Unrated, 1 hr. 44 min. Directed By:
Henry Koster. Release Date: Jun 1, 1951. DVD Release Date: Feb 6, 2001.
God, I love Jimmy Stewart. I don’t think Hollywood has ever had a
leading man who could pull off the “fellow well met” like Jimmy Stewart. Even when he kind of plays a jerk (like in Rear Window) there’s something about his
manner that makes me want to get to know him.
In this movie, he pulls off a character that sort of… personifies
unsullied goodness. He plays a man to
whom guile is totally foreign. There’s
no ill will, no deceit, no envy, no nothing that might otherwise make him more
interesting. But, despite that lack of
flaw, there’s something abjectly fascinating about the character, and that
Stewart was capable of pulling it off without making the watcher feel like
Elwood Dowd is more touched in the noggin than we were supposed to think.
I’ve seen this done as a stage play
once, at I enjoyed it, but I have to say that I liked this movie so much
more. The stage play felt jerky because
of the multiple scene changes as the characters try to chase down Mr. Dowd and
his invisible friend. The movie still
manages to convey the silliness of the story, but the performances in the film
are SO much better than what I saw it made that silliness seem like less of a
problem. And normally, silliness without
cause is a problem for me, but it wasn’t here.
I also have to admit that this movie
made me laugh out loud. More than
once. In modern comedies that’s kind of
a rare thing. Well, to be fair, that’s a
rare thing when the humor is as harmless as this. When it’s off color or suggestive, I tend to
laugh, and certainly I laugh when it’s crass.
I rarely laugh at humor that’s this clean, because I feel like I’m old
enough for a little bit of mud in my jokes, so I was kind of surprised that I found this not only funny, but totally charming in its approach to humor.
Basically, I couldn’t find a single
fault with this, no matter how I looked at it.
This is great family entertainment, and I wish I knew a kid with an
imaginary friend right now, because if I did, I’d be sharing this movie with
that kid.
