Friendly Persuasion
Tags: comedy, murder, romantic

Plot synopsis:
The film is set in Jennings County, Indiana in 1862. Jess Birdwell (Gary Cooper) is a farmer and patriarch of the Birdwell family whose Quaker religion conflicts with his love for the worldly enjoyments of music and horse racing. Jess's wife Eliza, (Dorothy McGuire) a Quaker minister, is deeply religious and steadfast in her refusal to engage in violence. Jess's daughter Mattie (Phyllis Love) wants to remain a Quaker but has fallen in love with dashing cavalry officer Gard Jordan (Peter Mark Richman), a love that is against her mother's wishes. Jess's youngest child "Little" Jess (Richard Eyer) is a feisty child whose comical feud with his mother's pet goose causes her heartache. Jess's elder son Josh (Anthony Perkins) is torn between his hatred of violence and a conviction that to protect his family he must join the home guard and fight the invaders.
We are introduced to the family via its youngest member, "Little" Jess, who is forever at war with his mother's pet goose. The story begins as an easygoing and humorous tale of Quakers trying to maintain their faith as they go to meeting on First Day (Sunday); contrasted with the Birdwells' neighbor Sam Jordan (Robert Middleton) and other members of the nearby Methodist Church. The mood shifts dramatically when the meeting is interrupted by a Union officer who asks how the Quaker men can stand by when their houses will be looted and their families terrorized by approaching Confederate troops. When confronted with the question of his being afraid to fight, Josh Birdwell responds that it might be the case. His honesty provokes the wrath of Purdy, a Quaker elder who condemns people who don't believe as he does.
The film returns to its lighter tone as the Quakers try to maintain their ways, despite the temptations of amusements at a county fair, and a new organ (which Jess buys over Eliza's opposition), but one is always reminded that the Confederate Army is drawing closer. On a business trip, Jess acquires a new horse from the widow Hudspeth (Marjorie Main), and is finally able to defeat Sam in their weekly horse race. One day, Jess is cultivating his fields and notices an immense cloud of smoke on the horizon produced by the burning of buildings. Josh soon arrives and tells them the neighboring community has been reduced to ash and corpses. Josh believes that he must fight, a conviction that threatens to destroy the family. Eliza tells him that by turning his back to their religion he's turning his back on her, but Jess sees things a different way. Josh finds himself on the front line of the battle to stop the advance of the raiders, fires his gun, and is injured by the Confederates. Meanwhile, Jess is reluctant to fight, only picking up a rifle when the family horse gallops back to the farm riderless.
When Confederates arrive, they loot the farm for food when only Eliza and the younger children are present. Sam Jordan is bushwhacked by a "Reb" and Jess struggles with the Confederate soldier and takes away his gun, but ultimately lets him go free and unhurt. Each member of the family faces the question of whether it is ever right for a Christian to engage in violence.

Review: But the biggest and best film that little studio ever put out was this wonderful film by William Wyler.Gary Cooper by now had a whole lot of career roles, but this one as Jess Birdwell, Quaker farmer in Southern Indiana during the Civil War was probably his last really great performance.
She and Cooper work so well together that you think you are prying in on the family of Eliza and Jess Birdwell.The film is based on a novel by Jessamyn West and it's about the effects of the Civil War on the Birdwell family, the parents and the children, Anthony Perkins, Phyllis Love, and Richard Eyer.
He said he admired both Gary Cooper and Dorothy McGuire as thorough going professionals and it was a pleasure to be working with them and William Wyler and associated with Friendly Persuasion.In some of the lighter moments of Friendly Persuasion before the war hits home, Cooper and Perkins go on a trip to sell some of their farm produce.
Wyler's "Friendly Persuasion" and "The Big Country" entitle an authentic and significant theme which is somewhat expressed in stronger terms in "Friendly Persuasion" but which meet with the impressive "The Big Country." The story is simple, lovely and sensitive...Gary Cooper, head of a Quaker family, is a loving husband and a caring father who has to consider his position at the outbreak of the Civil War in Southern Indiana...
Perkins sees that he has to convince himself that he is not a coward, so he becomes a member of the Home Guard, ready to defend the community...Dorothy McGuire emits pleasant emotions as the Quaker mother, projecting inner beauty to her family...Sentimental and well done, "Friendly Persuasion" is superbly acted and directed, beautifully shot in color...
It has remained one of my favourite movies -and takes its place with such classics as "It's a wonderful Life" and "Casablanca" It was also the first time that I really noticed the music of Dimitri Tiomkin, who is now firmly established as my favourite film composer.
Though the story ultimately focuses on just a couple of the characters' concerns, along the way it provides an effective overview of their lives as a whole.Gary Cooper is surprisingly believable in a somewhat atypical role as a Quaker father.
The change of pace provided by the interweaving of the characters' different stories, the appropriate & beautiful music for the various scenes, the sense of getting to know interesting people, genuine married love between two strong characters as well as the awakening of young love in a setting which has not had sex thrust in their faces, real friendship, the respect paid to religious convictions along with gentle humor at personal foibles - everything adds up to a wonderful film which sticks in the memory and needs just the opening bars of the title song to be brought back gloriously to mind.
A beautiful and sensitive film of a Quaker family whose peaceful existence is disrupted by the Civil War. Beautifully photographed with superb performances by Cooper and McGuire.
It concerns about "Jess Birdwell" (Gary Cooper , he initially turned the film down because he didn't believe the American public would accept him as Quaker , and role was originally intended for Bing Crosby) is the patriarch of a family of Quakers , a Christian sect that refuses to take part in wars .
As Jess/Gary Cooper (before Cooper became involved Montgomery Clift was offered the role of Birdwell, but turned it down) along with his family attempt to remain to its ideals , despite the Civil War which touches their farm life .This enjoyable film packs comedy , religious and familiar life , sense of mood , spectacular battles and lots of reflection .
Gary Cooper as a devout Quaker father and Dorothy McGuire as his wife are very well as the parents ; furthermore , Anthony Perkins is nice as the son fearing being taken for a coward .
One thing is for sure -- FRIENDLY PERSUASION is one of the true gems of the cinema -- a warm and loving film that truly lives up to the promises of the ads: "It Will Pleasure You In A 100 Ways!".
Classic Hollywood film about family of southern Indiana Quakers who resist the call to arms during the civil war.
Gary Cooper and Dorothy McGuire are perfectly cast by William Wyler as father and mother, Jess and Eliza Birdwell who must guide their lives as well as their children's who face mounting obstacles from the civil war encroaching their southern Indiana home in 1862 in this beautifully made film.
Religiosity in Times of War. In 1862, in Southern Indiana, the Quakers Jess Birdwell (Gary Cooper), his wife and Minister Eliza (Dorothy McGuire), their teenage son Joshua (Anthony Perkins), their teenage daughter Mattie (Phyllis Love) and their young son Little Jess (Richard Eyer) live a peaceful life in their farm.
But when the rebel Southern troops threaten the Birdwell family and their friends and neighbors, Josh decides to go to the front to defend their lands and Jess has to take a position against the principles of the Quakers."Friendly Persuasion" is another masterpiece of William Wyler that tells the story of a Quaker family in Southern Indiana that is forced to fight to defend their lands.
A labor of love for director William Wyler, based upon the stories of Jessamyn West regarding the Birdwells, a peacemaking Quaker family in 1862 Indiana who are faced with changing times when Civil War unrest breaks out.
The children bristle under the strict guidance of their by-the-Good-Book mother (a retread performance from Dorothy McGuire), with eldest son Anthony Perkins questioning the family's refusal to become involved in potentially violent matters.
Either like peas in a pod or not amounting to a hill of beans, Wyler always knew how to draw individuals as family members, generally getting the best out of actors.But even by Wyler's standards, there's something too conventional in that bucolic portrayal of a Quaker homesteader's family: the Birdwells, starring Gary Cooper as the reassuring patriarch, Dorothy McGuire the straight-laced holier-than-thou mother who bans as much fun as possible it's a wonder she got such goofy kids: Little Jess with his love-and-hate relationship with a pet-goose, Phyllis Love as Mattie enamored with one of the neighbors' son and Anthony Perkins as the awkward-mannered son.
What we've got in the beginning is literally "Little Quaker House in the Prairie".The first act establishes the major conflict between the Quakers' pacifist philosophy and the ongoing Civil war threatening their peaceful life and calling for every man, old or young, to defend their properties, their lives.
But there's a reason why "High Noon" is a classic and why "Friendly Persuasions is only an acceptable finished product made in Hollywood.The major conflict set-up during a powerful church sequence is cancelled out by the sense of unshakable sitcom-like unity within the Birdwells' family and diluted in many debatable episodic moments involving the buying of an organ or a horse.
Even Phyllis Love as the girl in love made me expect some twist in her romantic subplot but the camera was unnecessarily enamored with Cooper and McGuire who bored the hell out of me as the eternal killjoy.So granted the film has its outdated charm, its postcard look of Indiana Valley, the cute rivalries between neighbors, the moments where you could see Quakers becoming outcasts from the rest of the fighting men, I wish Perkins could become a sort of outcast too, a black sheep or someone who'd confront Cooper like Dean confronted his fathers in "Rebel Without a Cause" or "East of Eden".
But "Friendly Persuasion" suffers from an uneven pacing and no specific direction, made by a William Wyler whose pair of Best Picture winners put him in a zone of commercial comfort, this film doesn't standout as one of his best, it's not even one of his memorable lesser movies.I'm glad Wyler could pull himself together and make his final masterpiece: "Ben-Hur" three years later, and Perkins would get a role that would fit his acting talent in "Psycho".
A sensitive portryal of the moral dilemma facing pacifistic Quakers as their farms are raided by Confederate troops, this is a movie that takes religion seriously as an important, adult, and consequential subject.The delicate balance of power in the household of a straitlaced woman Quaker minister whose very masculine husband and restless children are members of her congregation is portrayed with insight and humor.The acting is beautiful, especially Anthony Perkins as the agonized teenaged son who must decide whether to fight to protect his home, against his mother's will.
The film provides not only a lesson in the lifestyle of a Quaker family in Indiana, it reveals the personal impact and heartbreak of the American Civil War. It was hard for a young man to adhere to his family's pacifist beliefs when he knew his friends were going off to war to defend the very place he called home.
Perkins is very amusing here.Eventually he decides to enlist in the Civil War though his father tells him he must kill, which is against their religious upbringing.One of the charms of this film is it is not an overblown production.
Friendly Persuasion is just such a film....it is a film that transcends all ages with strong emotion, peace, love and understanding.....FP might possibly the greatest Hollywood film of all time...certainly there are arguments for it being so....first of all it has brilliant casting with Dorothy McGuire and Gary Cooper as mother and father Birdwell.....at the time they might have been the very best male and female actors of their time....
Anthony Perkins handles his role as Josh with temerity and rigidity and wonderful emotional battles...like the scene where he cries out loud after shooting at the river...Phyllis Love as Mattie is strong, caring, sweet and pushed to her emotional boundaries....little Jess played by that wonderful kid at the time was splendid, Richard Eyer...who could forget him as the genie in "Seventh Voyage of Sinbad"......every emotional string is pulled within the Birdwell family in order to avoid involvement with the Civil War encroaching their Indiana home.
Then there are other Quakers who try to force their beliefs on the Birdwell family....director William Wyler directs a brilliant, flawless movie....he knew when to inject comedy, action, fighting and personal involvement to a tee.....you will howl in delight as Jess and Josh Birdwell visit Dorothy Main and her three, hapless, love starved daughters......then there is the antics at the county fair filled with comedy and genuine pure laughs...also Professor Quigley the organ salesman will make you howl......for my money the scene near the end when the rebel soldier is pinned to the tree and thinks he is going to die - but suddenly he is let go by Cooper is very emotionally draining and worthy to see......the solider melts down in a very compelling and emotional way as he is allowed to live.....there are so many moments in FP to talk about.....the horse race between Cooper and his neighbor are a stitch and Doprothy McGuire provides her own antics like blowing dust off of her bible......another compelling scene when a union major is called to the Quaker church to warn the Quakers about the dangers of not fighting to save their lands.....Cooper with that famous statement, "If I am called to violence, I hope that I can be an instrument of the Lord"......there are so many memorable scenes to talk about...this is just a movie par excellence and you can watch it 20 times and not get bored.....to this day 45 years later I think about avoiding violence in my life and "being an instrument of the Lord"....watch this movie with your family and be delighted.......
I found 'Friendly Persuasion' to be not only charming and well-made, but a good representation of the problems of Quaker life during war time.
Being human, we Friends do not always live up to our self-set standards; but this movie does show a Quaker family trying its best to remain faithful to its creed.As to the previous reviewer who questioned the use of the Plain Speech during the Civil War period, this is not an anachronism.
Gary Cooper, (never better), is the peace-loving farmer, Dorothy McGuire, (equally good), is his wife and Anthony Perkins, (brilliant in only his second film and picking up an Oscar nomination), is the son who goes off to fight.Wyler, who himself served in the Second World War, was too canny a director to make an outright anti-war film though the message of the picture is clear.
Cooper kind of plays against type here since he was so often a man of movie action, but in reality his strength of character and belief allows him to maintain his image.Comedy relief is at hand given the youngest son's ongoing battle with Samantha the Goose, a family pet with devious attack modes.
I thought Gary Cooper and Dorothy McGuire made a great couple, and though she was so stuffy and prudish in the beginning (well, she is a Quaker, after all) you see some changes in her by the end of the picture, and she will grow on you.Friendly Persuasion has the perfect combination of humor, drama, love story, and action.
But still, I was expecting a cornball, wholesome family film and so was pleasantly surprised by what I got instead."Friendly Persuasion" garnered six Academy Award nominations but won none: Best Picture, Best Director (William Wyler), Best Supporting Actor (Anthony Perkins), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Song (warbled by Pat Boone), and Best Sound Recording.Grade: A-.
This beautifully adapted film of Jessamyn West's novel is a treasure that I'm sure I'll watch again and again.The story of a Quaker family caught between their religious principals and the reality of the Civil War is both charming and compelling.
Gary Cooper breaks out of his usual roles as the father, Jess Birdwell, who isn't adverse to a bit of fun despite his strict Quaker beliefs, and Dorothy McGuire is perfectly cast as his somewhat fretful but tender minister wife.
Phyllis Love is captivating as their romantic teenage daughter, and Anthony Perkins, later unfortunately typecast in some rather oddball roles, puts in a splendid performance as their son Joshua, who is morally torn between his pacifist beliefs and his feeling of duty to protect his family from the invading southern army.While the backdrop of the story is the rural north and the horrible conflict of the Civil War and how the Birdwell family deals with it, there are so many warm and charming snapshots of family life and the love they have for one another.
"Ben Hur" too.But "Friendly persuasion" has a more interesting subject.A quaker family (Gary Cooper,Dorothy McGuire) who shall not kill,and know they will not,cannot ,for any reason,kill their brother.
Best thing about the movie: Dorothy McGuire was cast as Cooper's wife after Wyler's choice, Katharine Hepburn, declined.
Writer Michael Wilson told HUAC in 1951, "I feel that this committee might take the credit, or part of it at least, for the fact that 'The Friendly Persuasion' was not produced, in view of the fact that it dealt warmly, in my opinion, with a peace-loving people." Although it took a couple years, a slight name change, and Wilson's name removed, the film did still come out.There were some other changes: "What happened to Wilson's pacifist script after Capra dropped it," notes film historian Joseph McBride, "reflected the political climate of the Cold War. When William Wyler directed the film for Allied Artists in 1956 as Friendly Persuasion, he had the story changed to make the Quaker youth (played by Anthony Perkins) become a killer.
This movie also stands as a emotional look at the war between the states, what we call the Civil War. Many families and communities were torn apart by that war, and although we hear about those travails in books, capturing it on film is an entirely different story.
Splendid Americana: Gary Cooper/William Wyler Film.
William Wyler was the greatest director of his era: Jezebel, The Little Foxes, Wuthering Heights, The Letter, Mrs. Miniver, The Best Years Of Our Lives, The Heiress, Ben Hur, Funny Girl, and this movie Friendly Persuasion.
Bette Davis deemed Wyler the Great Love Of Her Life and Her Greatest Director: The Little Foxes, Jezebel and The LetterFriendly Persuasion is a beautiful film with a great co starring role for Dorothy McGuire.One of my favorite movies of all time.
Director William Wyler and many of the contemporary audience of FRIENDLY PERSUSION had seen the first hand horrors of war , whilst here the movie points out that the enemy are not brutal and everyone goes home to their family after a conflict .
"Friendly Persuasion" is the story about a Quaker family living along the Indiana border during the Civil War. Given that Quakers are pacifists, the family stays out of the action and tries to maintain their separatist ways.
The Quakers depicted in Jessamyn West's charming and well-plotted short stories, Jess Birdwell and his wife, played by Gary Cooper and Dorothy Mcguire, are trying to live by a set of rules that works miserably in the secular world and extremely well for them on their remote farm and in their food-selling business.
When I was going to watch this movie for the first time, my mother told me it's about a Quaker family during the civil war all i could think of was BORING.
With Gary Cooper in the cast, even portraying a Quaker, I thought there would be more in the way of conflict for the main character to face and persevere against.
Quakers in 1862 southern Indiana are caught up in the great Civil War. This is a film of emotional, psychological and religious conflict upon the members of Gary Cooper and Dorothy McGuire, both of whom give splendid performances.