I should start off my review by politely pointing out that I am not overly fond of Frank Capra- let's use It's A Wonderful Life, for instance. He focuses way too much on the story behind George and Mary, and why George is the way he is. Pretty much nothing happens in the first hour. George becomes an unlikeable character, and you just want him to go away. Then Clarence the angel comes on-screen and is on-screen for too short of a time (about twenty minutes) to make an impact, you would think, based on how long the film is versus how much screen time he gets, but- his character is overwritten (is that a word?) Capra's pacing is too choppy, is what I'm trying to say. You care about characters that you're not meant to care about.
Meet John Doe has similar pacing problems. The story is too preachy, and whoever wrote the screenplay focused too much on the long-winded speeches and not the feeling behind them. Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck do what they can with their roles- they were both quite good actors, but I'm not sure why Gary Cooper was always cast as a bumbling idiot. Maybe he was a bumbling idiot. But also, to be honest, he was still kind of cute in the early 1940s.
Barbara Stanwyck I have only ever heard good things about, and this was my first film with her in it. To be honest, she doesn't quite live up to the expectation I had of this shiny goddess woman with a country twang (always pictured her having a country twang- don't know why- perhaps because she was in a lot of Westerns when she was older), but she didn't disappoint me, either. She does what she can with her character, even if her character did get so hammy at the end (specifically IN the ending scene) I wanted to give her an ol' smackeroo in the kisser.
Walter Brennan has a good supporting role as Cooper's sidekick- he makes his character, who is perhaps the most preachy of the lot, seem almost like a normal person. The rest of the cast is good, too, but stuck in stereotypical Capra roles.
And, of course, Capra has to add his signature touches. He, first, takes a story that would make a good 45-minute TV special and stretches it into a two-hour movie. He has to show shots of all the people. He also likes montages, but so do I, so I don't mind that part. The story has to be of one common, insignificant man who rises up against the system (or in this case, one John Doe), complaining of corruption and demanding change, uniting the people against the system.
Don't get me wrong- I thought it was much better than It's A Wonderful Life. I'm just not fond of Frank Capra as a director, nor am I fond of having propaganda shoved down my throat- I understand that there was a war going on, but Capra did these kinds of stories even before the war.
If you can handle getting preached at for two hours, it's pretty good film. Could have been shorter, but Cooper and Stanwyck had nice chemistry. See Ball Of Fire after this one and compare the two.
Meet John Doe has similar pacing problems. The story is too preachy, and whoever wrote the screenplay focused too much on the long-winded speeches and not the feeling behind them. Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck do what they can with their roles- they were both quite good actors, but I'm not sure why Gary Cooper was always cast as a bumbling idiot. Maybe he was a bumbling idiot. But also, to be honest, he was still kind of cute in the early 1940s.
Barbara Stanwyck I have only ever heard good things about, and this was my first film with her in it. To be honest, she doesn't quite live up to the expectation I had of this shiny goddess woman with a country twang (always pictured her having a country twang- don't know why- perhaps because she was in a lot of Westerns when she was older), but she didn't disappoint me, either. She does what she can with her character, even if her character did get so hammy at the end (specifically IN the ending scene) I wanted to give her an ol' smackeroo in the kisser.
Walter Brennan has a good supporting role as Cooper's sidekick- he makes his character, who is perhaps the most preachy of the lot, seem almost like a normal person. The rest of the cast is good, too, but stuck in stereotypical Capra roles.
And, of course, Capra has to add his signature touches. He, first, takes a story that would make a good 45-minute TV special and stretches it into a two-hour movie. He has to show shots of all the people. He also likes montages, but so do I, so I don't mind that part. The story has to be of one common, insignificant man who rises up against the system (or in this case, one John Doe), complaining of corruption and demanding change, uniting the people against the system.
Don't get me wrong- I thought it was much better than It's A Wonderful Life. I'm just not fond of Frank Capra as a director, nor am I fond of having propaganda shoved down my throat- I understand that there was a war going on, but Capra did these kinds of stories even before the war.
If you can handle getting preached at for two hours, it's pretty good film. Could have been shorter, but Cooper and Stanwyck had nice chemistry. See Ball Of Fire after this one and compare the two.