Wars have a price, and that price is being paid even by the side that won an undeniable triumph, as the United States did in the Second World War. The price was paid long after the guns fell silent, and this is something Americans at the time were quite aware of. For that very reason, the subject matter of The Best Years of Our Lives, the 1946 drama directed by William Wyler, resonated strongly with the American public and critics, resulting in one of the most successful Hollywood films of its time.
The film is based on the 1944 novel Glory for Me by MacKinlay Kantor. The plot begins after the war, when US military servicemen are being demobilised and returning home after serving overseas. Three of them board a B-17 bomber scheduled to bring them to Boone City, their hometown somewhere in the Midwest. They are Captain Fred Derry (played by Dana Andrews), a US Army Air Force bombardier who used to be a soda jerk before the war; US Army Sergeant Al Stephenson (played by Fredric March), a middle-aged man who served in the infantry and is now returning to his old job as a banker; and US Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Homer Parish (played by Harold Russell), who lost both hands when his ship was sunk and now uses special hooks. Despite their different backgrounds, all three men bond during the flight and later maintain contact.
Al seems to have the easiest time, returning to his beautiful, loving wife Milly (played by Myrna Loy) and a well-paid job at the bank, but seeing how his daughter Peggy (played by Teresa Wright) and son Rob (played by Michael Hall) have grown during his absence, he senses an emptiness that he tries to fill with excessive drinking. Fred discovers that his wife Marie (played by Virginia Mayo), whom he married on impulse before going to war, lived well on his military pay during his absence and is now unwilling to adjust her lifestyle to her husband's low-paid civilian job. Homer wonders whether his fiancée Wilma Cameron (played by Cathy O'Donnell) will accept his condition and dedicate the rest of her life to a cripple.
The Second World War is in America's popular history portrayed as a "good war", which is hardly surprising because, unlike the wars that followed, it required unimaginable sacrifices from the American population – both among the millions of men put in uniform and those who awaited their loved ones to return from distant battlefields. Almost everyone was affected by the war, and that included the cast and crew of the film. Scriptwriter Robert E. Sherwood worked in the Office of War Information, while director William Wyler had even better veteran credentials. The character of Fred Derry is partly based on his experiences while he filmed US bomber crews over Germany for his famed 1944 documentary The Memphis Belle.
Wyler strived for authenticity, and this included the casting of Harold Russell. The character of Homer was originally written as merely "shell-shocked", but Wyler had seen the young man in Diary of a Sergeant, a film showing how Russell, a US Army veteran who had lost his hands in a training accident, adapted to life with specially designed hooks. Wyler decided to make Homer a cripple who would be an actual cripple and cast Russell despite his complete lack of acting ability. Sherwood’s script also very realistically portrayed not only the problems of veterans readjusting to civilian life, but also how civilians, eager to return to the certainties of the pre-war order, showed much more enthusiasm for that process. This is indicated at the very beginning, when we see how US military servicemen, who had enjoyed preferential treatment by airlines and other transport companies during wartime, are relegated to ordinary passengers.
Wyler’s exploration of these themes is helped by his superb direction, as well as excellent work by cinematographer Gregg Toland, who employs deep focus in a couple of scenes which are studied in film schools to this day. Wyler’s direction probably shines best in the scene near the end that takes place in a great aircraft boneyard, where Fred confronts thousands of military planes, considered obsolete or worthless in peacetime, and wonders whether that is the fate that awaits him too.
The cast is also very good, especially Fredric March, who won his second Oscar for Best Actor by playing a veteran who tries to fight the demons of wartime trauma with alcohol. Dana Andrews was perhaps cast mostly because of his matinee idol looks, but he delivers a realistic portrayal of a man dealing both with the psychological traumas of wartime and the clash between his wartime fantasies and the realities of post-war life. Virginia Mayo, who was becoming one of the major stars of late-1940s Hollywood, shines in the role of Fred’s ungrateful, trollop wife.
The Best Years of Our Lives is a very good film, but far from perfect. That could be attributed perhaps to the very Hollywood craftsmanship that makes it a little too polished and, consequently, look a little artificial for a truly realistic depiction of the subject. That includes protagonists who look more like archetypes than real characters – each represents different branches of the US Armed Forces that fought on land, sea, and in the air; each belongs to a different social class (Fred is poor, Homer is middle class, and Al is rich). Unlike the protagonists, the character of Milly, played by Myrna Loy, is too perfect as a loving and understanding wife. The same can be said for the melodramatic plot which introduces a romance between Fred and Al’s beautiful daughter Peggy, which is resolved very predictably in order to restore order and have the protagonist rewarded for his wartime service by getting the "right" girl. The character of Homer’s uncle Butch, a sympathetic bar owner, is introduced largely to have the famous singer and songwriter Hoagy Carmichael play him and deliver a number of delectable piano pieces. Many of these subplots only prolong the film to an epic running time of nearly three hours.
Despite that, The Best Years of Our Lives found an audience in post-war America and became the most commercially successful Hollywood film of the 1940s. Critics were equally enthusiastic, praising Wyler’s skill and the graceful way he handled a sensitive topic. This was finally reflected in a rich harvest of Academy Awards, including Best Picture, which would give this film the high reputation it enjoys to this day.
From today’s perspective, The Best Years of Our Lives might look a little too Hollywood, but its subject matter is universal. Today’s viewers, even in countries where war experiences are abstractions based on video games and Marvel films, might very soon find it quite relevant for our troubled times.
RATING: 7/10 (+++)
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