"Mr. Smith Goes to Washington"... This is Quality Film-Making

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is, and I say this with most sincerity, one of the most amazing movies I've seen in a long time. For what seemed like epochs, my heart longed for a truly great movie to come and capture it. Then, one day, when my movie tongue has nearly dried up and my movie legs were near exhaustion, in the distance I see "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". I try to approach it, but my legs have no energy and collapse. Thankfully, "Mr. Smith" is forgiving, and good, and it walks towards me and lets me devour its bottle of goodness. My health is rejuvenated. I am ready to enter the world of film viewing with a new optimism. And it's all thanks to "Mr. Smith".

Let's get down to what makes this movie leave such a good impression. It is the ending. Claude Rains plays Senator Joseph Paine, and in the film's last two minutes, he delivers a monologue so amazing that my heart cannot refuse to light up with glee and bring a smile to my face every time I see it. The ending is so shocking and unexpected, and when he shouts the film's final words, it is just an amazing, amazing moment; easily one of the best scenes ever to be captured on film. This movie is all about the performances people, and I have to hand it to Rains, as he does an amazing job as a good-at-heart Senator who is having a difficult time dealing with his conscience. Jimmy Stewart's performance, as always, is outstanding, and the "aw, shucks" presence he brings to the screen is so comical, but when you see him being attacked like he is in this movie, it just breaks your heart. And... I think Jean Arthur's performance was good, but I'm not too sure, because most of the time she was on screen I was just admiring her. She's... she's really beautiful. Not that I let that get in the way of the movie or anything, but... yeah.

Early in the film, a Senator from an unknown state dies. And when a Senator dies, it is up to the governor of that state to decide who replaces him. Governor Hopper (Guy Kibbee), feeling pressure from a media giant and his own party, cannot reach a real decision, and just decides to go with whom his kids tell him to nominate, this being Jefferson Smith, a goodie-goodie who is a hero to Boy Scouts around the country. The state's Senior Senator, Sen. Joseph Paine, finds this to be an agreeable decision, since Smith shouldn't stand in the way of Paine's march towards the presidency. Smith is a good man, and he sincerely wants to help the people, but he knows scandal when he sees it, and soon finds himself uncovering a truth in the political world that we all know about, but are too apathetic about to investigate, as corruption in politics is a sort of inevitability. Smith's unsheathing of this system fires back on him, and soon he finds himself in more trouble than he expected.

All of this comes down to a very long and arduous forty-minute climax which has us praying for an end just because we are all sure that the system has screwed Smith over for the rest of his political career. It is a heart-breaking process, and it sucks to see Smith in such political pain, but the outcome of the whole event just blows me away, and going through all of the pain is very easily worth it just for the ending.

Capra is a brilliant director, and he uses the cinematic cheesiness of 1938 to his advantage. A scene where a bunch of Boy Scouts cheer Smith's bill on is actually rather humorous, both because of what has just happened, and because we can almost feel Capra smiling at it all behind the camera. Additionally, back in this era, alcohol was used a lot more for comedy, and the way Capra exercises his skills in a scene involving Jean Arthur's drunken character, and a friend of hers, is pretty damn funny. The guy simply knows what he was doing, and the way he intensifies the situation in the film's final moments borders on genius.

Rating: A+