FILM REVIEWS

However, the more sober reaction of playwright Lillian Hellman seems more reliable. Upon seeing the film, she told her friend, director William Wyler (who had directed several of her plays, such as “Little Foxes,” to the screen), “Willie, this is such a piece of crap.”

Based on a book by Jan Struther, adapted to the screen by four scribes (Arthur Wimperis, George Froeschel, James Hilton, and Claudine West), the film, a portrait of an English family during the Second World War, was a typically middlebrow MGM propaganda, a moral booster that reaffirmed the ideals of human suffering and fortitude.  Needless to say, the picture represented a very Hollywood version of an English ordinary family.

At the center of the story is an “ordinary housewife” (played by the stately and elegant Greer Garson, who won the Oscar), married to an architect (Walter Pidegon) who always buys new cars the family cannot afford. Mrs. Miniver is the proud mother of three children, one elder and two young ones. The movie was meant to symbolize the gallantry and courage of the British housewife during the Blitz.

Mrs. Miniver’s unconquerable spirit in the face of war was meant to inspire other (American) housewives. By concentrating on one presumably “typical” family, “Mrs. Miniver” was meant to be a universal portrait. Though Garson is supposed to be a “plain and ordinary” woman, she is always well-dressed, wearing expensive hats, and courteous and controlled in every crisis she faces.

The movie contains a number of touching scenes, such as the evacuation of Dunkerque and the harrowing night the family spends in a bomb shelter, but it loses the little credibility it has in a scene in which Mrs. Miniver encounters a downed German pilot she had captured.

But it’s the last lines, spoken by Henry Wilcoxon, preaching from the pulpit, that Roosevelt and millions of viewers remembered: “This is not only a war of soldiers in uniform. It is a war of the people—of all the people—and it must be fought not only on the battlefield but in the cities and in the villages, in the factories and on the farms, in the home and in the heart of every man, woman, and child who loves freedom.

Well, we have buried our dead, but we shall not forget them. Instead, they will inspire us with an unbreakable determination to free ourselves and those who come after us from the tyranny and terror that threaten to strike us down.  This is the people’s war. It is our war. We are the fighters. Fight it then. Fight it with all that is in us. And may God defend the right.”

Wyler’s direction is reliably skillful but impersonal, lacking the strength and depth he would show in his 1946 Oscar-winning film, “The Best Years of Our Lives.”

Receiving the largest (12) number of nominations in 1942, “Mrs. Miniver” swept most of the major Oscars, including Picture, Director, Actress, Supporting Actress (Teresa Wright), Screenplay (George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West, and Arthur Wimperis), and Black-and-White Cinematography (Joseph Ruttenberg). C

Franklin D. Roosevelt was so impressed with the film that he requested the hasty release of the schmaltzy and patriotic “Mrs. Miniver.” Later, the President had the vicar’s lofty speech at the end of the film printed in leaflet form and dropped by airplanes over Nazi-Occupied Europe. However, The reaction of playwright Lillian Hellman seems more reliable. Upon seeing the film, she told her friend, director, William Wyler, “Willie, this is such a piece of crap.”

The film, a portrait of an English family during the Second World War, was a typically middlebrow MGM propaganda, a moral booster that reaffirms the ideals of human suffering and fortitude. Needless to say, the picture was a Hollywood version of the English ordinary family.

At the center of the story is an “ordinary housewife” (played by the stately and elegant Greer Garson, who won an Oscar), married to an architect (Walter Pidegon) who always buys new cars the family cannot afford. Mrs. Miniver is the proud mother of three children, one elder and two young ones. The movie was meant to symbolize the gallantry and courage of the British housewife during the Blitz.

“Mrs. Miniver”‘s unconquerable spirit in the face of war was meant to inspire other (American) housewives. By concentrating on one presumably “typical” family, “Mrs. Miniver” was meant to be a universal portrait. Though Garson is supposed to be a “plain and ordinary” woman, she is always well-dressed, wearing expensive hats, and is courteous and controlled in every crisis she faces.

It’s worth noting that when first offered the role, Greer Garson declined it, because she didn’t want to play the mother of a grow-up son; it’s therefore ironic that she later married her screen son, Richard Ney. The part had also been offered to MGM’s other star, Norma Shearer, who refused to accept it for the same reason.

Receiving the largest (12) number of nominations in 1942, “Mrs. Miniver” swept most of the major Oscars, including Picture, Director, Actress, Supporting Actress (Teresa Wright), Screenplay (George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West, and Arthur Wimperis), and Black-and-White Cinematography (Joseph Ruttenberg).