User Reviews

A well meaning war drama is on the emotional scale of "Mrs. Miniver", "The Fighting Sullivans" and "Since You Went Away" tells the story of how a son's death in the service of his country takes an affect on his father. Heaven couldn't wait for the practically perfect son of pharmacist Don Ameche and Frances Dee, not giving much detail to the mother (basically she seems to just go on with her life) while having Ameche's long dead grandfather (Harry Carey) come back to aide Ameche in his hour of need. Through Carey, Ameche relives the upbringing of his son where great grandpa to be Carey literally died of pneumonia to get to the hospital to see him being born. Three actors play the son from adolescent to pre-teen to young man facing a war he believed strongly in fighting to end. Ameche goes from dour grieving dad to, through flashbacks, returning World War I vet, to young dad, reluctantly disciplining and later standing by every move his growing son makes.

Larry Olsen, James West and Richard Crane bring the son to life with his short span on earth, and Ann Rutherford gives more of a home spun feel as one of Crane's girlfriends. Some audiences might find this too goody goody as the Marsh's are quite untroubled and completely supporting of each other, but for me, this represents what grieving families needed to see in 1943. Carey is excellent, and a cameo by the young Harry Morgan as the late son Rusty's navy pal is spectacular. I saw this as a young man facing my own young demons, a relationship with a father that was practically nonexistent, and my own ideals of patriotism I learned by watching movies like this as a kid. It's certainly more a fantasy, but for me, it's a perfect representation of what American life would be like if Hunan beings could just learn to be kind to each other and if families could learn more to relate.

I agree with Rooster Davis (one of our contributors) -- this film was a good idea that missed the target.

It begins with a great premise -- a young man who has been fighting in World War II is KIA, and his father (Don Ameche) receives the dreaded telegram and becomes very depressed and doesn't seem to be able to even begin to put it behind him. The ghost of Ameche's grandfather arrives to take Ameche for a walk where they review the son's short life. For a while you have the hope that maybe the telegram was a mistake, and the young man will actually come back alive; but that ending would have been unfaithful to what so many families were experiencing in 1943. So, all good premises.

So what's the problem? The main problem for me was the length of the B film -- 75 minutes. And that shortness doesn't give us the opportunity to get to know the son very well. As an older teen and then young man we get to know him a bit, but as a boy we see only a couple of brief episodes. A nice kid. But why was he so special to his dad. That just never across. Perhaps another 15 or 20 minutes to expand on that would have made the difference.

That's not to say there aren't some good things here. Don Ameche is never a disappointment, and is great here as the father. It's nice to see Harry Carey (as Gramp) in a more substantial supporting role; he's one of the great character actors. It's also nice seeing MGM's Ann Rutherford as a potential girl friend.

Look, this isn't a bad film. It just coulda been more. I'll let it hold on to a "7", but that's stretching it.

I think rating this picture a '4' is about right... it shows a slice of wholesome American life in reprise as Don Ameche reviews the life of his son who has just been killed in WW2. The story starts off with everyone upbeat and happy - then a telegram comes with the bad news. Rusty has been killed in action.

Ameche is too immersed in his sorrow to go back to work at the family drugstore; then to his disbelief, his long-dead grandfather reappears from the past to help him work through his memories of Rusty's life, and see how rich and full it was despite being cut so short. At the end of the movie, Harry Morgan arrives; he's a good friend of Rusty's and comes to meet his late friend's parents, and tell them how nobly their son died.

It's all nice enough, I guess, a very prim and proper movie showing life in a simpler, more patriotic time. Now... maybe I over-analyze things, but I'm wondering this: if Ameche's grandfather (who is also Rusty's great-grandfather) could appear from the dead, why couldn't Rusty himself have done so? The old man seems as real and 'visible' as anything to Ameche (once he accepts that he's not imagining it all) as the old guy pays him a visit to help him through his grief; he talks about Rusty being 'gone' now, but hey, he's no more gone than you are, old timer! Why didn't you bring him with?

I think Henry Morgan's short role in this movie is one of the best I've ever seen him in; he's still very young here, younger than you've probably ever seen him, and his part has some emotion to it which he handles very well. I think in his short part he out-acted everyone else in the whole film. And, I think if we'd have had just one glimpse at the very end of Rusty appearing before his dad to say 'Don't be sad, pop, I'm okay where I am. We'll all be together again someday', it would have made the earlier part with the old guy a lot more credible and it would have given a good feeling to the ending of the story, reminding people that maybe this isn't all there is to our existence.

It's a nice movie, flawed in that major regard for me - just that one change of having Rusty make one appearance from 'beyond' would have turned the whole thing around for me. So, I'll give it a five as an artifact of the days of WW2 and an earlier version of America now gone. And I might add, it's an America in which I wish I had lived.