Point/Counterpoint
It's a Wonderful Point/Counterpoint

This originally appeared at the Online Film Critics Society in December 1999, back when I was still a member; my cohort Dan Jardine still is. The article seems to have disappeared since the OFCS joined forces with Rotten Tomatoes.

IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is one of the most beloved Christmas fantasies of all time. Dan Jardine and MaryAnn Johanson uncover its darker sides -- from opposite points of view.

What is the enduring appeal of that most Capra-corny of Christmas movies, IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE? Let's take a closer look at the film, and see if we can determine the elements that conspire to make this a classic.
The actors, of course, are uniformly terrific. It is hard to imagine a more sinister figure than Lionel Barrymore as Potter, nor a more appealingly subsuming performance than Jimmy Stewart's. Lastly, Donna Reed absolutely glows -- it is as if she has swallowed the moon and its beams are radiating out of her fingertips. The film also has a progressive social conscience, evidenced by the (at least temporary) defeat of Potter's materialistic values by the spiritual kinship of the good working people who live in Bedford Falls. Potter's desire to subjugate the poor, to keep the "lazy rabble" under his thumb so they can be moulded into a "thrifty working class" is defeated by a brotherhood of like-minded working-class people, who refuse to let Potter's values triumph. This gives us a clear sign of the social conscience lying beneath the surface of this All-American story. Simply put, people like George Bailey live better, more rewarding lives than the soul-sick Potter. The life-affirming themes certainly cut both wide and deep. The casual viewer will be drawn in by the film's appeal to small-town American values, as well as the undeniably wonderful aw-shucks performance of Jimmy Stewart in the lead role. The surface message of the film, that everyone is important, that our lives make a difference, that every action has a potentially profound effect on the world, only touches the surface of what is really going on in this film.
But, buried just beneath the surface, there is a darker force at work in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE as well, and I don't just mean Henry "Ebenezer" Potter. (On a separate note, it is clear that the characters tap into literary archetypes that speak to audiences across the ages. George Bailey is a small-town Everyman, while the supercilious malevolence of Henry Potter is a direct descendant of the aforementioned Scrooge, but look a little more closely and it isn't hard to see Potter as Beelzebub, Flibbertigibbet, the Prince of Darkness with a poisoned apple. Uncle Billy is the Village Idiot and the sweet Clarence Oddbody, Angel Second Class [AS2=ASS?] is the Beatific Idiot Savant, or perhaps even more aptly the Infant Redeemer.) The slightly sinister side of the story centres on the lost and abandoned dreams of an intelligent, ambitious protagonist. The defeat of George Bailey's youthful refusal to be domesticated and tamed, his desire to shake off the dust of his crummy hometown, see the world and build cities to the sky is what really leads to his suicidal urges.
This is the darkness on the edge of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE that we can find some spiritual and intellectual depth in what would otherwise be a relatively simple (though beautiful) fable. Add to this the realisation that Potter remains on his throne at the end of this film, unpunished and unrepentant, and you have the makings for a much darker film than the casual viewer may at first apprehend. The darkness visible at the edges of this film is ominous. George Bailey's despair is deep: he really believes that the world would be better if he had not been born. In a scene that echoes an earlier scene when George was battered around by old man Potter, George similarly attacks poor dim-witted Uncle Billy for misplacing the $8,000 deposit -- hinting to us that George, like Gower, is not of his right mind. Confirming this is his despicable behaviour when he gets home. George explodes in anger as his daughter plays "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing," rages at one and all, and eventually exclaims, "You call this a happy family? Why did we have all these kids?" leading Mary to ask open-endedly, "Why don't you..." Later, when he is punched in the mouth moments after praying for help, George cynically notes, "That's what you get for praying." His moral and spiritual descent is complete, and suicide seems an inevitable, tragic but logical conclusion to his plight.
George is left staring into an icy and swirling body of water, seconds away from throwing away "God's Greatest Gift" (the title of the short story on which this movie is based), his life. However, before George has a chance to act on this impulse, Clarence Oddbody throws himself in the river. Faced with an emergency, George reverts to more natural, instinctive behaviour and he leaps into the water and saves Clarence. Even in the depths of despair, as always, George looks past himself and does the right thing. The fact that George is a man who always does the right thing, and ultimately (though not before nearly giving into despair) learns that it is through such self-sacrifice that one finds happiness and meaning in this world provides more evidence of why the film touches us. George abandons hopes of going to university so his brother can do so, he abandons hopes of travelling around the world in order to save the Building and Loan (not to mention all the homes his company has built, and the happy lives of the families that live in them), he surrenders the money for his honeymoon in order to keep the B and L from a bank run. George's generosity of spirit appears to have no bounds. The youthful George dreams of doing something big, making something important, while the mature George realises that he has been doing this all along. This must touch the hearts of the thousands (millions?) of men and women whose lives are spent in toil that may seem mighty insignificant when placed in a much larger global context. Indeed, who among us wouldn't want to be told that our lives touch as many lives as that of a George Bailey?
The death of George's father and Potter's carnivorous plottings force George to succumb to the realisation that it is in this small town, with its broken down building and loan, and with Mary, a small-town beauty, that his future lies. The scene where George is nearly tempted by Potter is a classic scene of serpentine proportions. It is only the oily residue of Potter's handshake that reminds George that the measure of one's life is not material success. Potter is dismissed as nothing more than a scurvy little spider in the vast configuration of things, righting the impending inversion of world values. Unlike Adam, George resists temptation. However, like the satanic figure he resembles, Potter lives on at film's end. George may have won this battle, but the war goes on.
In the end, George Bailey is, like the saint whose name he shares, a slayer of dragons, a champion of the little guy, defender of the poor and the meek, standing firm against the avaricious, evil consumptiveness of Henry Potter. Like his father, George is the biggest man in Bedford Falls, even though he is far from the wealthiest.
To finish, let me offer to you all the blessing delivered by Mary to a family whose life has been made better by the actions of George Bailey: "Bread, that this house may never know hunger. Salt, that life may always have flavor. Wine, that joy and prosperity may reign forever."

Christmas Eve in black-and-white. Snow falls softly over a picture-postcard American town. A man, thoroughly despondent and unaware of the extent of his influence to the good on the people around him, contemplates suicide in the midst of this peaceful scene.
No, it's not IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE. I'm talking about Frank Capra's classic MEET JOHN DOE, released five years earlier in 1941. It's not traditionally considered a Christmas movie, and yet it's at least as deserving of that status as LIFE -- and maybe even more deserving.
IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE isn't a terrible film by any means, and it's easy to see why people revere it. An ordinary man sees the life of adventure and travel he hoped for constantly thwarted but eventually learns to love the pleasant life he does have. Cherish what you have, is the movie's message. Count your blessings. Who could argue with those aphorisms?
And that, maybe, is my problem with IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE: it's too easy. Its two main characters -- George Bailey (James Stewart) and Mr. Potter (Lionel Barrymore) -- are stereotypes, respectively, of the poor, eternally put-upon ordinary guy and the mean-spirited, rich old bastard. The conflicts the film sets up couldn't be more black-and-white -- and I'm not talking about the film stock.
George Bailey may think the deck is heavily stacked against him his entire life, but the audience can see that it isn't. Sure, everything that can possibly go wrong for poor George does -- he's forced to skip his long-planned summer in Europe, ends up passing up his dreamed-of college career, doesn't get to have an exciting time during WWII like the other men in his town do (and how likely is that?), and even has to cancel his honeymoon. But he does it all in the cause of the eternal battle his family -- which runs the local building and loan society, serving the working-class people of Bedford Falls -- has waged against Potter's bank. Potter, the "richest and meanest man in the county," is a direct descendant of Ebenezer Scrooge, cutting po' workin' folk no slack and constantly on the lookout for a way to buy just about the last thing in Bedford Falls he doesn't own: Bailey Building & Loan.
George's suicide attempt, of course, gets him the attention of an angel looking to earn his wings, who shows George what an awful place Bedford Falls would have been if George had never been born. George has his famous change of heart after seeing what a wonderful life he has lead... but something about this has always bothered me, too, and I've just realized what it is: George deferred and eventually lost all his dreams in order to help other people fulfill their dreams. A noble cause, surely, and helping others is certainly something we should all be doing... to an extent. But who's gonna help poor George realize his dreams?
It bothers me, too, that Potter -- whose sneaky act is finally what drives George to suicide -- gets no comeuppance and suffers no consequences as a result of his contemptible act. Sure, we're supposed to see Potter as a loser because he has no friends -- unlike George, beloved by the entire town -- but Potter seems quite happy with himself.
Remember that "alternate ending" of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE that SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE came up with years ago? George never finds out what happened to that $8,000 that nearly ruined him, and the film ends on a happy note when the townspeople pitch in to raise the money. SNL's ending was a little darker: Someone discovers that Potter has George's money, and so we're treated to the spectacle of Dana Carvey as Jimmy Stewart leading a lynch mob: "Well, let's get 'im!" Carvey's George cries. That's more the ending I'd like to see.
I like a bit of edge, even at Christmastime -- I can't help it. And it is actually possible to find that in a seasonal Capra movie: MEET JOHN DOE. While IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE feels dated, MEET JOHN DOE is still startlingly relevant today, nearly 60 years after it was first released.
In a publicity stunt to boost circulation, the corporate owners of THE NEW BULLETIN newspaper go along with columnist Barbara Stanwyck's hoax: She created "John Doe," a homeless, unemployed man "disgusted with civilization" who says he's going to commit suicide on Christmas Eve by jumping off the city hall building. When the published "letter" provokes a public outcry -- offers of jobs and places to live and pleadings not to kill himself -- the newspaper brings in a ringer (Gary Cooper) to "play" John Doe while Stanwyck keeps pumping out protest letters for the paper to run. Doe's rants against corruption in politics, the lack of decency in world, and the like inspire people, first locally and then nationwide, to take an interest in their neighbors and make their towns a better place to live.
But nefarious things are going on behind the scenes. While the first John Doe Clubs spring up grassroots style, the media magnate (Edward Arnold) who owns the BULLETIN soon gets his corporation involved in ensuring that the clubs are everywhere across the country. He has political ambitions and plans to use the John Doe Clubs to send him to the White House.
MEET JOHN DOE could be remade today, and you'd barely need to change a word to have it still strike home. Corporate misbehavior, media circuses, consumerism, and wealthy fat-cats thinking they can speak for ordinary people -- all things we unfortunately recognize today. And the film's morality is a lot more complicated than LIFE's, too -- when Cooper threatens to expose Arnold's plans, Arnold sets him back with this: At least Arnold believes in what he's doing. John Doe is a fake. It's a much more tangled dilemma -- and much more realistic one -- that drives "John Doe" to contemplate suicide than George Bailey faced.
And while it can be called a paean to the little guy -- just as IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is -- MEET JOHN DOE is a lot more pragmatic. In the national radio speech that sends Doe's stock skyrocketing, Doe says that the average man "is inherently honest but has a streak of larceny in his heart."
Pessimistic? Maybe. But a lot more believable than the practically sainted working-class people of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE.

Dan: Your essay was an interesting read, but I'll start off this exchange with a couple of questions.
First, you complain that George Bailey is a stereotype, while I have suggested that he is an archetype (a subtle but important distinction. One's a cliché, the other a figure of depth built out of a rich literary heritage). If George is a stereotype, he would have no depth. Don't you think that his "dark night of the soul" indicates his richness of character? His despair is real. Would a cartoon cutout consider suicide?
Second, you say that the film is "too easy" in its depiction of good vs. evil, George vs. Potter. However, you also argue that it is a letdown that Potter doesn't get punished for his evil doing. Aren't these stances in some way self-contradictory? Wouldn't the story be far too neat and tidy, too pat, if Potter was destroyed at the film's end? Also, if you look closer at the film, I think you will see that the seeds of his destruction have been sown. Remember the scene where his minion is pointing to all the new houses being built by the Bailey Building and Loan? The underling suggests that soon "this bright young man will find himself working for the Bailey Building and Loan." The implication is clear: Potter's empire is being eroded gradually but incessantly by the Building and Loan. At the end of the film Potter may not receive an overt comeuppance, but besides being left alone to gag on his own stench, he is left with the knowledge that his position of town oligarch is doomed. His spiritual rot will be matched by a material one.
MaryAnn: Your essay gave me a lot to think about, but I keep coming back to the same thing I always feel about the movie: that it's Depression Era pabulum meant to make the deprived masses feel good about being poor. (The postwar boom hadn't kicked in yet when the film was first released in 1946, and rationing was still in effect in many places, so I think it's fair to call it a product of the Depression Era.) I think the fact that the movie tanked initially (it's only the endless TV reruns that made it a classic later) might have something to do with audiences refusing to buy the idea that there's anything ennobling about being poor -- or that there's something inherently corrupting about being rich.
That's what I was talking about when I mentioned the easy depiction of good and evil: money is bad, poverty is good here. I don't think it's contradictory at all to then complain that Potter goes unpunished, because it seems to me that we're supposed to see Potter as punished merely by dint of the fact that he is alone. His comeuppance is that he's rich, this sort of twisted logic goes, because look what money does to you: it makes you a bad person. I don't buy into this idea, and I don't think a lot of other people do, either, which is why I don't see Potter as punished, though the filmmakers obviously do.
My comments about George come from the same complaint. Maybe if he did actually commit suicide, I could agree that he's more than just a stereotype. You're absolutely right when you say that it's the loss of his dreams -- not the loss of the money -- that drives George to suicide. But you seem to think that losing these dreams isn't such a bad thing. I think giving up one's dreams is probably the saddest thing a person can do.
It's interesting that you chose these words: "youthful refusal to be domesticated and tamed" in describing George, because it occurs to me that the kind of self-sacrifices George makes are in many ways like those that women did make -- particularly at the time the film is set -- as they became "domesticated" by husbands and children and homes. How many women gave up -- still give up, sometimes -- even attempts to pursue dreams of careers and travel because those aren't things women are supposed to do? I've known too many women who've been forced to make sacrifices like these -- like George's -- and these women haven't learned that, to quote you, "it is through such self-sacrifice that one finds happiness and meaning in this world." Nobody can make the kinds of sacrifices George makes and not be bitter.
Dan: This is the strongest point you have made in your attack on this film's themes (we can argue all day along about our personal preferences for optimistic/pessimistic messages, but in the end that is a frivolous, self-indulgent exercise), but I believe that you are misinterpreting the film's messages.
You say the film is telling us to just keep shufflin' along, be content with our lot, know (and accept) our place. You contend that the movie mouths platitudes like "poverty is ennobling" and "money is corrupting."
I would counter those arguments this way: the film is suggesting that materialism -- or, more conventionally a love of money (not the money itself) is corrupting and degrading. Potter is an evil man not because he is rich, but because he covets money. He is willing to debase people in order to get more of it. He is a satanic figure not because of his wealth, but because he behaves inhumanely in order to acquire it.
Also, I don't think you can really defend the view that the film is encouraging the poor to simply accept their poverty, be happy with what they have. That is the point of the Bailey Building and Loan: it provides an opportunity for those less fortunate to escape the clutches of money-grubbing Potter, to begin the gradual process of improving their conditions. George Bailey himself provides the counter argument to your suggestion that the film encourages people to accept their subjugation: Potter, the evil one, proposes that poor folk need to be kept in line, under the wealthy one's thumb, in order to create a "thrifty working class." If you give them the means to escaping their poverty (as Bailey Building and Loan does, in its own little way by helping people developing the sense of self-worth that comes from having a home they can call their own), you are -- according to Potter -- creating a "discontented rabble." Only if you ascribe to Potter's view of the world can you say that this film promotes the view that the poor should simply be happy that they aren't rich.
Finally, you renew your suggestion that Potter goes unpunished at film's end. Three points: one, isn't it more realistic that Potter goes unpunished (how often are the wealthy punished for misdeeds in real life? Doesn't this sort of ending fit more in with your preference for cynicism?). Two, it is important to realise that just because George has managed to come out on top in this battle, the war is neverending. If the film promotes stark contrast between good and evil, it is because the movie exists on the same exalted plane as other great works that explore similarly grand themes. Works like the Book of Genesis, John Milton's PARADISE LOST, or Dickens's A CHRISTMAS CAROL all look at the conflict between Good and Evil. Does that make these works simplistic? IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE is more modest in scope than the first two works I mention, but is certainly in the same league as Dickens's novella, and I don't see anything wrong with drawing a stark contrast between these two forces (good/evil) in a work of fiction. Besides which, I reiterate my claim that George is not a cardboard figure, that his despair is profound, deep and real. Three, I would argue that Henry Potter will be punished, and not in the simple "unlike George he has no friends, so how rewarding can his life really be" way that you suggest. As I mentioned in my essay, Potter's material destruction is inevitable. The Building and Loan is gradually eating away at his empire. Every person who escapes from Potter's Field and buys a house through the B and L is diminishing his wealth, one nickel at a time. Potter's spiritual punishment is to live alone, but a material punishment -- the one he would recognise as real -- is also imminent.
The most potent point you have made in rebuttal, in my opinion, is in regards to George's surrender of his youthful dreams of travel and career. As you note, to give up one's dreams is the saddest thing a person can do. But I don't think George has given up his dreams: I think he has realised them.
In our youth we are full of hubris. We want to see the world, conquer it, rebuild it in our image. Doris Lessing's short story "A Sunrise on the Veldt" looks at this phenomenon and exposes its solipsism. Her hero leaps into the African veldt every morning to go hunting. He sees himself as bigger than the world, he contains the world, he can make of it what he wants. However, when he witnesses the grisly death of a young antelope -- perhaps due to negligence on his part -- he realises that the world is vast, in which he must find his place. He has certain responsibilities, he cannot behave as if he was "king of the world." He is a part of it, not superior to it.
George Bailey's youthful ambitions are the dreams of just such a figure: one who wants to rebuild the world in his image. The energy and enthusiasm of such ambition is to be applauded. However, the egocentrism of such pursuits is not. As George matures, he realises that he is part of the world, not superior to it. He is part of the human community, with certain responsibilities to it -- particularly when he sees the vulnerability of his community in the face of Potter's malevolence. George comes to realise that his real dreams can come to fruition in his role as a humble small-town director of a building and loan. It is the immature George who slaps Billy around, screams at his kids and storms out into the blizzard that dark night. It is the mature George who discovers that one's dreams need not be quite so grandiose to be meaningful and satisfying.
MaryAnn: I might be able to buy the idea that the film is suggesting that materialism, and not money, is corrupting if there was a character in the movie who was both wealthy and a good person. But the only image of money we have is of Potter. And, maybe, George's brother... But note that scene in which the brother -- with, tellingly, a new wife -- comes to visit George in his brand spanking new car. The brother left town to pursue his dreams -- college, then a job with the first wife's father -- which obviously rewarded him well, financially speaking, but I can't help but linger on that contrast of the brother and the new young wife in her fur and jewels, and George and Mary driving off in their old jalopy. The brother may be rich, but he obviously can't settle down with one nice girl. Money may not have made him a bad person, but it has perhaps made him subvert the traditional values of family and home that the film espouses.
I see your point that George is helping people escape financial poverty, but there's a big difference between being rich and merely having a roof over your head. Many a point is made in the film about how substandard Potter's housing was. His tenants turn to Bailey Building and Loan as much to get a decent place to live as to have something they can call their own. Bailey's customers do now own something, true, but they'll likely struggle just as hard to pay for it as they did to pay Potter's rents. Of course it's better to struggle for something that's yours than for something that isn't. But it's still a hard life.
There's also a poverty of the spirit -- and this ties in with your argument that George's dreams aren't defeated but are actually realized. Maybe it's just the hubris of my (relative) youth, but I see George's epiphany more of a transference of his dreams than a realization of them. It may make George happy to come to terms with himself and his life -- and I think this is a huge part of the appeal of the film, because most people find themselves in the same situation of George, seeing the dreams of their youth slip away -- but I can't help but see that as a "giving in," as a defeat. I'll probably feel different in 20 years, when my dreams end up unfulfilled, but I can't feel that now.
Finally, it may be more realistic that Potter goes unpunished, but this is not a realistic movie. Mixing cynicism and uplifting fantasy doesn't quite work for me. And in the other works that you name -- particularly A CHRISTMAS CAROL, which I think has the most in common with IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE -- the evil does not go unexamined and unchanged. I think that's a key difference. Potter never comes to any realization about himself, as George does about himself.
All that said, you've made me see this movie in a new light, even where I don't agree with you. Thanks for that.
Dan: I think you undermined your point here by bringing George's brother Harry into the fray. In the scene that you refer to Harry is introducing this lovely young woman as his wife, so clearly Capra believes that you can have material success without a Potter-like corruption of the soul. Harry, of course, turns out also to be a war hero so he is obviously not destroyed by material success. I don't see how has he subverted the values that the film espouses -- he merely accentuates the point that Potter is evil not because he is materially successful, but because of the way he has become successful.
Capra was certainly no social revolutionary. His films do not espouse radical, violent overthrow of the corrupt system, but rather a slow reformation from within. Still, his commitment to communal values and a belief that real happiness comes from a sense of contributing to the overall well-being of the society rather than an egotistical indulgence in one's personal material wealth is a refreshing one is a society that reveres personal accomplishments at the expense of the communal good. (Look at who we heroize: megalomaniacs like Bill Gates and Donald Trump. How is their wealth acquired? The same way Potter's is.)
Life for the citizens of Bedford Falls may be only slightly better materially in Bailey Park (vs. Potter's Fields), but it is immensely more rewarding in a spiritual sense. These folks have a sense of belonging, a sense of community, that people like Potter will never have.
As for our personal interpretations of George's fate (has he given up his dreams or transcended his youthful egoism and transformed them into something far more rewarding?), I submit that when you become a white, middle-aged man like George (and me), you'll change your tune!
Thanks for giving me the opportunity to defend this film. Your insightful criticisms have forced me to closely examine the values that the movie is propagating, and led me to a deeper appreciation of its message. We may disagree on the film, but I must say that you have been a more than worthy adversary. Thanks for giving me this forum to bleat my ideas. I hope we can do this again some day.
MaryAnn: Two points that I can't let get by:
When Harry returns from college and brings his wife with him -- that scene at the train station -- yes, she is clearly introduced as his wife. But when we see him again, years later, at Bailey Park, he is with another young woman. That's what I was referring to -- that kind of instability. Hardly evil, but not exactly the homey "norm" of the Baileys.
Do you really think anyone considers Gates and Trump heroes? Some may envy their superwealth, but I don't think the public consensus sees them as nice people.
Dan: Whether the public sees Gates and Trump as nice guys is irrelevant -- but it would make an interesting question on an opinion poll. I have a feeling they are more popular than you think.
People certainly envy their wealth -- and don't spend much time questioning their methods of acquiring it. As a society, we spend very little mental energy examining the truly selfish nature of wealth. The individual acquisition of vast fortune is possible only if there are thousands, millions who do not have enough. The lionization of wealth as a social goal completely ignores the implication on the social fabric: for me to be rich means that others must be poor -- perhaps not those in my neighbourhood, but somewhere in the global village. Hence, the pursuit and acquisition of personal wealth is communally divisive, not uniting. This is the point made by Capra, and one I wholly subscribe to.

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