The nominees were ...
- Frank Capra, It Happened One Night
- Victor Schertzinger, One Night of Love
- W.S. Van Dyke, The Thin Man
... when they should have been ...
And the Oscar went to ...
 |
| Frank came up and got it |
 |
| Capra with Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable |
I have no problem with this choice. I love Hawks and Lubitsch more, of course, and Capra's sentimental populism goes crosswise with me. (Honestly, am I the only one who puts It's a Wonderful Life alongside Forrest Gump at the top of his list of Movies I Hope I Never Have to Watch Again?) To my mind, everything Capra did after It Happened One Night is a long slide downhill into intellectual, political, and moral chaos. But except for the busload of passengers singing "The Man on the Flying Trapeze," there is little in IHON that foreshadows Capra's degeneration into mush-headedness. I'd like to think that it's because he had wonderful actors like Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable to work with, but Gary Cooper, James Stewart, Barbara Stanwyck, and Jean Arthur are at least as good -- if not better. Some may think it's screenwriter Robert Riskin's fault, but screenwriter Philip Dunne put it more convincingly: "Frank provided the schmaltz and Bob provided the acid." And it was Capra who finally judged the proportion of schmaltz to acid. In later life, Capra was even reluctant to admit that Riskin had anything to do with the success of his films. Riskin was a good New Deal liberal, after all, and Capra headed off into the kind of libertarianism that cozies up with the right wing. Anyway, Riskin had nothing to do with the somewhat hysterical Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and the sticky fantasy of It's a Wonderful Life. Still, let's give Capra the nod for his one great film and its huge influence on the golden age of romantic comedy.
No comments:
Post a Comment