Great Directors-Frank Capra

Great Directors - Frank Capra

"My films must let every man, women and child know that God loves them, that I love them and that peace and salvation will become a reality only when they all learn to love one another."

These are the words of Frank Capra when he was asked to describe what his film were really all about.

Frank Capra was truly a one off as a director - he made movies to a 'theme'.

His theme was usually about the underdog (male or female) who fought the higher powers or bureaucracy and won through.

Frank Capra is also one of the most successful directors of the 'golden age' of Hollywood but his insistence on sticking to his 'theme' ultimately led to his being out of step with what cinema audiences were looking for and so his career before the second world war is like an amazing, vibrant burst of fireworks in the Hollywood skies whilst most of his movies after World War II are not.

So for this article, I will not concentrate on the movies after the war.

I would like to celebrate Frank Capra's movies. This article is not a dissection of his career - it is too complex, too strange and rather sad to contemplate his talent not being appreciated after the war. He was still a talented director but he was no longer a successful one.

So this is an homage to Frank Capra's greatest movies.

Frank Capra - Did Art Imitate Life?

Frank Capra was king of the underdog movie so it is hardly surprising to learn that he saw himself as something of an underdog in real life.

His family came to the USA from Sicily when he was six years old, travelling in steerage on a ship with nothing to their names except the clothes on their back and a small amount of start-up money. Capra many times described the journey to the USA as one of the darkest moments of his life, but he also qualifies this with his description of first seeing the Statue of Liberty and of his heart rising and of feeling that he would be protected by her and his family would be safe in this new land.

So Frank Capra started with nothing and he had to make his own way in life.

Perhaps his own life informed his movies - it's something for which we should be grateful; he made some amazing movies.

Platinum Blonde - 1931

Platinum Blonde, in essence is a sequel to It Happened One Night made 3 years earlier than that movie. Jean Harlow is feisty and unpredictable as the sister of Robert William's latest paparazzi victim.

Harlow and Williams marry against everyone's wishes and eventually it all unravels as Harlow starts to overpower her husband.

He falls for Loretta Young and Harlow is dumped.

The movie was meant to be a vehicle for the up and coming Loretta Young and was originally called 'Gallagher', the name of Loretta Young's character. Capra changed the name of the movie when he saw Harlow's potential (she basically stole the show with her performance) and Loretta Young was furious.

The movie's male lead, Robert Williams, died of a ruptured appendix a month after the movie was released. He was 37. Jean Harlow died 6 years later at the height of her fame, she was 26.

It Happened One Night - 1934

In 1934, It Happened One Night won all 5 of the major Oscars, quite a feat for what was, essentially, a screwball comedy. I don't think many people would argue with the assertion that comedies don't generally win the day at the Oscars but this one did.

It owes its success to amazing chemistry between its two leads, Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable. Gable is the smart-alec, worldly-wise journo to Colbert's spoilt little rich girl on the run from her objectionable daddy.

The eary part of the movie sets the scene with Gable's character, Peter Warne losing the last seat on a greyhound bus to Colbert's spirited, rich girl, Ellie Andrews.

They end up sharing the seat much to both's unrest and discomfort. The next morning they bicker at breakfast and take longer than they should, leading to the bus leaving without them.

What then ensues in basically a road-movie starring a pair of opposites in personality type.

This movie set the pace for screwball comedies to come with opposites thrown together by circumstances (usually amusing,rich girl and laconic, witty, world-weary guy) and hot on its heels came movies like The Philadelphia Story, Pat and Mike, Bringing Up Baby and latterly movies like Valentine's Day.

Think on this, the movie is now almost 80 years old and it shines as brightly now as it did in 1934. It is sad to think that few romantic comedies now give an equal comic status to the female role as the male.

This movie got everything right, it was funny, mildly risque, fast-paced and best of all, romantic.

The 'walls of Jericho' references and scenes all seem anachronistic now but I can see why audiences laughed at them in 1934.

Capra's lightness of touch is evident throughout, he left it to the script and the actors to make the movie what it was but the movie is littered with references to the great depression happening at the time, lowly individuals hanging around the bus stations, characters eating one egg and one donut for breakfast because that is all they could afford and in one scene we are treated to one person beginning to sing 'The Man On The Flying Trapeze' who is then joined by everyone on the bus - Capra giving us a sense of communal 'happiness' in dark and desperate times.

Incredibly, Gable and Colbert had to be talked into making the movie because they saw it as a 'bus movie' and didn't believe it would be popular with audiences.

In fact, it turned out to be just what people needed, it is uplifting to see 2 people struggling across the country during the depression and it is love which rises above everything to unite them and make their surroundings insignificant. Classic Capra!

Mr Deeds Goes To Town - 1936

In Mr Deeds Goes To Town, Capra gives us likeable country bumpkin, Longfellow Deeds (Gary Cooper) being left 20 million dollars by a rich uncle who is accidently killed.

Deeds is presented as an already successful man on his uppers with little need for the money.

When he inherits, it is almost like the money is a burden so he sets to work to try and give it away to good causes. Taken to New York by his lawyer, it isn't long before the press are chasing this man from the country ('yokel') who seems intent on philanthropy on a grand scale.

Enter 'Babe' Bennett played by Jean Arthur, a wise-cracking journalist who ends up pretending to faint near Deeds so she can get his story for her own paper. She publishes his stories and they become front page news. Her prize from her boss for this achievement will be a week's paid vacation. Deeds is delighted to have been there to help Babe in her moment of distress (her fake faint).

Deeds is certain this is fate and that he was meant to save this 'woman in distress'.

Eventually, her own small-town background, long lost thanks to her work in New York begins to rise back into her mind thanks to her close association with Deeds.

He reminds her of her father and his views on the world begin to resonate with those of her past and her own country upbringing.

Capra is at it again with his 'theme' - always, against the odds and even when a guy gets rich, Capra turned this good fortune on everyone around him. Selfishness and wealth is secondary to goodness and sharing with others.

In this movie, Thoreau is quoted a number of times - a reference to Thoreau's philosophy about every part of mankind having its own purpose.

Inevitably, Babe Bennett falls for Longfellow Deeds because he is a good man, a loving man who appreciates her for who she is. Mr Deeds Goes To Town is really about remembering to scratch the surface when trying to get to know who a person really in, it's not all about wealth, goods, looks etc, reality goes deeper than that, humanity is as deep as the ocean.

It is also about the goodness of 'small town' America, a theme Capra would return to in later movies.

Mr Smith Goes To Washington - 1939

Frank Capra returned to form with this movie after the less successful Lost Horizons which was, as a fantasy style movie, something of a departure from his normal fare.

Mr Smith Goes To Washington starred Jimmy Stewart and was the movie which catapulted him to movie stardom as a leading man after a few near misses. He made this movie in the same year as the hit Western comedy, 'Destry Rides Again' and the double success was enough to secure Stewart the pick of the leading roles going forward.

1939 is often acknowledged as the 'greatest' movie year during the golden age of Hollywood and although it was outscored at the Oscars by Gone With The Wind, it did receive 10 nominations to Gone With The Wind's 11, not bad for another of Capra's 'small town guy makes good' movies.

Jefferson Smith is the poor 'sap' chosen by his peers for the Senate when an elderly senator dies. They hope to use him as a mere puppet, to do their will, not realising that the man from Montana is driven by goodness and fairness.

Mr Smith Goes To Washington is more than a human parable though. It had been doing the rounds of Hollywood studios for years with no boss brave enough to take on its overt criticism of political systems. By 1939, Columbia bit the bullet and gave the movie to Capra.

He didn't disappoint with an excellent movie led by an ensemble cast seemingly perfectly at home with the movie's big theme of political corruption. Capra let his actors go with the sparky dialogue, and it is thanks to excellent performances from Stewart, Arthur et al, imbued with emotion and feelings, that the movie proved to be one of the biggest successes of 1939.

Before its release, the Film Board of Control asked Harry Cohn to remove certain elements of the movie which might suggest wide-scale corruption in the senate and he was asked to edit scenes where the senate were referred to as 'performing monkeys'. Cohn did ask Capra to edit out some of the references but left in enough to preserve the movie's pace and theme.

Mr Smith Goes To Washington did have its fair share of Capra's corniness - small town goodness, the small guy winning over on the big stage, the wise crackng girl getting her guy but as always, he does it with consummate ease. The acting rises above the themes, the theme is used to underpin the human story and is carries off with some style.

Meet John Doe - 1941

Meet John Doe was Frank Capra's attempt at an independent movie at a time when that was frowned upon. He once again used Robert Riskin as his script writer; the two men clearly shared an agenda about the human race as Meet John Doe is another of Capra's parables on the small guy making good over society, bureaucracy and the press.

This is old stomping ground in many repects and is not a far remove from Mr Deeds Goes To Town.

It stars Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwych in the lead roles; this time Cooper is a bush-league player down on his luck who is talked into playing a fictional suicidal man created by Stanwych's journalist, Ann Mitchell, in her newspaper column.

What started as a joke by Mitchell, to get her own back on her boss firing her takes on a life of its own as Cooper becomes the voice of the people (albeit a voice provided by Mitchell).

A politician can see the effect John Doe has on the people and decides to use Doe as a political pawn - this is when things begin to get a little murky. Doe has been heard on the radio and in the newspapers by the populace at large and soon 'John Doe Clubs' spring up around the nation leading to further publicity for Mitchell's previously failing paper.

John Doe covers a lot of Capra's old ground but is still an enjoyable movie because of his knack of choosing excellent casts to take on his sparky dialogue.

Cooper is as smooth as ever as John Doe and as we see the demise of this good man in the light of bad influences from outsiders, Cooper continues to be believable. Stanwych provides excellent support as Ann Mitchell's misguided but inherently good journalist.

This movie was Capra's last thematic type movie; he started to go off in other directions with his movies, but he wasn't quite finished yet.

Arsenic and Old Lace - 1944

Frank Capra took on an out and out comedy farce in Arsenic and Old Lace and somehow made it work.

As a movie, it has not aged well but in 1944 it was a huge hit, mainly thanks to the melding of horror and comedy, a relatively new idea at the time.

Arsenic and Old Lace was based on a hit stage play with lots of fast paced dialogue and much over the top acting, all typical of a farce.

Sadly, whilst this works on stage, it doesn't work as well on the movie screen.

Cary Grant was actively encouraged by Capra to let fly but he is completely over the top, missing all of his usual subtlety as a comic actor. That said, Raymond Massey is very good in a Karloffesque turn as Grant's brother Jonathon, himself a mass murderer.

Peter Lorre offers a good cameo as Dr Einstein and the two sweet old ladies, Josephine Hull and Jean Adair playing the murderous aunts, add to an excellent ensemble cast.

In spite of Grant's OTT performance, the movie was a hit. Capra had gone off in a different direction with this movie and it had worked in spite of its shortcomings.

Capra actually made the movie very quickly in 1941 and was duly paid $100,000 for doing so. He needed to do this because he went to war. The money was to support his family whilst he was on active service.

The film was released in 1944, 3 years after it was made; this was in agreement with the film's rights.

It's A Wonderful Life - 1946

Frank Capra made this movie after World War Two and it was, like his earlier movies, a tale of a small-town guy taking on a bigger power and winning through.

George Bailey is the bank manager in his town of Bedford Falls. He has lived there all of his life, married a local girl and is raising his children there.

His family are well-respected and he had achieved everything with nothing more than being an honest, straight up guy.

When his bank books fall $8,000 short when audited, his whole life begins to fall apart. He cannot explain how this has happens and it is not long before his desperation leads him to consider ending his own life.

Enter Clarence, George's angel, only too eager to gain his wings after a less than successful angelhood apprenticeship.

The rest is history, It's A Wonderful life has become one of the greatest feel good movies of all time.

But it wasn't always so - Frank Capra made this movie, feeling that he was onto another of his winners. Indeed, it was nominated for the Best Film Oscar but lost out to The Best Years Of Our Lives.

It's A Wonderful Life was only moderately successful at the box office and sadly, it also represents the end of Frank Capra's career in terms of it being out and out successful.

So it seems like with It's A Wonderful Life, Capra went out with a whimper not a bang; thankfully history tells a different story.

Even now, It's A Wonderful Life is considered one of the most popular movies of all time. It has stood the test of time even when other similar movies have come behind it.

It is Capra's' best small town guy makes good movie and it is ageless in its theme - nothing can keep a good man down.

George Bailey may have need a little bit of 'divine' intervention to get him through his particular crisis but he still has us all rooting for him.

Look at the video I have included of George Bailey's prayer, it is 46 seconds of Frank Capra bringing his camera closer, closer, closer and closer to George Bailey's face. He gets in so close that you can feel what George Bailey feels - and your heart aches.

That was Frank Capra's secret - he tapped into his audience, he tapped into all of our own human emotions and made us feel an affinity with his central characters. We were there with George Bailey and we felt his pain; but Capra will let us be there at the end as well to feel his joy.