Mr Smith Goes to Washington
Year: 1939
Director: Frank Capra
Writer: Lewis R. Foster
Cast: James Stewart, Jean Arthur, Claude Rains
Genre: Drama/Comedy
Rating: (A)pproved
Runtime: 129 mins
Political heavyweights decide that Jefferson Smith (James Stewart), an obscure scoutmaster in a small town, would be the perfect dupe to fill a vacant US Senate chair. Surely this naive bumpkin can be easily controlled by the senior senator (Claude Rains) from his state, a respectable and corrupted career politician.
Director Frank Capra fills the movie with Smith’s wide-eyed wonder at the glories of Washington, all of which ring false for his cynical secretary (Jean Arthur), who doesn’t believe for a minute this rube could be for real. But he is.
Capra was repeating the formula of a previous film, Mr. Deeds Goes to Town, but this one is even sharper; Stewart and Arthur are brilliant, and the former cowboy star Harry Carey lends a warm presence to the role of the vice president.
Bright, funny, and beautifully paced, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is Capra’s ode to the power of innocence — an idea so potent that present-day audiences may find themselves wishing for a new Mr. Smith in Congress.
The 1939 Congress was none too thrilled about the film’s depiction of their august body, denouncing it as a caricature; but even today, Capra’s jibes about vested interests and political machines look as accurate as ever.
