169 - Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life
Added 2024-12-18 22:00:07 +0000 UTCThe lads do battle with Mr. Potter for the heart of Bedford Falls as they cover Frank Capra’s 1946 Christmas classic: It’s a Wonderful Life. Topics include the pernicious myth of “Capra-corn”, the art of the Jimmy Stewart impression, and what it takes to be a George Bailey in a system designed to turn you into a Henry F. Potter.
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Media Referenced in this Episode:
It’s a Wonderful Life! Dir. Frank Capra. 1946.
'Young George Bailey' Took Some Hard Hits by Stephen Cox. Los Angeles Times. December 15th, 1996.
What ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ Shows Us About The Weird History Of Building & Loans by John Wake. Forbes. December 31st, 2021.
TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com
Interstitial: “Jimmy the Raven” // Written and Performed by A.J. Ditty.
Comments
I've only ever seen the VeggieTales version, once again lads, you're my favorite source for people I do not know talking about movies I have not seen
Ray of F---ing Sunshine
2024-12-29 16:33:55 +0000 UTCMy life insurance company had a two-year restriction on suicide after I bought the policy.
Josh James
2024-12-27 23:06:23 +0000 UTCJust a music history note: Buffalo Gals isn't about women who herd bison. It's about ladies from upstate New York. Also, it's a minstrel song, just FYI.
Andrew T. Wilson
2024-12-24 21:21:22 +0000 UTCim from a christmas vacation household (for the last ten plus years without fail, my mom will make sure to tell us the kid is leonard from big bang theory)
Tyler Jay
2024-12-23 07:23:24 +0000 UTCI love how deep you are going with this beloved movie while still pointing out random things you wouldn’t notice and parts everyone likes. The Jimmy Stewart impression in the commercial is really really good, and putting the background music as “feed the birds” from Mary Poppins is the icing on the Christmas cookies! Also, thanks for explaining buildings and loans , and merry Christmas! PS: like the end of this movie, the end of this episode made me tear up a little.
Elizabeth Power
2024-12-23 02:20:53 +0000 UTC"Most realistic snow ever seen" ... so.... on a scale from one to Сталкер...?
Ijon Tichy
2024-12-22 07:41:33 +0000 UTCalso its "leigh-vitt"
John Leavitt
2024-12-21 04:21:29 +0000 UTCI wanna expand a bit on "if you have black picture in a movie you can;t show it in the south" thing. Lena Horne was drafted into MGM because black GIs in WW2 where getting punished and in some cases Blue Discharged (court martial without a trial, also used against gay servicemen) for having pinups of white starlets. When she arrived at MGM, Lena (a successful showgirl at the originally white-patrons-only Cotton Club) was greeted by the head of makeup refusing to work with her, fobbing the job onto the Hair dept head Syd Guilaroff who helped create one of the first makeup kits for non-white actors for a major studio, dubbed "High Egyptian" (He was also something of a Confessor and therapist for a lot of stars at the time and, if you believe some rumors, a spy for the studio heads) So now MGM has the first modern african-american starlet firmly in the star machine BUT they have to put her in stuff so they can cut her musical numbers out to show them in the south or cut her character out of the movie altogether which, on a long enough time line, leads to her doing a very candid cabaret show about the experience in the 70s which was filmed and is on youtube if you want to go looking.
John Leavitt
2024-12-21 04:08:04 +0000 UTCMine was a Gremlins house.
James Cézanne-Taipale
2024-12-20 12:49:40 +0000 UTC1:49:15 “there will always be a guy like potter” a very potter sequel reference??????!!!!11???
LogalogJack
2024-12-20 10:04:00 +0000 UTChell yeah Back To The Future II supremacy the first is the classic but yeah II is arguably better in so many ways
Ciara Rhiannon
2024-12-20 07:28:24 +0000 UTCThat's an Easter movie
The Worst of all Possible Worlds
2024-12-20 02:40:20 +0000 UTCbut in all seriousness, fantastic episode on one of my favorite movies definitely helped with a rough last couple weeks
Robert Heilman
2024-12-20 01:26:53 +0000 UTCBeginning to think it’s weird that we were a Ben-Hur Christmas family
Adi
2024-12-20 00:28:30 +0000 UTChark! another banger AJ interstitial
Robert Heilman
2024-12-19 22:09:22 +0000 UTCThe Muppets and John Denver Christmas album came out the first Christmas after I was born, and I've listened to it ever since, though less so since my dad passed in 2013, since I associate it so strongly with him. "It's In Every One of Us" makes me cry too.
murt pie
2024-12-19 21:23:26 +0000 UTCAlmost impossible to watch this one without crying. Its message is one I feel so deeply yet remains so hard for me to truly believe when it comes to myself.
Ghostly
2024-12-19 20:25:45 +0000 UTC*Uncle Baby Billy is mentioned* "Dear sweet baby Jesus, I ask that you grant us a Righteous Gemstones or Trinity Broadcasting Network episode. I ask that you move a spirit through these young men to make their guest play a round of Bible Bonkers. I trust that you will continue to do great works through them. And we thank you, baby Jesus, for casting out the spirit of Catholicism from AJ, and bringing him into the tent of revival. In your name we pray, Amen" 🙏
Dergon
2024-12-19 18:47:31 +0000 UTCBrian's corner is iodine. (That's the only -ine camera related word I could think of)
Dergon
2024-12-19 18:41:40 +0000 UTCTurns out Gruesome Gavin's Plump Jack is stealing valor.
Crispined Glover Potato Snacks
2024-12-19 18:04:37 +0000 UTCSince A.J.'s corner is equine and Josh's corner is bovine do you think Brian's corner would be ovine or caprine?
Crispined Glover Potato Snacks
2024-12-19 18:03:47 +0000 UTCThis one is always in my family's rotation, but it's far from my favorite 1940s Christmas movie. I highly recommend "It Happened on Fifth Avenue," a Victor Moore film that isn't going to blow a critic's mind, but is absolutely charming and has a bonus bit of class consciousness about it.
Gorbant
2024-12-19 17:15:40 +0000 UTC(to be clear, I donct hate it because it's a bad film--it's a quite good one--Injuat hate it from overexposure)
Ember
2024-12-19 15:08:28 +0000 UTCI thought testosterone was supposed to make you LESS emotional but I swear I just saw it again and bawled like a dumb little baby. This episode is the PERFECT pregame before driving to grandma’s for the arguing season
LogalogJack
2024-12-19 15:00:08 +0000 UTCThe world ends with Drew
Ewan J
2024-12-19 14:50:20 +0000 UTCGot to be one of the absolute funniest interstitials
Peter Larkin
2024-12-19 14:39:36 +0000 UTCOne of my favorite movies is Only Angels Have Wings in which Thomas Mitchell plays a solid emotional and moral center of the film, and seeing him as Uncle Billy in this really helped me appreciate his range as an actor. The contrast is remarkable.
BarFly
2024-12-19 13:17:55 +0000 UTCI first saw this movie all the way through on 2020 and boy was that an emotional bomb. My family was a Christmas in Connecticut family, another mid 40s movie that built a New England village on a soundstage.
BarFly
2024-12-19 12:30:30 +0000 UTCI'd have thought the "Smith wins nomination" headline was a reference to Al Smith the NY politician
Peter Larkin
2024-12-19 12:19:15 +0000 UTCAlso, "The Hungry Paunch" was a short-lived San Francisco Beatnik poetry club with an all-you-can-eat clam chowder bar. Lenny Bruce once walked past, but didn't go in.
AngryOldManYaddaYadda
2024-12-19 03:17:18 +0000 UTC[Jimmy Stewart voice] "I don't have your money here! It's--it's in Josh's house! And A.J.'s place! They bought Funko-Pops!"
AngryOldManYaddaYadda
2024-12-19 00:39:13 +0000 UTCI'll be catching up on the John Denver one thanks for the suggestion!
Mark Schwagner
2024-12-18 23:36:54 +0000 UTCOh NO. I hate this film! Out of the two traditional Christmas movies my family (mostly my mom) made us watch /every year/, I will never watch It's A Wonderful Life again. White Christmas was the other one, and I'll still watch that one. :-)
Ember
2024-12-18 22:32:30 +0000 UTCLoved Muppet Family Christmas! Though I always liked the songs from the John Denver Christmas with the Muppets better. :-) ("it's in every one of us" still makes me cry though.)
Ember
2024-12-18 22:31:17 +0000 UTCI see people having been talking to my mother, as this was the only thing she wanted to watch on Christmas! So every year we rotated between this, my Dad's choice of (of course) National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, & my combo recorded on a blank VHS A Muppet Family Christmas/ Will Vinson's (man, didn't realize anyone could not like that special, id love to hear how) A Claymation Christmas Celebration! Nostalgia completed, good job everyone!
Mark Schwagner
2024-12-18 22:15:09 +0000 UTC
