Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #12 in VHS
• Released on: 2005-11-28
• Rating: Universal, suitable for all
• Formats: Black & White, Collector's Edition, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of tapes: 1
• Running time: 168 minutes

Synopsis
A young man commits suicide but is saved by a guardian angel who shows him what he has achieved during his life. Includes the making of, a personal introduction and interviews with Frank Capra Jr.

Customer Reviews

It's a wonderful film...
A holidy favourite and one of the best classics sure to become a tradition. Jimmy Stewart is magical. While the story line may seem simple and a take off on Dickens' Christmas Carol, it is an example how we touch lives and never know what we have done. This is not just a holiday favourite but an all-time favourite... they can't make a movie like this today.

A rarity, feelgood but aware of the darker side to life
Forget the caricature, this film involves disappointment, loss, failure and at one point even shows a man on the edge of suicide.

It sketches out the life of one man- a normal man, an unimportant man, whose actions facilitate the success of other men, whose kindness enables other men and women to thrive, and ultimately he is rewarded for those acts of kindness with love and respect. It is unusual in that the film is quite dark- the man who does all this is left fairly bereft for a lot of the film, we see his sacrafice at its most poignant- though we also see how it has brought him the love of a woman- we see him think that there is no point to his life lived for others. The film also offers no punishment but significantly no redemption either (unlike Dickens's scrooge) for the hero's alterego who lives merely for himself. It in some sense has a similar theme to Ingmar Bergman's Wild Strawberries- a film I'd reccomend having watched this- that no man can afford to be an Island and that it is better to live with and for others than onesself. This is a classic as other commentators have said but not just because its a feelgood film, its a feelgood film which is aware of the darker sides to life.

The best film of all time!
Its a classic! Its worth every penny and its a must for Christmas time. Ideal for Christmas eve viewing!
Cos this film really is what it says 'wonderful'