Window on an era

Rating: 10/10 (3 April 2016)

This is one of the important movies.
It was when it was first released in 1946, addressing as it did the issue of veterans returning from WW2, and the affect it had on them and their families. It focused on three men, all psychologically scarred, and one who has lost both arms. They return to a small city in the U.S., but the themes of the film were universal.
That was 70 years ago, and over the years, the movie has tended to move into the background - there have been more wars and more veterans returning with their own issues.
However, I think the importance of this movie can't be underestimated now that the WW2 generation is fading away.
WW2 was well covered; we have millions of feet of newsreel film as well as towering stacks of history books. However, movies from the era do something quite unique; they get inside the emotions and the feelings - they represent the mindset of the time. Audiences identified with the issues through the stars in a way that was very personal. Hollywood did this job best - it was entertainment, but it was also a commitment to a generation.
At the end of the war and into the 50's, Hollywood addressed the aftermath - "Till the End of Time", "The Men", "My Foolish Heart", "The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit" and others, but "The Best Years of Our Lives" towers above them all.
The film could never really be remade. It was created by people who had experienced the war either in combat or on the home front. Many behind the camera had served including director William Wyler who had flown dangerous missions making documentaries about the U.S. Air Force; he was left nearly deaf from the experience.
The film tackled tough issues and attitudes. Sergeant Al Stephenson (Frederick March) returns from the Philippines, but he hasn't seen his kids for years and he seems out of step with them. Fred Derry (Dana Andrews) returns to an unfaithful wife and an uncertain future, he was good at war but what now? Real-life amputee Harold Russell plays Homer Parrish. He has much to overcome, but his girlfriend remains loyal, and he emerges as possibly the best adjusted of them all; he accepts what he can't change, and just gets on with it.
The film has a powerful score by Hugo Friedhofer. Friedhofer was not as famous as Newman, Korngold or Steiner but he was as good. He surpassed himself here; his music helped express the unspoken thoughts of the actors - there are sections of this score that bring a lump to the throat.
This was my parent's generation; my father was in the Australian army and fought in the war. And although this movie was about Americans, the story resonated far wider.
Of course you could argue that some issues were not tackled - and that also gives an insight into an era, but with that said, this film is a window on the ideas and forces that were shaping society at a critical time in modern history.
Seen that way, it's a movie that may never lose its relevance.