one of my leftist hippie friends recently re-watched that christmas-time classic "it's a wonderful life" and commented that some of the things mr. potter said sounded like things i would say. he meant it as an insult, but i took it as a compliment.
mr. potter has been ranked #6 on the American Film Institute's list of the 50 Greatest Villains in American film history - but let's review the facts. i'm going to be lazy and copy/paste/paraphrase from here and here.
- The clear-cut black and white morality with which we see the world through George Bailey's biased eyes is swirled deeply with shades of grey, and I'm forced to conclude that Mr. Potter is not only not a villain, but perhaps cinema's greatest tragic hero.
- Mr. Potter was a canny businessman who tried (and, alas, failed) to turn boring, repressed Bedford Falls – a town full of drunks, child beaters, vandals and racial and sexual harassers – into an exciting new destination nightspot called Pottersville. Pottersville, with the exception of the closed Bailey Building and Loan Association, clearly has substantially more local business and almost certainly a stronger economy than Bedford Falls.
- George repeatedly accosts people about the shitty houses that Potter supposedly rented to them, but watch closely. Does anyone ever really jump to agree with him, or do they just stare in confusion or nod uncomfortably to end the moment with this deranged lunatic?
- You know who doesn’t commit any crimes in this movie? Mr. Potter. Everyone keeps saying he’s rotten but it’s smart and ethical for him to offer to buy out the shareholders of the wobbly Building and Loan. True, it’s unethical for Potter not to return the money that Uncle Billy literally drops into his lap, but Potter’s right in accusing George of gross negligence. Entrusting anything more important than a broom to a drunken fool like Billy (he loses track of the money while taunting Potter) makes George an unfit fiduciary.
- Without George, Mary winds up in a place worse than the cemetery – “she’s just about to close up the library!” – where she wears glasses and dresses like Paula Poundstone. It’s an insult to working women. Anyway, Mary wouldn’t have been an “old maid.” More likely, she would have married the millionaire Sam Wainwright, the guy she was seeing when George stole her away.
- George may be a nice guy, but he’s also plain stupid. He turns down Sam’s offer to make a fortune in plastics; later, after he’s been libeling Mr. Potter for the entire movie, the latter offers him a $20,000 job. On $20,000 a year, George could have fixed that broken knob on the banister, gotten a better piano teacher for his daughter and sent Uncle Billy to rehab. Perhaps he could have steered the town in a direction more suited to his moral code. But what does he do? Well, this is George Bailey we're talking about here, so we know how it goes: he responds to Potter's generous offer with a near-psychotic torrent of verbal abuse before storming out in a rage. Bedford Falls' number two business owner, ladies and gentlemen. Bravo.
- Let's look forward to the present. Bedford Falls might still exist (then again, maybe not, with all the bad loans George was giving out undermining the town's economy), but if it does it's a sleepy, depressed armpit with good intentions and little else except some kind of hollow longing for the 1950s. And in the previous financial crisis, the whole town might have just ended. And Pottersville? Well, Mr. Potter's enhancements to the local nightlife actually encouraged some new people to move in, people whose kids grew up smart thanks to Mary's work at the library. Bigger population, fresh blood, a thriving local economy, and more tax dollars to build a better hospital, a better school, and hire better teachers. Maybe Pottersville circa 2014 is even sending its kids to Ivy League schools and producing great thinkers, scientists, businessmen, artists, academics. Henry F. Potter had a grand vision for the future of Bedford Falls, not necessarily as a thriving American city, but a good place to live. George Bailey wanted to hold its hand and walk it into the abyss.
mr. potter has been ranked #6 on the American Film Institute's list of the 50 Greatest Villains in American film history - but let's review the facts. i'm going to be lazy and copy/paste/paraphrase from here and here.
- The clear-cut black and white morality with which we see the world through George Bailey's biased eyes is swirled deeply with shades of grey, and I'm forced to conclude that Mr. Potter is not only not a villain, but perhaps cinema's greatest tragic hero.
- Mr. Potter was a canny businessman who tried (and, alas, failed) to turn boring, repressed Bedford Falls – a town full of drunks, child beaters, vandals and racial and sexual harassers – into an exciting new destination nightspot called Pottersville. Pottersville, with the exception of the closed Bailey Building and Loan Association, clearly has substantially more local business and almost certainly a stronger economy than Bedford Falls.
- George repeatedly accosts people about the shitty houses that Potter supposedly rented to them, but watch closely. Does anyone ever really jump to agree with him, or do they just stare in confusion or nod uncomfortably to end the moment with this deranged lunatic?
- You know who doesn’t commit any crimes in this movie? Mr. Potter. Everyone keeps saying he’s rotten but it’s smart and ethical for him to offer to buy out the shareholders of the wobbly Building and Loan. True, it’s unethical for Potter not to return the money that Uncle Billy literally drops into his lap, but Potter’s right in accusing George of gross negligence. Entrusting anything more important than a broom to a drunken fool like Billy (he loses track of the money while taunting Potter) makes George an unfit fiduciary.
- Without George, Mary winds up in a place worse than the cemetery – “she’s just about to close up the library!” – where she wears glasses and dresses like Paula Poundstone. It’s an insult to working women. Anyway, Mary wouldn’t have been an “old maid.” More likely, she would have married the millionaire Sam Wainwright, the guy she was seeing when George stole her away.
- George may be a nice guy, but he’s also plain stupid. He turns down Sam’s offer to make a fortune in plastics; later, after he’s been libeling Mr. Potter for the entire movie, the latter offers him a $20,000 job. On $20,000 a year, George could have fixed that broken knob on the banister, gotten a better piano teacher for his daughter and sent Uncle Billy to rehab. Perhaps he could have steered the town in a direction more suited to his moral code. But what does he do? Well, this is George Bailey we're talking about here, so we know how it goes: he responds to Potter's generous offer with a near-psychotic torrent of verbal abuse before storming out in a rage. Bedford Falls' number two business owner, ladies and gentlemen. Bravo.
- Let's look forward to the present. Bedford Falls might still exist (then again, maybe not, with all the bad loans George was giving out undermining the town's economy), but if it does it's a sleepy, depressed armpit with good intentions and little else except some kind of hollow longing for the 1950s. And in the previous financial crisis, the whole town might have just ended. And Pottersville? Well, Mr. Potter's enhancements to the local nightlife actually encouraged some new people to move in, people whose kids grew up smart thanks to Mary's work at the library. Bigger population, fresh blood, a thriving local economy, and more tax dollars to build a better hospital, a better school, and hire better teachers. Maybe Pottersville circa 2014 is even sending its kids to Ivy League schools and producing great thinkers, scientists, businessmen, artists, academics. Henry F. Potter had a grand vision for the future of Bedford Falls, not necessarily as a thriving American city, but a good place to live. George Bailey wanted to hold its hand and walk it into the abyss.
"it's a wonderful life" - in defense of mr. potter
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