 "Each
man's life touches so many other lives."
There
is a conundrum here. A Christmas cliche, It's a Wonderful Life
has a
reputation as a heart-warming, tear-jerking, 'all's well that
ends
well' favourite. But, it's actually a rather dark film - full of human
weakness, much of it unaffected by the happy
ending. The
view at Christmas Matters
is that the film is popular because of the darkness within it - it
avoids the saccharine quality of many Christmas offerings.
 Many critics find
fault with Capra's work - accusing him
of giving this film a facile message that is summed up in
its title. But, of course, it does not really have a 'count your
blessings' theme at all. 'It's a Wonderful Life' could
actually
more
easily be called 'It's an Incredibly Hard Life'.
What's
important, of course, is how we deal with the difficulties that life
throws at us. George Bailey (James Stewart) is given the gift of
knowing how his community would have been shaped if he had not been
part of it. The rest of us aren't granted this insight but
Capra's message is that we should live life as if we had been.
More than that, we should embrace life & its
complexities
because we cannot know what is around the corner.
And,
significantly for this Christmas film, we don't have to do all this
alone. We have our friends and family around us to help us through. And
this, of course, is another reason when this film is so important to so
many people. It reminds us of what communities have to do to
get along. Other fabulous Christmas films |
