Wonderful

I'll admit it--I try to catch It's a Wonderful Life during the end-of-the-year holiday season because, well, it's tradition. And, the FSM forgive me, Brother Harry looks damn fine in his uniform in that final scene:

Gotta love a silk aviator scarf.
If you have any kind of tradition related to this movie, then you have to check out an essay from the 18 December edition of The New York Times by Wendell Jamieson about his own experience and revelations about George Bailey and his trials and tribulations. If you ask me, Jamieson is dead on when he writes,

It’s a Wonderful Life is a terrifying, asphyxiating story about growing up and relinquishing your dreams, of seeing your father driven to the grave before his time, of living among bitter, small-minded people. It is a story of being trapped, of compromising, of watching others move ahead and away, of becoming so filled with rage that you verbally abuse your children, their teacher and your oppressively perfect wife. It is also a nightmare account of an endless home renovation.

Jamieson is so right here. George Bailey's life is as much tragedy as it is success. How often are we told as kids to never stop dreaming, to aim for the stars, to work and work to make our dreams come true--and what happens to the majority of us? We wind up with mortgages, with jobs we come to loathe, in lives in which we're surrounded by people we once delighted in but now tolerate more than celebrate. In other words, despite being dreamers and working hard to realize our dreams, we wind up in ruts.

Oh, and Bedford Falls is the worst hell a person could wind up in.