El secreto de vivir

I had the privilege to watch the recently restored version on the big screen, or at least, a reasonably big screen, in the "Arsenal", the cinema of the Berlin Filmmuseum. And it was simply wonderful, a heart-warming experience. This film leaves you with such a pleasant daze, you almost want to shake hands with every stranger you meet when you're back on the streets.

What's there to add about one of the best loved films off all time, packed with gems and first-rate performances? Gary Cooper is just perfect in the title role as the seemingly ignorant small town tuba player from Mandrake Falls, Vermont. When he's informed he has inherited $20 million, he instantly leaves for New York to take care of the estate. Immediately everybody in town wants a piece of him, businessman, relatives and journalists, but he somehow manages to outsmart them all.

A deceptively simple story, this film is so much more than just a romantic comedy. There are some of the typical ingredients that so many Hollywood thirties-films contain, such as the typical depression-era social conscience, but when handled this way, it even puts a smile on the face of the most grumpy film theorist or historian. Jean Arthur has never been more appealing than this in a fantastic role as a hard-boiled newspaper journalist who initially is after Deeds too, but - off course - things turn out a little different than she thought. There's a not a single dull moment in the whole film, fast paced, a razor-sharp script and stellar performances all contribute to the enjoyment of the crazed proceedings in this film. One of the many highlights: When Deeds lets his butlers holler in the hall and stairwell of his mansion in order to enjoy the echoes they produce. Priceless!

Highly enjoyable, don't miss this one.

When a famous millionaire dies the media is aflame with the identity of his missing heir. The lawyers are just as interested and track him down to none other than small-town, simple-living Longfellow Deeds. He is more bemused than anything else about his sudden wealth and goes to New York to find out more. Once there he finds no end of people offering him services or selling him things and he tries to find some humanity within the city and the sharks around him. He believes he has found it with women-in-distress Mary Dawson but little does he know that she is really "Babe" Bennett – the sharpest reporter on the streets.

Unfair to watch this film with wholly modern eyes as some have done – berating it for its celebration of small-town values and perhaps depicting a naivety that is beyond the pale. Likewise though, I don't think that we should embrace it unquestioningly as many do. At its heart it is a Frank Capra film and it presents us with everything that we have come to expect from a film with that description. A simple man (many would say a "good" man) is confronted and to an extent crushed by examples of modern society that fly contrary to his moral and solid existence. That's it. It doesn't really matter what the specifics happen to be here as this is all you really need to know. To some extent of course this is all a bit obvious and naïve and indeed to some viewer it will be hard to get past that but in its favour it does manage to presence this homely cliché with an enormous wedge of charm.

This charm is evident throughout the film but one of the best examples of it is in the courtroom scene that manages to just about avoid being preachy due to the sheer cheering quality it has to it. Capra's direction and Riskin's script bring this out really well although I would question the tagline "rocking America with laughter" – it was amusing and warming but not hilarious by any means. I'm not entirely sold on Cooper in the lead and certainly not as enamoured as some are here. For my money he plays the "aw shucks ma'am" stuff just a bit too heavily, forgetting to give me a character to go along with it. Jean Arthur is better as she has more to play with, while Bancroft is fun in a bit of a cliché but a fun one. The rest of the cast do what you would expect whether they be simple men inspired, crooked men confronted or serving men treated with respect – all good but nothing earth shattering.

Overall then this is an obvious film that does just what you expect it to and watching it purely with modern eyes will kill it for many viewers. It is best watched with a mind to the period even if not total forgiveness – because it is not without flaws. The charm and the warming effect it has makes it though and, while not the Capra I would point the newcomer to, it is certainly an example of what we mean when we now say something is Capra-esquire (which is quite something – to have your name used as a descriptive word so many years later!).

Frank Capra knew that Gary Cooper was made for the part of Longfellow Deeds, he waited until Harry Cohn could get him from Paramount before making this film. It certainly is a once in a lifetime role and it got Gary Cooper his first nomination for Best Actor. He lost that year to Paul Muni for The Story of Louis Pasteur. But Capra won for Best Director that year.

Cooper, poet laureate of Mandrake Falls, inherits 20 million dollars from a rich uncle. He's not terribly impressed with that as he feels he's living just fine in Mandrake Falls. But he goes down to New York City to settle the estate and gets put up in grand style at his late uncle's mansion.

The executor of the estate, Douglass Dumbrille, is one smooth talking, white shoe bottom feeder. This is probably Dumbrille's best known classic villain, John Cedar. He wants Cooper's power of attorney real bad to cover up some dipping he's done. Cooper isn't giving it to him right away though.

In the meantime his inheritance has become news and local editor George Bancroft has dispatched sob sister reporter Jean Arthur to invade his inner sanctum. That's a common thread in the Capra populist trilogy, a woman sent to invade the inner sanctum of the hero and ends up falling for him. Jean Arthur did it again to James Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and Cooper had it done to him again by Barbara Stanwyck in Meet John Doe.

After a whole lot of silly incidents which Arthur duly reports on, Cooper gets a real wake up call from one of what the current president then called a forgotten man. John Wray, a desperate farmer, tossed off his land and there were plenty of those in the twenties and thirties tells him off good and proper in a very powerful scene. Cooper, his own values questioned, decides to set up a fund to save the family farm as an institution.

Then he's called insane and Dumbrille takes as clients other heirs who want to contest the will. Which leads to Cooper's hearing in court to determine his sanity.

The values of Mr. Deeds are certainly eternal, honesty and decency don't and should never go out of style. Unfortunately the family farm is a thing of the past, there are less and less of them every year. It's agribusiness now so a faithful remake could never work today.

Yet the original still has a charm that cannot be denied, due to Frank Capra's vision and the way he got great performances out of the whole cast. One performance that shocked me was Raymond Walburn who usually plays avuncular, loquacious types. He plays the butler to Cooper's uncle and now to Cooper himself. To those who expect the usual Walburn we know and love, this is one different Walburn.

Even though Mr. Deeds Goes to Town is rooted firmly in the Thirties it should still be seen and studied today.

The combination of story, cast, and director make this an entertaining offbeat comedy, and one that also has a few worthwhile things to say. Gary Cooper does well in a somewhat atypical role for him, Jean Arthur does well in the kind of role that she often played very well, and Frank Capra applies his usual touch to hold it all together.

The story has a light but interesting premise, with Cooper as the naive Mr. Deeds who is confronted with the consequences of sudden wealth. He and Arthur work surprisingly well in their scenes together, and they make both the premise and their relationship tangle-ups believable.

It's probably not as easy as it looks to make this kind of material work, as the rather ill-conceived 2002 remake demonstrated. The remake actually started better than expected, and for quite a while Adam Sandler was surprisingly bearable in the lead role. But eventually it lost its balance, inserting too much extraneous material that either did not work or that did not fit in with the tone and themes of the rest of the movie.

Capra, on the other hand, keeps a good balance between the light, gentle tone and the sometimes far-fetched plot developments. He winds it up in good fashion with a funny courtroom scene that also provides a couple of good, if uncomplicated, observations on human nature.

Capra and the stars all made other movies that worked even better than this one does, but "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town" itself still remains one of the better movies of its kind.

In my opinion, a far superior work compared to that other Capra populist film `Mr. Smith Goes To Washington' (even Jean Arthur seems fresher her in a role that is a virtual remake of the aforementioned film). We like the story because we can identify with parvenus such as Mr. Deeds and this pulls us through all the way to the predictable, yet delightful and satisfying conclusion that takes place in that good ol' American institution, the courtroom. Just what the doctor ordered to battle a case of cynicism.