or tricks, as applied by the Los Angeles branch of the Bureau, were smearing “values or institutions judged to be particularly American”–in this case, the capitalist banker, Mr. Potter, is portrayed as a Scroogey misanthrope–and glorifying “values or institutions judged to be particularly anti-American or pro-Communist”–in this case, depression and existential crisis, an issue that the FBI report characterized as a “subtle attempt to magnify the problems of the so-called ‘common man’ in society.”
George Bailey, the film’s protagonist, is also a small-scale community bank manager, and seen from one perspective his competition with aggressive tycoon (and Scrooge stand-in) Henry F. Potter, who runs the competing bank, tells a larger story about American business and industry. In the moment of post-war paranoia, even the idea of a community bank could be read as Communist. And George Bailey’s deep unhappiness in a quintessentially American small town life could be perceived as failure, which was broadly portrayed as Communist as well. But the story of the movie is much subtler than that, writes Noakes: “It’s a Wonderful Life depicts a struggle between two bankers, each representing a different vision of capitalism and democracy.”
The Weird Story of the FBI and ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’
By Kat Eschner
December 20, 2017
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/weird-story-fbi-and-its-wonderful-life-180967587/
By Kat Eschner
December 20, 2017
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/weird-story-fbi-and-its-wonderful-life-180967587/
George Bailey banging Mary Hatch was the only good thing in his sorry life:
GEORGE & MARY
It’s a Wonderful Life is hardcore Socialist crap. The rich guy, Mr. Potter, is a meanspirited cheapskate while the hero, George, is beloved by everyone except Mr. Potter. The overt message is that George’s suicide would be a tragedy. (A strange message coming from the people who later gave the world the Culture of Death.) The subliminal message is that Mr. Potter’s demise would do the world a service.
This “fringe banking” system, and the people who use it, are the subjects of Mehrsa Baradaran’s How the Other Half Banks.
Let’s be clear at the outset: this is not a judicious or balanced analysis of that system and population. It is a partisan work suffused with moral outrage. Baradaran, a law professor at the University of Georgia, at times sounds like a certain Harvard Law professor who recently traded Cambridge for the Senate.
This Law Professor Wants to Turn the Post Office into a Giant Bank
BY: Ted Lawrence
November 21, 2015 5:00 am
http://freebeacon.com/culture/this-law-professor-wants-to-turn-the-post-office-into-a-giant-bank/
BY: Ted Lawrence
November 21, 2015 5:00 am
http://freebeacon.com/culture/this-law-professor-wants-to-turn-the-post-office-into-a-giant-bank/
No matter how Mehrsa Baradaran slices it, go to the movie to get the original collectivist crapola. Liberals selling it as “. . . a classic and brilliant movie.” has been partisan bullshit since the day it was released.
Mr. Potter and George Bailey were both bankers.
Bailey ran a Building and Loan Association which is another name for Savings and Loans —— not a savings bank. The screenplay clearly identifies it as a bank founded on Socialism’s political orientation. This scene is a little taste of Hollywood’s liberal crapola:
Incidentally, I am not a big fan of bankers, but I would like to meet one who is loved by angels!
I admit that most movie fans do not analyze a screen play as do I; nevertheless, Clarence the Angel overpowers the Socialist message, but the collectivism is all there.
Parenthetically, there was a 1944 movie titled Arsenic and Old Lace that was also directed by Frank Capra. Cary Grant starred. The plot had two homicidal old maids killing old men with kindness. That gem, based on a play, was Hollywood’s first pitch for euthanasia. At least back in 1944 movies with such terrible messages were the exception. I do not know how Grant and Capra felt about euthanasia:
Grant hated his acting in the picture and considered it one of his least favorite movies, while Capra generally left the film behind him, not giving it much thought as he continued forward with his career after the war attempting to work as an independent filmmaker.
http://ryanmccormickfilmhistory.blogspot.com/2016/11/arsenic-and-old-lace-1944.html
Hollywood liberals are no different than liberal politicians in that they have to doublespeak the message to get people to listen to them. Politicians look you in the eye and lie, while Hollywood lies in its advertising in order to sell even bigger lies. If the touchy-feely message in any movie would sell more tickets Hollywood would advertise that message. For instance: In 1944 everyone knew what Arsenic and Old Lace was about. If that movie was being made for the first time today it would be advertised as two delightfully horny old maids caring for homeless old men.
Hollywood cannot tell the truth in its advertising because movie producers know they have to con people into sitting still for liberal garbage. It is one thing to have politicians and television shows sneak liberal messages into the public’s thoughts, it is doubly aggravating knowing the public pays money to produce those messages. I will not get into the propaganda output financed by tax dollars. That topic is a large book all by itself.
Regardless of the topic, liberals always wrap themselves in touchy-feely misdirection whenever their horse manure is challenged. In every instance liberals claim moral superiority, while they never say word in defense of Socialist economic failures.
Censorship was not good enough for CNN writer Carol Costello:
Even holiday classics like It’s a Wonderful Life have come under vicious scrutiny in our politically correct, brave new world, with CNN openly questioning whether the beloved film is secretly sexist and should, therefore, be “retired” from American culture.
XXXXX
“Perhaps it is time we retire these dinosaurs and bask in a brighter, more equitable future,” Costello writes.
It’s a Wonderful Life is not alone on Costello’s cinematic chopping block. She would also like to eliminate the Broadway hit The Producers along with the Nutcracker Suite ballet, while other feminists have called for censoring Gone with the Wind for its supposed depiction of “marital rape.”
CNN: ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ Is ‘Inherently Sexist,’ Should Be ‘Retired’
by Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D.
25 Dec 2017
http://www.breitbart.com/big-govern...ful-life-inherently-sexist-should-be-retired/
It never occurs to feminazis to give individuals a choice —— watch or do not watch —— read or do not read.
Socialists laid it on with a trowel. All the good people are like George Bailey, everybody else is a villain.
Liberals always spout their garbage under the guise of making a better world for the future. It is a simple matter for the government to prevent performing a ballet, but I have to ask which method Costello will employ to prevent everyone from listening to the music?
Logically, Costello & Company will have to “retire” every record and record player along with every musical instrument. If that does not work they will have to make infants deaf for life as soon as they are born.
Collectivism is not self-help in a welfare state unless helping yourself to tax dollars counts as thrift and progress. It sure as hell is Communism when everybody else is forced to pay for it. It started decades ago with public housing that turned into crime-ridden slums. The original Socialist scheme evolved into guarantying millions of mortgages given to people who could not pay the mortgages let alone maintain a home.
Millions of new homeowners were supposed to pay property taxes to state and local governments in addition to putting upward pressure on the residential real estate market. What the country got was another failed collectivist scheme when existing homes lost equity, and damn few unqualified buyers paid property taxes with money they earned in the private sector. They got the houses but not the jobs to pay for them. Not even George Baily could bail them out.
Finally, since this thread started about a movie, I suggest everybody watch Major Barbara to get a good dose of G.B. Shaw’s collectivist utopia. George Bailey was a flaming capitalist compared to the horseshit in that one.
