Contemporary Social Issues, the trending theme of over the last few Oscars, is what made the 19th Annual Academy Awards so memorable. Over the years movies that were nominated dealt with the war, alcoholism, and religion. Now, with our boys back home and life slowly starting to get back to normal then next issues that needed to be talked about were our veterans. The Best Years of Our Lives, the Best Picture Winner that year, did an excellent job of discussing just that.
The war had finally ended! After many lost year, and many miles traveled, three soldiers are on their way home to Boone City. After waiting for a flight back home for a few days Al Stephenson, Fred Derry, and Homer Parrish wind up on the same flight heading back to the small town and talking about finally being home. We learn, very briefly, about their lives, their battles, and the struggles that they are worried about coming home to. Upon getting home they find that they have some adjusting that needs to be done. Al has to learns that his children are practically grown and has to get to the know them all over again, Fred has to find his newly wed wife and search for a "grown up" job in order to pay for her high class lifestyle, and Homer, who lost both of his hand in the war, has to prove that he is still himself and try to adjust to the civilian life. With so much more confusion in the world, and their personal lives, they wonder if some of the things they want are really worth fighting for or if they need to take a step back and readjust what they need.
This is not only a truly special story, but how the Academy honored it something that does need to be mentioned. Samuel Goldwyn wanted to produce a story about veterans coming home and adjusting to civilian life after reading an article in Time about that very issue. He brought in Mackinlay Kantor, a former war correspondent, to write the screenplay. He got together some of the greatest actors and actress, such as Myrna Loy, Fredric March, and Virginia Mayo, to play the parts. If that was not enough the film was nominated for six other awards that night as well. The most interesting of these would be the nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Harold Russell played the part of Homer Parrish, the boy he lost both of his hands in the war. The reason that this was interesting was because Harold was actually a WWII Veteran who did loose both his hand in the war. He was also not a professional actor of any kind. The fact that he was even nominated was astonishing! Many people in the Academy thought that is was going to be a long shot for him to win so they made him an Honorary Academy Award for inspiring his fellow vets. Later that night it was announced that he did win the Academy Award from Best Supporting Actor, to everyone's enthusiastic surprise, and has become the only person in history to win two Awards for the same performance. The Best Years of Our Lives beat out very notable movies to win the award that year. The other four movies nominated were: Two Cities Films' Henry V, RKO's It's a Wonderful Life, 20th Century Fox's The Razor's Edge, and MGM's The Yearling.
I have to say that this movie really touched my heart. Especially learning about all of the honors is received, and how it came to be made it more special. This film is even relevant to what is going on today with soldiers leaving and coming home. Technology has advanced to help them to adjust but the problems that they face when they come home are still the same. There is no switch that can be flipped to make someone automatically adjust to their old lives. In fact after war lives are never the same again. I think that this is one of those films that everyone needs to see just once in their lives. the cast was amazing, the set were too, and the script could not have been any better. I give a 10 out of 10!
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