Is this a most cynical film?
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life4all — 13 years ago(February 26, 2013 11:04 AM)
It's really nothing more than a "suspension of disbelief", feel-good, now classic holiday movie. Hollywood would go bust if it stopped making that type of film. What you originally pointed out is exactly what makes this movie work so well! All the fun jokes are in the irony. So "yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus" because, "it's a wonderful life"!
So you have a great day because February 26, 2013 only comes once in a lifetime! -
acwoodcraft-1 — 12 years ago(November 29, 2013 06:21 AM)
A bit late but had to comment. Are you for real? It's not the 6 o'clock news, IT'S A MOVIE! put your logic on hold for an hour and a half and just enjoy it.
A heart can be broken, but it still keeps a-beatin' just the same. -
Kevin-94 — 11 years ago(May 21, 2014 07:01 PM)
I'm often struck by the bizarre, satirical twist the film takes in the final twenty minutes, as various government employees choose to do whatever makes their life easier. It is funny how everyone is out for their own best interests. Perhaps it helps give the film a little darkness, to offset the sweet.
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rizdek — 11 years ago(May 22, 2014 03:46 AM)
Everything you say is true. But this movie is still one of our favorites and we watch it every Christmas season. As others have said, it's a bit of suspended disbelief.
Trivia for any Christmas special buffsdoes anyone know another Christmas special that shows a cane toward the end which suggests a mysterious side of the story? -
Rizzyay — 11 years ago(November 20, 2014 01:49 PM)
Didn't ye hear the big speech the lawyer gave to the mother without imagination? The whole point is that things like love and compassion are more important than having a huge lack of imagination. If you have to chooce between the two, I mean. I have always failed to see why lack of imagination makes you a better human being, like some people tend to believe.
Now, as for the other people benefitting from it Unfortunately, there are always people who will benefit from other people's imagination: for example an imaginative writer not only makes money for oneself, but also to one's publisher, book salesmen, etc furthermore, when the writer pays taxes, the whole society benefits in all sorts of ways I'm afraid: roads are constructed and education provided for the kids. And, even though the consumer loses money when purchasing the book, the consumer also gains a lot of value from the book in other forms: it inspires them and teaches them a little something about their own imagination.
What I am saying is, people will get all sorts of benefits that will make them happy in many ways. And this movie of course reminds people that not only is imagination nice and lovely in all sorts of way, it can also benefit people as well. Some people apparently find this to be unfortunate. So be it, then the movie was cynical to you. I for myself am inclined to disagree, altough some levels of satire might've been found, like in all good movies.
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soneill — 11 years ago(November 24, 2014 04:25 PM)
Who is "everybody"? Kris knows he's Santa Claus; Mr. Macy on the stand did not just think of potential bad publicity if he said he didn't believe in Krishe thought of all the small trusting faces of little children, who have not been regimented into adult disbelief and so are not blind to the truth. And suddenly he realizes that he, the hardened tycoon, also believes that Kris is Santa Claus. The little Dutch girl who had just been removed from the murderous clutches of the Anti-Claus, Hitler, most certainly believes in Kris Kringle and knows his value better than anyone else in the film. Fred Gayley believes in Kris; so does Albert, the fat kid from Brooklyn. and when they get sense enough to know when to discard common sense, Doris and Susan Walker believe in Kris as well, and at long last. as Fred points out, those two were a couple of lost souls. and judging from the responses to your post, there's quite a few on this message board as well. If you don't sit around trying to impose hard logic on a spirit as lovely as Kris Kringle, you might realize that there really is a Santa Claus. There may not be a guy ho-ho-hoing on the North Pole, but that doesn't prove a thing. He's like the Buddhajust as we are all Buddha now, so are we all Santa Claus, if we just choose to be; listen to the Mills Brothers recording of "You Don't Have To Be a Santa Claus"explains it all better than I can!
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irvberg2002 — 11 years ago(November 25, 2014 05:13 AM)
You've convinced me. I believe! I believe! Glory Hallelujah! But you're wrong about Fred Gayley. The closing scene reveals that when he sees evidence that Kris is Santa he begins to doubt what he has believed before, i.e., that he did a great job in "proving" what he knew wasn't so.
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Errington_92 — 10 years ago(December 01, 2015 12:43 PM)
Cynical? I think its aiming to reacquaint two major characters with an antidote to cynicism.
Good point. It can be argued that Kris and Fred's optimism winning over others' cynicism makes
Miracle on 34th Street
a film that shows love and compassion is better than the actions of immoral characters.
I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not. -
PillowRock — 10 years ago(December 08, 2015 02:03 PM)
It's not a cynical movie at all.
However, it does contain a fair number of characters who are cynically acting out of self-interest. (The trick is realizing that a movie's point of view and the views / attitudes of characters in the movie don't necessarily align at all. Sometimes they do, and sometimes they don't.)
I also would contest the implication in the OP that Mr. Macy and the judge would be counted among "the film's "good guys"". It's not that they're "bad guys" either; they're just part of a film world where most people (even those who are basically decent people) generally won't act in a way that hurts themselves.
Fred never actually lies (and certainly doesn't commit perjury). He understands that truth, what you believe, and what you can derive as logical proof (in the geometry or symbolic logic class sense of the word "proof") are three different things. Fred knows that everybody involved either wouldn't really mind if Kris was not committed or else actively prefers that Kris not be committed. So he builds a logical construct that gives everybody an excuse, under the law, to create the preferred outcome.
Doris never actually lies either. The sentence "I believe in you, too" is completely valid at that point. Words mean what they mean, and that wasn't stated in answer to a direct question that would pin down any specifics that she didn't mean. She didn't say (well, write) "I believe that you are really Santa Claus". Whether Kris inferred something that wasn't actually in what she wrote is a separate issue. -
molly-31 — 10 years ago(December 20, 2015 08:48 PM)
I sort of see it as a takeoff on
The Song of Bernadette
. Is there really a lady up in that cave or is Bernadette hallucinating from starvation? People take one side or the other depending on how it will benefit them. These people don't necessarily believe it, but it just so happens that it's in their own best interests, either financially or in terms of public opinion, to say they do.
Well, the city's being built and I'm winning this game. So don't interrupt us with trifles. -
montgomerydou55 — 10 years ago(February 13, 2016 12:37 PM)
I noted that Susan says of Kringle, "He's so kind and nice and jolly; he's not like anyone else!" A bald insult to "anyone else."
And the post-office scene where Jack Albertson tells his colleague just before the guy goes off to send the Santa mail to the courthouse, "Why should WE be bothered with all that stuff?"
That sounds cynical to me.