Film - 'It's a wonderful life' unAmerican?

[Anna B]

I love this film, it's on every year and it makes my Christmas.

 

But I've just been reading that an FBI file from 1946 says that the film was 'written by communist sympathisers and was a blatant attempt to instigate class warfare.'

 

The file claimed the plot also 'demonised bankers in a way that made viewers question American Capitalism and potentially sympathise with Marxists,' and it was viewed with deep suspicion by the American establishment right up until the mid 1960's

 

What sort of country could feel seriously threatened by a film like this?

[skinz]

I love this film, it's on every year and it makes my Christmas.

 

But I've just been reading that an FBI file from 1946 says that the film was 'written by communist sympathisers and was a blatant attempt to instigate class warfare.'

 

The file claimed the plot also 'demonised bankers in a way that made viewers question American Capitalism and potentially sympathise with Marxists,' and it was viewed with deep suspicion by the American establishment right up until the mid 1960's

 

What sort of country could feel seriously threatened by a film like this?

 

 

A very paranoid one,

[Harleyman]

Y

I love this film, it's on every year and it makes my Christmas.

 

But I've just been reading that an FBI file from 1946 says that the film was 'written by communist sympathisers and was a blatant attempt to instigate class warfare.'

 

The file claimed the plot also 'demonised bankers in a way that made viewers question American Capitalism and potentially sympathise with Marxists,' and it was viewed with deep suspicion by the American establishment right up until the mid 1960's

 

What sort of country could feel seriously threatened by a film like this?

 

A country which felt threatened by godless communism. Dont forget the Cold War.... hello !

 

By the same token which country could feel it's morals seriously threatened by such works as "Lady Chatterly's Lover" and the "Kama Sutra"

[LeMaquis]

A country which felt threatened by godless communism. Dont forget the Cold War.... hello !

 

By the same token which country could feel it's morals seriously threatened by such works as "Lady Chatterly's Lover" and the "Kama Sutra"

 

I think you Yanks have got cultural paranoia perfected better than anyone else has. I love the Duck And Cover films where citizens are advised to cover their heads with a wet towel or similar in order to survive a nuclear attack.

 

IAWL came out a year after the end of the war in which the Russians had played the major part in defeating The Third Reich. The Berlin Blockade was 2 years away. NATO hadn't been formed. Neither had the CIA. Some though thought that all-American hero James Stewart was a communist stooge. With hindsight and a lot of paranoia it all seems so clear.

[Vague_Boy]

But I've just been reading that an FBI file from 1946 says that the film was 'written by communist sympathisers and was a blatant attempt to instigate class warfare.'

 

Where is this quote from?

 

Reading the actual FBI report (LINK) none of the text you quote can be found (cf. page 14 of the PDF).

 

I fear you may be confusing newspaper hyperbole with actual facts. For example, the phrase "class warfare" is not mentioned at all in the report itself.

 

Given that the The House Unamerican Activities Committee (HUAC) was starting up at the time this report was written (1947) the anti-Communist paranoia can be understood within the historical context of the time, although not necessarily sympathized with.

 

One of the things the report misses is that while Potter is a banker, so are the Baileys.

[999tigger]

 

What sort of country could feel seriously threatened by a film like this?

 

I think you need to understand the times of when it was written being just after the war and the US was deeply suspicious of the communists. Two of the writers were already blacklisted and under the atention of the US aythorities for un american activities.

 

You can read a more balanced account here if you wnat to find out more and see it in perspective.

 

http://www.worthpoint.com/blog-entry/naughty-nice-its-wonderful-life-capra-commices-fbi

[johncocker]

I love this film, it's on every year and it makes my Christmas.

 

But I've just been reading that an FBI file from 1946 says that the film was 'written by communist sympathisers and was a blatant attempt to instigate class warfare.'

 

The file claimed the plot also 'demonised bankers in a way that made viewers question American Capitalism and potentially sympathise with Marxists,' and it was viewed with deep suspicion by the American establishment right up until the mid 1960's

 

What sort of country could feel seriously threatened by a film like this?

 

 

 

google the history behind ''high noon 'the gary cooper classic

[thetruth]

google the history behind ''high noon 'the gary cooper classic

 

Why don't you share this infomation? You must be a really lazy chap

[Electerrific]

In the attitude of most users on SF, including yourself on many posts- it's badly acted, boring and trite.

 

And...in the wrong posting section...

[Harleyman]

I think you Yanks have got cultural paranoia perfected better than anyone else has. I love the Duck And Cover films where citizens are advised to cover their heads with a wet towel or similar in order to survive a nuclear attack.

 

IAWL came out a year after the end of the war in which the Russians had played the major part in defeating The Third Reich. The Berlin Blockade was 2 years away. NATO hadn't been formed. Neither had the CIA. Some though thought that all-American hero James Stewart was a communist stooge. With hindsight and a lot of paranoia it all seems so clear.

 

The first signs that the cold war was inevitable was when Stalin grabbed Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and the rest of the east European countries at the end of WW2.

 

President Truman had every intention of pulling all the Yanks out of Europe but Winston Churchill was sounding the alarm bells that Stalin was also planning on grabbing western Germany after occupying the eastern part of the country.

 

My daughter-in-laws grandfather was a young husband and father in Hungary when the Soviet Union crushed any hopes of that country's freedom with it's tanks in 1956. He and his family had to leave or face arrest and internment in a Gulag We KNOW all about the USSR where incidentally, any and all western movies were banned outright as evil capitalisitic propaganda.

 

I dont suppose you see that hiding behind your Marxist rose colored specs.

 

I'm not defending the attitude taken by Edgar Hoover towards IAWL but in order to understand history one has to understand the circumstances that existed then. Anyway Jimmy Sterwart was hardly a commie sympathiser being a WW2 bomber pilot and war hero and all so it can be said that Hoover not for the first or last time went overboard on this one.