Our Town (1940)

Set in the typical American small town of Grover's Corners in New Hampshire. Beginning in 1901, we see life played out ..... birth, love, marriage, death with two families, the Gibbs and the Webbs. Based on the Pulitzer Prize winning play by Thornton Wilder and directed by Sam Wood (GOODBYE MR. CHIPS). Perhaps the quintessential American play, Wilder's OUR TOWN is stripped down (literally on stage, there are no sets) to its very core where both everything and nothing happens, where life passes by so quickly that it's too soon over. The film is faithful to the play except for the character of Emily (Martha Scott in an Oscar nominated performance) who dies in the play but lives in the film. This was not a whim of the movie people but requested by Wilder himself. Although both were still in their 20s, William Holden and Martha Scott seem too mature for the 17 year olds they're playing but their acting is solid. It's a classic play and the film manages to convey some of the play's poetry though its innocence seems a bit archaic. Only two years later, Wood directed another film about small town life, KINGS ROW but the innocence was gone and when the veil was lifted, we saw the rot. The much admired score is by Aaron Copland. With Thomas Mitchell, Fay Bainter, Beulah Bondi, Guy Kibbee, Stuart Erwin and Frank Craven as the "stage manager" repeating the role he played on stage.