In The Time Of The Pixies- Frank Capra’s Mister Deeds Goes To Town

 

DVD Review

 

By Sam Lowell

 

Mister Deeds Goes To Town, starring Gary Cooper, Jean Arthur, directed by Frank Capra, 1936

Recently in a review of a film later than the one under review, Gary Cooper’s role in Meet John Doe where he plays a serious victim of the Great Depression raging in the 1930s as hobo down on his luck who is desperate in get out from under, I noted that Mister Cooper was the epitome of the old time values fair-haired Midwestern, “ah shucks,” boy that such roles required, that audiences, female audiences could relate to. Mister Cooper brings that same “gee whizz” vitality to the role of Brother Deeds in Mister Deeds Goes To Town although here he is spouting forth the old time Yankee virtues since he was plucked out of Vermont in this one. But I would contend that those old-time values are the same ones that had been high-lighted in the latter film as our intrepid crusader railed against the strangeness of big city life (the “goes to town,” New York City life railed against in the former movie as well, an easy moving target of biting social commentary then as now.  

Here’s how it played out this time though. Brother Deeds sitting unknowingly in his bucolic little Vermont retreat playing tuba and doing other small town good deeds had his life turned around when he as the seemingly sole heir to a playboy killed in a car accident was uprooted to the evil empire, to New Jack City, by members of the scheming law firm that had handled the decease’s accounts. That was their first mistake, bringing him to the big city to be dazzled. The second was to underestimate a so-called “rube” when they tried to pull the wool over his eyes about how and what he should do with his new found fortune. The third was to, well, not protect him from the reporters, at least one reporter, Babe, played by Jean Arthur.    

 No question then, as now, a guy who grabbed the brass ring of twenty million dollars was hot news although now it would have to be about  twenty billion to raise any interests. The law firm was able to keep the wolves of the fourth estate away except the wily Babe. She began to write stories about him on the sly while he was falling for her. Not good, not good when after he was told who she was and what she was doing, he sensed she was just for the main chance. Not good too when he decided to flee the big burg and head back to forlorn little Vermont.

That would have been that except a distraught farmer cornered him in his mansion before he fled and bewailed him for his high lifestyle. Hey, that was not our fair-haired boy, not in hard scrabble times 1930s when people were in serious trouble to provide themselves with three square a day. So our boy, our boy Longfellow Deeds, decided to use his monies to do a personal “redistribute the wealth” scheme by using his fortune to set farmers up on the land again (the old forty acres and a mule that had run through farms belts of the world since the first field was seeded.) Of course this action had the corrupt law firm (a bunch of Cedars and another guy okay but corrupt law firm sets the right tone) up in arms since Deeds’ account was being milked by them to cover their own malfeasance.

The corrupt law firms’ strategy: have this knucklehead declared mentally ill and throw away the key. But to do that they needed to take him before a competency court another mistake (rather than say having a “hit man” take him out). Despite every ploy Brother Deeds had their number, outfoxed them, and gave the big city lawyers the boot. Gave New York City the back of his back. Oh yeah and swooped up Babe too. Not Cooper or Capra’s best but okay, okay.