State of the Union (1948 Frank Capra)

Another one of Capra's naive political 'little guy saves America' films, cf. Mr Smith Goes to Washington (having said that, I haven't actually seen the latter for a million years). An interesting choice for Tracy as the film mirrors his own life - Angela Lansbury is the public figure with whom he's having a not-quite-private affair, Kate is the estranged left-at-home wife, explicitly mirroring the Spence-Louise-Kate situation. ('State of the Union' is of course also about the marriage.)

But what's wrong with this film? It's very talky and in places it's like Capra can't direct a continuous take, with ugly cutting - as these scenes often involve Adolphe Menjou you can't help wondering if he was the problem. There's a surfeit of words in the screenplay, many of which are contemporary political references which go over our head, dating the film, so it doesn't hold up very well. Van Johnson's wise-cracking PR guy seems to me to overplay it. Tracy does deliver his long speeches perfectly and it has the customary good-guy-comes-clean ending, full of people and passion cf. It's a Wonderful Life (in that respect the endings are very similar). (Seem to be doing this-that-other frequently this morning.)

See what I mean?

Lansbury was only 21 - she has a bitchy control of the screen.* And according to James Curtis's excellent Tracy biography, the filming took place as the HUAC interviews began - Menjou being on the side of the anti-commies, branding Hepburn as a 'pink' and saying derogatory things to the press - resulting in a 'tense but cordial' set.

The play was by Howard Lindsay and Russell Crouse, adapted for the screen by Anthony Veiller and Myles Connelly. With Lewis Stone, Howard Smith, Charles Dingle, Maidel Turner (cocktail imbibing wife), Raymond Walburn, Margaret Hamilton (who Q identified correctly as The Wicked Witch of the West), Tom Fadden (room service, It's a Wonderful Life). Music by Victor Young, photographed by George 'Falsey' (tut,tut) for Liberty Films.

* She died not long after this review, October 11, aged 96. New York Times obit. I think my favourite of her performances might have been in The Manchurian Candidate.