Reviews

If The Twilight Zone had ever chosen to air a cartoon, this would have been the one. The concept is clear, the moral obvious. The 1890s music, while skillfully rendered ("The Michigan Rag" is not contemporary with the other songs the frog performs but an original composition created for the cartoon) suggests something strangely paranormal: The frog is a ghost or a demon! This is emphasized by its reemergence at the end, where a futuristic construction worker finds the eerie, cakewalking being still singing period music!

Certain elements in the production are racist, such as the cakewalk, and "Hello Mah Baby" which was a "blackface" song when first released (ca.1902) This dates the cartoon badly. All this wouldn't matter if it wasn't hailed as a timeless classic.

At one time, before the advent of digital expansion television, every station in the Chicago area was showing this film-on one occasion, literally at the same time! This also had something to do with licensing: the copyright has been renewed, or whatever, and the airtime of "It's..." is somewhat more limited, but I've seen this beloved holiday classic enough for several lifetimes!

The plot is deeply flawed, something not quite apparent the first hundred viewings. (To provide more details would be including spoilers but suffice to say, the movie ends with nothing really resolved.) The premise- that having scores of friends makes life wonderful- won't appeal to everyone, and director Frank Capra's style of populism doesn't seem true anymore if it ever was. Indeed one man's life CAN make a difference if he happens to be white, affluent, and well-connected!

Saturday Night Live had a skit in which the people of Bedford Falls lynch Mr. Potter. THAT would've been a more satisfying ending!

Lincoln wasn't the last casualty. There.was still some blood to be shed before the formal end of hostilities and even more during the violent overthrow of Reconstruction. However Lincoln's quotation of Shakespeare is entirely in his character. There's no mind-bending space/time transcendence in this episode, only the sadness of war. It's no wonder that MASH picked up on this one. (note: Jamie Farr has a mini role!)

The horse is the nightmare of schizophrenia that carries Sarah from the conscious world. If the film seems inconclusive, and the narrative dissolves, it only follows her mindset. She lapses into a state of consciousness in which events are disconnected. This is a stunningly realistic depiction of schizophrenia, and Allison Brie gets it right: she's vulnerable, yet ludicrous. Ms. Brie has much depth here.

This film exemplifies its era both as an artifact, and in content. As the poster proclaims, it has it all: surfers, bikers, broads, not to mention Selective Service. (Maynard G.Krebs avoids getting drafted by pretending to be Gilligan-see for yourself!) A great theme song, too, written by Lee Hazelwood, and sung by Dusty Springfield.

Taken by itself, this is merely a scratchy old movie, noteworthy for the casting of the soon-to-notorious Farmer, and the always excellent Edward Arnold. When placed in the context of the Edna Ferber novel, this film is practically offensive. Aside from representing about half of an epic, (and informative) story, the casting of Walter Brennan as the gargantuan Swede, would rank among the greatest miscastings in Hollywood history if this film was better known.

The reviewer who characterized this film as B- movie entertainment must possess unattainably high standards. Having never coached basketball, I can't honestly rate "Wolves" in terms of what must be a fairly specialized field (as one critic here has done). From my admittedly limited perspective, I found "Wolves" to be an intelligent, and involving melodrama.

The casting of war hero Audie Murphy, and cartoonist Bill Mauldin clearly shows the outlook of the creators of this film., It must have seemed fitting to pay tribute to the servicemen of America's earlier wars, but the Civil War wasn't WWII. This production lies somewhere between a Western, and a generic war film: little of it is distinctively Crane, or 19th century. The film was obviously shot in California, and the Union kepis resemble tourist souvenirs (same wrong insignia). I can understand viewers having a sentimental attachment to this movie, but this deserves no badge.