6. Clarence Get’s His Wings – It’s A Wonderful Life
Again, an obvious inclusion, but no less deserving for it and perhaps the only Christmas movie moment that could challenge the sign-language scene from Miracle on 34th Street for supremacy. IAWL recently got a buffed up Bluray release and you can read Jon’s rightly effusive praise of the film here. It’s a Wonderful Life keeps improving not just with time passing, but more to the point with us as the viewers growing into the film and an appreciation of the tension Jimmy Stewart’s George Bailey feels as Bedford Falls refuses to let him get away. He loves his life, but is unable to appreciate what he has because he frustrated over what he feels he lacks. His realisation at the end is a beautiful thing indeed, as he runs through Bedford Falls, wishing everyone and everything a merry Christmas, thankful now for what is life is and means. The tenderness of his wife’s love and prayers for him guarantees to insert a walnut-sized lump in the hardiest of throats, but it is as the film finishes and a bell rings and Clarence finally gets the wings he so clearly deserves that we all finally get to feel that Christmas has arrived. Perfect.
About Dave Roper
