NFR Project: “The Best Years of Our Lives”
Dir: William Wyler
Scr: Robert E. Sherwood
Pho: Gregg Toland
Ed: Daniel Mandell
Premiere: Nov. 21, 1946
172 min.
This, the most affecting of Hollywood films in its decade, is remarkable for its depiction of the failures, foibles, and fears of a cross-section of ordinary men, specifically men who came back from fighting in World War II.
The film won seven Oscars (Best Picture, Director, Actor, Supporting Actor, Editor, Score, Screenplay), and was amazingly popular. It dealt with contemporary problems. The war and the reintegration of the soldier into civilian life was troublesome. Men found themselves squeezed out of the job market, unable to get loans to start businesses, in changed relationships with friends and family, and with horrible nightmares and PTSD, or battle fatigue, as they used to call it.
Kudos to director Wyler and producer Sam Goldwyn, who won the prestigious Thalberg award for public service for this effort. They were determined to really get to the heart of matter, and did. They selected the novella Glory for Me by journalist, writer, and screenwriter MacKinlay Kantor, which gives us a trio of storylines that cross each other in a mid-sized city after the war. Robert E. Sherwood shaped it into a screenplay.
The trauma, surprisingly for a Hollywood movie, sits front and center. Three servicemen hitch a ride home to their town in an inbound bomber. Fredric March plays Al, an affluent banker who wound up an Army sergeant. Dana Andrews is Fred, a former soda jerk who rose to the rank of Captain in the Air Force and was decorated for bravery. And the amazing Harold Russell, a real-life combat double amputee, playing Homer, a disabled sailor.
The tender depiction of the soldiers’ return is expertly played and heart-rending. The three stay in touch and intersect at Butch’s, the bar owned by Homer’s uncle (the great Hoagy Carmichael). Al goes on a bender, and Fred joins him at Butch’s. Fred spends the night at Al’s, where he suffers and cries out from a battle nightmare, triggering the compassion of Al’s daughter Peggy (Teresa Wright).
All three men are torn up. March won the Oscar for his warts-and-all portrayal of Al, who readjusts with difficulty. Dana Andrews deserved an award for his complex role as Fred, a guy who finds his G.I. bride (Virginia Mayo, unusually playing a heel here) doesn’t love him, and that he has to go back to his old job at the soda fountain. He and Peggy fall in love, but their chances don’t look good.
It’s Harold Russell who is the real revelation. An amateur actor, he lost his hands in combat, and is here supplied with a pair of metal hooks, which he handles adroitly. His Homer is confident on the outside, but inside he is sure that his fiancĂ©e, the literal girl next door (Cathy O’Donnell), won’t want him anymore due to his disability. Completely without the tricks of the trade, Russell conveys Homer’s torment and humiliation with a profoundly understated performance. Russell actually won two Oscars for this role, a feat unequalled in Academy history.
Al, Fred, and Homer handle their dilemmas and move on with their lives, one way or another. What's unique is the examination of male emotions and the emotional relationships men build with each other. Wyler is a reader of faces, a genius at getting actors to express themselves on film. Many times, he holds a scene a few beats longer than is normal, just to let us drink in actors’ reactions. Gregg Toland’s incredible deep-focus photography is here, and it’s beautiful.
There is some awkwardness. Most of the women are savior types (Myrna Loy has the thankless task of playing loving wife to Al), and drinking heavily seems to be the prescription for those just out of the service. Still, it’s a trio of moving stories that anyone can identify with. By the time we get to the haunting scene of Fred in the airplane graveyard, we are hooked. What will happen to these men? Can they persist, and thrive?
The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: The Big Sleep.
