SVTODAY'S MOVIE FORUM-CAPRA

The following was received from a member of the First Hour email forum. —Editor.

You mention Frank Capra, and his strong Catholicism...E.J. Dionne, a commentator who is generally objective, better than most, once said that the Capra movie..its a wonderful life...summarized what most Americans actually believe in terms of social relationships...neither very liberal nor conservative...in the movie there are subtle hints of the New Deal having some nexus to Catholic social policy and of course Clarence the guardian angel with his cries of "Joseph help me."

How do you believe that Capra shows his Catholicism in this movie or in his other movies?? I have seen some of his others such as Dr. Deeds, Mr. Smith goes to D.C., etc...but I never made a strong nexus between his films and his Catholic heritage...

Maybe I'm a little guilty of playing a word game here. My actual statement, "For Roseanna unapologetically professes a robust Catholicism that was more familiar in the days of Frank Capra," stops a little short of saying what you're taking out of it. And I wouldn't be surprised at all if one were to study Capra's movies if we'd find him—at least on film—more devoted to American civil religion than Catholicism. At the very least, he seems to have a highly developed ecumenical spirit for the 1940's. Jimmy Stewart has always been known as a Presbyterian. I don't recall whether the Baileys' church affiliation was specified in It's A Wonderful Life, but the opening sequence with all the townspeople praying for George definitely suggests a melting pot of all different sorts and kinds of small-town Christians. And in the forties I think the whole thing about guardian angels and Clarence invoking St. Joseph would have been seen as specifically "Catholic," whereas today I think Christians of all backgrounds would not be uncomfortable with it.

So the simple answer is, "specifically, I don't." I've seen It's A Wonderful Life as often as any movie, but am not more than passingly familiar with Capra's other films, except for clips I've seen and comments made at tributes and retrospectives. But Capra was on my mind because of the similiarities between It's A Wonderful Life and Dream with the Fishes, and apart from him, other films of the '40's like Going My Way, The Bells of St. Mary's, Boy's Town and many more certainly had a robust respect for Catholicism that is often lacking in today's portrayals. So the emphasis of my statement was on Capra's "time" ("days") more than on his own films. And he was described in the latter-year tributes to him as a devout Catholic in his private life, if I am not mistaken.

I'm posting this exchange to our movie forum, in the hope of generating comment from other readers besides those on First Hour. You might want to check there later, as I won't post any that come from off this list to First Hour.

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