Back in the technological dark ages of the 1970s, an early December highlight was the publication of the bumper Christmas issue of the Radio Times. Like a teenage Old Farmers’ Almanac, the dense small print columns would effectively dictate my waking and sleeping schedule for the upcoming school holidays. In those pre-VCR, pre-DVD, pre-internet streaming days, blockbuster movies would have their brief cinema run and then depart to wander a media wilderness for the next three or four years.
After their contractual exile had expired, the BBC and ITV would then bid to have them return in small screen incarnations just in time for Christmas. Alongside the ‘Big Movie Premieres’ there would always be a supporting cast of evergreen classics; tried and trusted favourites that provided the scaffolding to hang the new TV baubles on. ‘The Wizard of Oz’ on Christmas afternoon (at least three or four times during the 70s), Bond on Boxing Day (preferably Connery), ‘The Great Escape’ sometime between Christmas and New Year, and my personal favourite ‘Zulu’, usually in a late morning slot. These movies were the event television that brought the whole family to the sofa to consume Terry’s Chocolate Oranges by the crateful.
In today’s on-demand media world, event television is restricted to live sports and the periodic ‘Strictly Come Dancin’g or ‘X Factor’ finales. But like a ghost of Christmas past, certain anachronistic traditions remain. In the US there is a roster of beloved kids movies like the 1966 animated version of ‘How The Grinch Stole Christmas’ that serve the same function as ‘The Snowman’ in the UK; a vehicle for intergenerational connection to a treasured memory that parents and grandparents want to share with their kids. For the adults, one of the longest running US Christmas traditions is the screening of Frank Capra’s ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’, a movie that has embedded itself so deeply into the American psyche that numerous surveys have shown it to be the film most associated with Christmas and frequently one of top 10 movies of all time.
Based on the short-story ‘The Greatest Gift’, the movie depicts the life story of George Bailey, a suicidal small-town banker who is redeemed on Christmas Eve by the gift of seeing what his hometown of Bedford Falls would have been like had he never been born. While lauded by the critics and Oscar nominated on its release in 1947, the movie wasn’t a great commercial success, and during the 50s and 60s it disappeared from the public consciousness. But in 1974 a clerical error at Republic Pictures meant that the copyright wasn’t renewed, so for a period of nearly 20 years the movie was in the public domain and free to air. Cash-strapped local TV stations across the country saw an opportunity, and used the movie to pad their Christmas schedules, often showing it multiple times within a few weeks and extending it out to a three-hour time slot with frequent commercial breaks. While its ubiquity in the late 70s and 80s was principally driven by economics, familiarity and repetition helped it become event television and an iconic part of a traditional American Christmas.
Capitalising on its increasing popularity, NBC bought the exclusive broadcast rights in 1994 and installed ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ as a Christmas Eve staple. Having invested in the asset, NBC also set about amplifying its importance as a cultural touchstone through stunts like having President George H W Bush record a commentary to help viewers understand the many ways in which the movie taught them how to be better Americans. Even last year in 2014, this nearly 70-year-old movie won the ratings battle on Christmas Eve. Such is its cultural power that the movie has broken free of the constraints of simple entertainment. At the University of Virginia it is put on constant rotation during exam time to discourage suicides. In 1987, a Florida judge ordered a man to watch the film as part of his sentence for killing his wife, and then attempting suicide, in the hope that it would help him re-evaluate his life.
It’s not hard to see why this somewhat schmaltzy, sentimental fable has such a cultural grip. The core of the story is a celebration of the virtues of mid-century small town America, both in terms of community values and the under-appreciated contribution of Jimmy Stewart’s everyman. The message is that all lives have purpose and value and that life is a gift to be treasured and appreciated. While you’re striving to keep up with the Joneses, you also need to remember to take a step back and recognise that your true worth is actually measured in family, friends and faith, and not material possessions.
Part of the allure of ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ is that, like any great confessional, it has the ability to absolve sins. As we get to the end of the year we all tend to hark back to the things we haven’t done, the things we said that we shouldn’t have, and the annual accumulation of small disappointments. Despite our reputation for Hogmanay partying, most Scots recognise that maudlin sense of what might have been that settles over the country come late December (but let’s not talk about the rugby).
With its final reel arc of despair and then redemption, everyone gets to walk in George Bailey’s shoes a little and maybe comes out of it feeling a little bit better about their own flaws. The scene of a distraught George sitting at the bar in Martinis pleading with God to intervene and save him, also plays into the strong evangelical tradition in America that teaches that only by giving yourself completely over to God and putting your life in his hands can you be saved.
But as America prepares for its annual pilgrimage to Bedford Falls, it’s worth asking: would George Bailey be the hero of a 2015 remake of ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’? The dark side of the movie is the crushing disappointment that stalks George throughout his life and the recurring motif of the train that always leaves without him because duty and family commitments thwart his dreams of travel and adventure. He strives to do the right thing, but ultimately it takes divine intervention to help him recognise his true worth and the cumulative impact of his kindness and sacrifice.
Despite his good deeds, without the help of second-class angel Clarence, Donna Reed would have been identifying George’s frozen body at the Bedford Falls morgue sometime around New Year. Even in 1947 there was ambivalence at the heart of the story about what constitutes success. In a clear violation of the ‘Motion Picture Production Code’ of the 1940s, Old Man Potter, the Dickensian villain of the film, is never punished for his crimes, and as the movie comes to its heart-warming conclusion, he’s still the richest man in Bedford Falls.
More problematic is Harry, the beloved brother, who through George’s sacrifice escapes Bedford Falls, becomes a decorated war hero, marries well and is on a path to be a captain of industry. With his good looks, heroism and success, it’s Harry and not George who exemplifies the American Dream, yet you can make the case that it’s Harry’s selfishness that drives George to the edge of the bridge on a snowy Christmas Eve. The irony of Jimmy Stewart, already an Oscar winner and a decorated second world war veteran, playing the loser brother who gets left behind wasn’t lost on the audience. He’s the emotional heart of the film and his salvation is why we tear up when he stands with his daughter Zuzu in his arms beneath the Christmas tree in the last scene singing ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’. But when Harry reappears in uniform to toast George as ‘the richest man in town’, it has the patronising tone of someone who has no desire whatsoever to swap places with him.
The reality is that in 2015 most Americans aspire to be Harry rather than George, and in the ascendancy of Trump to the top tier of American politics, the ‘winner’ mentality has a powerful cheerleader. In your climb to the top there will be casualties, but you can’t worry about them. On reality TV contestants are encouraged to ditch empathy, to shed their inner George Bailey, and to win at all costs. Look after number one and economic success will trickle down to those less fortunate. You can’t help suspect that Trump would applaud Potter’s land-grabbing machinations as a smart business deal and dismiss George’s small town communitarianism.
When families gather in a few weeks on sofas throughout America with whatever passes for a Chocolate Orange substitute, the sentiment and the emotion will be genuine. But the real question is what lasting impression this beloved holiday tradition will leave on them once the credits have rolled. At some point in the 2016 political cycle those of voting age will be asked to consider weighty issues concerning income inequality, healthcare, and immigration. Will they recognise that aspiring to be George Bailey often means sacrifice and short-term pain for the benefit of others? Will they recognise that it was George that gave the Italian immigrant bar owner Martini his start on the housing ladder and that in the George-less alternate universe, Martini has vanished? Or will they slip easily into the shoes of Harry Bailey or even Old Man Potter and decide that their own path to a wonderful life can come at the expense of the good people of their own personal Bedford Falls.
By Alan McIntyre | December 2015
