For the wintry setting, the special effects department, unhappy with the traditional method of painting cornflakes white in place of snow, invented an innovative, exponentially more convincing chemical flurry. It just wouldn’t feel like the holidays in our house without the annual showing of It’s a Wonderful Life, Holiday Inn, Scrooged, and National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Bedford Falls, the sleepy fictional town in which the story unfolds, was one of the largest American film sets ever created sprawled across four acres, with 75 fake stores and buildings, a three-block main street, and 20 full-grown oak trees. The following is a guest post by Samantha Kosarzycki, legal intern, Office of Public Information and Education. Immediately, the cast and crew felt certain they were making something special. This film is not currently playing on MUBI, but many other great films are. In April 1946, production finally began on the film. Instead, he shows him what a world without George would be like.
MOVIE IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE MOVIE
“When we were pretty far along in the script but not done, our agent called and said, ‘Capra wants to know how soon you'll be finished.’ Frances said, ‘We're finished right now.’ We put our pens down and never went back to it.” The pair were still given final credit, but it was Capra, with uncredited help from writers such as Jo Swerling, Michael Wilson, and Dorothy Parker, who finally cobbled together the rest of the screenplay. Its a Wonderful Life is a touching Christmas classic movie and arguably one of the best movies of all time, full of some important life lessons.
“Frank Capra could be so condescending,” said Hackett. When he did, he recruited husband and wife writing duo Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett to help him polish the failed scripts into something coherent. Perhaps even more meaningful today than it ever was before as the film opens, its Christmas Eve and Bailey and his beloved Bailey Building &. After creating three inadequate scripts – one of which was worked on by Dalton Trumbo – RKO had decided to shelve the project, before Capra came on board and immediately saw its potential. The film, which was originally going to be produced by RKO Pictures, had a stuttering beginning.