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Warehouse 13: "The Greatest Gift"

Pete Lattimer accidentally stumbles upon an artifact that has the power to erase him from existence, forcing him to see what life would be like for his co-workers if he had never joined the staff of Warehouse 13 -- and, of course, putting him in the position of having to set things right again. As you might guess, the plot of this episode is a rather deliberate homage to It's a Wonderful Life; indeed, the writers of this episode are smart enough -- or at least, respectful enough -- to actually reference the original short story upon which the movie It's a Wonderful Life was based on instead of just attributing the whole storyline to Frank Capra like far lazier writers might have done.

It may not be the best homage to Frank Capra that I have ever seen but it is one of the better ones that I have seen so far. Then again, I have a soft spot for this show so what can I say?

Real Men and Real Girls


It's tempting to describe 2007's Lars and the Real Girl as the flip side of May. Instead of a mentally disturbed woman whose only friend is a real doll, it gives us a mentally unsettled man whose only friend is a real doll. (Actually the official name for the title character's inanimate companion is Real Girl but let's not get into that.)

The story could have gone into several different directions including the same dark way May went but instead it chooses to go in a lighter, more comic way. Though the doll of the title is anatomically correct, there is only one reference -- a subtle one, fortunately -- to this fact. Indeed, for a movie with so many perverse possibilities, Lars and the Real Girl is surprisingly conventional. Like May, it does have dark elements, but unlike May, the story concerns the title character's triumph over potential darkness, not his surrender to it.

Anyway, the movie concerns a shy young man named Lars who lives in a small town but never gets emotionally involved with anyone apart from his brother -- on whose property he lives -- and his sister-in-law. Shortly after his sister-in-law gets pregnant, Lars starts going crazy and orders a Real Girl through the mail. He calls his recent acquisition Bianca and starts treating it like a real person. He never uses the Real Girl for its intended purpose but he does talk about it as if it were real and as if it were an actual girlfriend.

His brother and sister-in-law are not sure how to respond to this so they consult the family doctor who advises them to go along with Lars' delusion. Eventually they talk the whole town into going along with Lars' delusion and Bianca starts to get a bit of a social life. Along the way, Lars get obsessed with what it takes to be a real man and then something happens and Lars is forced to confront something he has not wanted to confront...

It would be easy for me to wax cynical about this movie. After all, I spent several months in a small town in Michigan very similar to the town depicted in this movie and during that time, I was very lonely except for the weekends when I visited my relatives in Detroit. By all rights, I should be condemning this movie for its lack of realism. After all, people do not always rally around the well-deserving shy young person in real life and small town life is not always as friendly and heartwarming as it appears in movies like this.

But it says something about the subtlety of the script, the acting and the direction that I actually found myself won over by the movie despite all the myriad opportunities for me to go, “But that would never happen in real life.” And this from someone who usually rolls his eyes at feel-cute movies like Little Miss Sunshine.

Perhaps I gave Lars and the Real Girl a break because after seeing my share of cynical new movies, it felt good to finally see a modern movie which said, “Yes, I know it's a harsh world out there. But sometimes people can be a whole lot better than you give them credit for. Maybe not the people you know right now but the people you might someday meet in the future.”

In short, this flick is basically a modern-day Frank Capra movies for people who normally hate modern-day Frank Capra movies. And that is not a bad thing to be. Mind you, if they bring Bianca back for a sequel like Son of Lars and the Real Girl, I will not be quite so charitable.

Banking on American Madness -- But in a Good Way

The film begins with the sight of a weary switchboard operator beginning her workday with a stifled yawn and a brief glance at her compact. Before it ends, it shows us a boardroom dispute, a bank robbery, an attempted seduction, and a bank run reminiscent of a similar scene in Capra's It's a Wonderful Life. Only this isn't It's a Wonderful Life. It's American Madness, a 1932 film by director Frank Capra that anticipates many of the same themes as It's a Wonderful Life but which has been neglected by film buffs for so long that I almost expected Joan Blondell to show up and start singing about it.

Does the movie deserve to be forgotten? Not in my opinion. Indeed, I found the film to be quite memorable.

Although it is tempting to declare the film dated because of the way banking laws have made bank runs a thing of the past, enough of the film rings true that I have no trouble forgiving Capra for that. Especially since he and his screenwriter Robert Riskin have provided such a good story.

Unfortunately, the movie's set-up seems more well-done than its resolution. Capra and Riskin have no trouble establishing the various characters of the bank staff in a way that seems more interesting than an actual bank would seem. But the way the bank's customers are panicked by negative rumors into attempted withdrawals of their money is depicted so convincingly that it takes quite an effort to believe such events can be reversed by mere mortals. And it is a bit depressing -- no pun intended -- to speculate how likely such a positive resolution would be in today's world.

For that matter, the philosophy of Walter Huston's Thomas Dickson, the president of the bank where all this takes place, seems a thing of the past. In these times of multiple credit reports, the idea that a bank president would justify bank loans on the basis of a man's character seems downright anachronistic. Yet I found myself identifying with Dickson even though Huston is by no means as naturally likable as Jimmy Stewart.

Could we use a Thomas Dickson today? I would like to think so. But somehow I doubt we will get one. And don't get me started on the likelihood of another Frank Capra...

The Clarissa Complex

I probably can come up with a hundred theories if Frank Capra's Mr. Smith Goes to Washington became so popular but if I had to pick just one, it would be this:

Almost every American, male or female, can't help identifying with Jean Arthur's Clarissa Saunders character when we look at the American political world. We would like to be as idealistic as Jimmy Stewart's Jefferson Smith but I suspect most of us identify more with Ms. Saunders. Why? Because over the years, we can't help but grow a bit cynical at the difference between what our politicians promise and what they deliver. And although we would like to truly think the best of them, we can't help fearing that we'd end up like suckers if we do so.

Yet every now and then, we meet a politician that gives us hope that the world of politics does not have to be the way that it is. We do not necessarily develop the same type of relationship with them as Ms. Saunders does with Mr. Smith but we do come to trust said politico to the point of abandoning our cynicism in favor of idealism. Perhaps because said politico chooses to encourage our more positive emotions instead of encouraging our most negative ones.

I must confess that I have a tendency to wax more than a little cynical about politics myself. (For example, it is not a coincidence that "trust not in princes" is one of my favorite Biblical quotes.) And yet I am idealistic enough to prefer a politician who encourages me to vote in favor of something over a politician who encourages me to vote against something. A politician who chooses to run a positive campaign as opposed to one who runs a negative one.

In any event, I would rather take a chance that the candidate of my choice is a genuine idealist like Jefferson Smith than to assume that he is more a cynical rogue like the title character of The Great McGinty. And no doubt that is the real reason I like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington so much.

Either that or else I really like the chance to look at Ms. Arthur for about two hours...

The Paradise Paradox: Lost Horizon

Ain't it always the same? You finally find the one place on Earth where you really feel comfortable, where the people really seem to get you, and you finally have the opportunity to meet the girl of your dreams. Then, wouldn't you know it? You end up having to leave because of your pesky little brother.

Of course, there is a lot more to Frank Capra's 1937 epic Lost Horizon than that. Yet the gist of the film's plot revolved around a sibling conflict between two characters played by actors Ronald Coleman and John Howard. Coleman played the older brother, Robert Conway, a man who was already famous the world over for his work as a British author and diplomat. Howard played the younger brother, George Conway, who was not so famous and who dwelt for the first part of the film within his brother's shadow. Granted, the two actors for all their talent did not seem all that convincing as siblings especially since Coleman made no effort to disguise his English accent and Howard sounded about as American as Clark Gable.

Perhaps this was intentional, and Capra meant to allude to the age-old relationship between Great Britain and America by casting an English actor to represent the older sibling and an American actor to represent the younger sibling. Perhaps the casting was just a cynical attempt to appeal to both the British and the American film markets. More likely, the casting director had other things on his mind apart from appeasing the tastes of nitpicking movie-goers like myself.

Anyway, as the film began, the brothers Conway were organizing the escape of the last few Western refugees from an Asian city about to be swept under by an oncoming revolution. Scenes of this escape seemed oddly reminiscent of accounts I have read about the Fall of Saigon, especially when it came to the part when the Westerners deliberately tried to prevent the local Asians from trying to board the planes being used for the Westerners' getaways. (Of course, this movie predated the Fall of Saigon by at least three-and-a-half decades, but the parallels are still eerie.)

Being the noble person that Coleman normally played in movies like this, Robert Conway waited until the last plane out before choosing to escape the city. And even then his departure seemed to have more to do with his brother George's efforts -- and the responsibility he felt toward the last three Western refugees -- than his own free will. Once on board, Conway proved to be the only Westerner concerned enough to fret about the fate of the Asians who had been left behind to face the fury of the oncoming rebellion, all the other Westerners being content to congratulate themselves on being the last white people to escape. (Yes, they actually put it that way. But then this was the 1930s, when people were less diplomatic about saying things like that.)

Eventually the refugees found out that their pilot was not the British one they had been expecting but a pistol-toting Asian. Any attempt to retake the plane was immediately smashed by Robert Conway, who pointed out the futility of retaking the plane when the Asian hijacker was the only one on board who knew how to fly a plane.

Then the plane crash-landed and the refugees ended up being taken to a Tibetan lamasery known to the locals as Shangri-La. There they were told about the difficulties of traveling to the outside world due to the surrounding mountains and the harsh climate and about how they would have to stay in Shangri-La for an indefinite period. Needless to say, the five refugees were not happy to hear this about this involuntary layover. However, Robert Conway was more philosophical about the situation than the rest.

Eventually all the refugees save George Conway learned to enjoy life in Shangri-La. Robert Conway himself proved to be the most well-adjusted of them all, not only meeting a kindred spirit in the lamasery's mysterious High Lama (played by Sam Jaffe) but falling in love with an equally enigmatic Western girl named Sondra (played by Jane Wyatt). Unfortunately, his younger sibling was not as content with his surroundings. Even after he fell for yet another mysterious Western woman (played by Mexican actress Margo), George Conway talked of nothing but leaving.

Eventually he not only got his wish but he also talked his older brother into leaving with him despite his brother's best judgment. His departure unfortunately proved to be a mistake when he found that the reason Robert had initially warned against the trip was true. He killed himself in despair and Robert Conway, alas, was left alone to tell the tale. And maybe, just maybe, attempt a return trip...

So what is there for modern audiences to learn from this film? On one hand, I have to salute the much-maligned American Film Institute for actually doing a decent job of restoring as much of the original film as possible. Even a brief nude scene that must have annoyed the heck out of the Hays Office was restored (though it did not seem all that daring by 2008 standards). I must confess that I must found the performances of Ronald Coleman, Jane Wyatt, Thomas Mitchell and the always memorable Edward Everett Horton to be pretty interesting as well. John Howard I did not care for that much -- and not just because he played the obligatory fly in the Tibetan ointment -- and Margo's casting as a Russian character I found to be more eccentric than anything else. (Nice to see that the old Hollywood tradition of the interchangeable ethnic actor still existed back then. Well, I suppose that is why they call it acting -- among other things.)

Yet the philosophy of the film seemed more than a bit over-idealistic, even by Frank Capra standards. I can readily understand the appeal of the film to a country that was then in the midst of the Great Depression and on the brink of World War II. Indeed, I can understand the appeal the film might have to even today's jaded movie-goers. And yet just as some film critics take Capra's Mr. Deeds Goes to Town to task for over-romanticizing the small-town lifestyle of Depression-era America (noting that it couldn't have been that wonderful if so many rural folks abandoned it to go to the big city), I can't help wanting to take this film to task for over-romanticizing the rural lifestyle of 1930s Asia. I especially can't help wondering how accepting of Shangri-La the Western refugees would have been had they been expected to do any of the menial tasks routinely expected of the local Asians. After all, it is easy to pretend you've living in Paradise if you are being waited on hand and foot, but when you are the one who has to scrub the floors and tend the sheep and cook the food and make the beds, then life does not seem all that idyllic.

Nor can I avoid seeing the irony of how many of the refugees wanted to show their appreciation to the hosts of their new-found home by immediately trying to change it. The Horton character wanted to educate the local children in a Western science, the Mitchell character wanted to install a modern system of running water. Even Sondra, who grew up in Shangri-La, chose to instruct the local children in Western ways. In short, the reaction of the Westerners to Shangri-La appeared to be: this place is just perfect... now let's change it.

Then again change is a part of life, and it could be argued that without such change, few of us would ever be truly happy. Perhaps the efforts the Westerners made to change their surroundings were the only way they could have ever been truly content -- which makes me wonder whether the true inspiration for this movie came not so much from the James Hilton novel of the same name as it did from that most legendary of hard-to-please characters, Faust.