It's A Nauseating Life

Rating: 1/10 (10 March 2006)

Count me among the proud minority who think this movie is drek.
I love old movies. And I like Jimmy Stewart a whole lot. But this thing is just awful. And the fact that we are barraged incessantly with it, and that people rush to gush over it, just makes it all the more unbearable.
My big problem with the whole thing is that I vociferously *reject* the movie's main premise, the moral premise that it is somehow good and right and wonderful to live only for others. George Bailey is a *doormat*; he never pursues the life he really wants, instead suppressing his desires in order to serve every other yahoo in town. He's a fool, and the only ending I would consider truly happy for him would be if he were to decide to close his pitiful, practically non-profit business, and go off and make something of his life. I'm sorry, but having a lot of people be grateful to you for being a willing doormat is just not making something of your life.
I'm sorry, I just can't like a movie that takes altruism so far as to say that the only value of your life is how you helped others.