Gone with the Wind (winner)
Goodbye, Mr. Chips
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Ninotchka
Wuthering Heights
The two screenplays that jump out at me immediately are The Wizard of Oz and Of Mice and Men. Both of these are great screenplays and I’m pretty surprised that neither one earned a nomination. Dark Victory is a surprisingly engaging film, and given the time, I’m a little surprised that no one considered Gunga Din worthy of a nomination, either (although given all of the great films from 1939, I probably wouldn’t nominate it, either). There’s been a great deal of talk on this blog over the last few days about The Hunchback of Notre Dame. I haven’t seen the 1939 version, but based on reputation, I think I’d be remiss not to mention it here. Only Angels Have Wings doesn’t technically qualify as an adapted screenplay, but Stagecoach does, and it should be here.
Weeding through the Nominees
4: On the other hand, I rather liked Goodbye, Mr. Chips, but the story is kind of a nothing. We watch a man essentially age, experience love and loss, and then eventually die, having realized at the end what his life was truly all about. It’s a fine movie, but the story and the screenplay are pretty unexceptional. Looking at the snubbed films for 1939, I’m surprised that this earned a nomination over most of my suggestions above, if only because there’s not that much here and because I expect more from a nomination.
3: I’m surprised every year that no one has remade Mr. Smith Goes to Washington in the modern era. It has such obvious polemic possibilities for either the Right or the Left that it seems shocking that it hasn’t turned into a propaganda piece in someone’s hands in the last five years. I like this movie almost in spite of itself. I have trouble taking much directed by Frank Capra too seriously since he was so keen on corn. This is a great movie and one of the great performances of James Stewart’s career, but there’s just too much melodrama here for me to love it.
2: No one was more surprised than I at how much I enjoyed Ninotchka. It’s not the romance that sells the movie for me here, but how much of what happens on screen is very subtle and clever. There are jokes here that are funny not when they happen but a couple of minutes later after they’ve had a chance to process. That’s not terribly surprising, coming from an Ernst Lubitsch film, but it’s also exactly why Ninotchka is as good as it is. I like it when filmmakers don’t talk down to the audience, and this one expects us all to be smart enough to keep up.
My Choice
1: As much as Gone with the Wind isn’t my favorite film of 1939, it has to be handed to Victor Fleming for keeping the whole thing on track, coherent, and entertaining. This is a massive story and it still holds together as well now as it did 75(!) years ago. Bringing a story like this to the screen is no small accomplishment, and a major part of its success comes from its adaptation from Margaret Mitchell’s novel. It earned this Oscar almost by virtue of its very existence, and I won’t be the one to take it away.
Final Analysis
The Women is just chock full of zingers that you would have thought the Academy might have appreciated. Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett could have been nominated in any other year for their very witty Midnight script. On the other hand with the actual nominees so strong, it's hard to fault the Academy here and I have to agree with you on the winner. Even with such a long movie, a lot had to but cut from the novel and the writers did a wonderful job.
ReplyDeleteThe Women is still a hole in my viewing, so I can't comment on it. I do love Billy Wilder, though, so it certainly makes sense that I would like it.
DeleteI forgot The Women was 1939! It should definitely have been included in some of the nomination categories.
ReplyDeleteAnd it would have been tough to chose between The Women and Gone with the Wind in the screenplay category.
I admire your courage in sorting out the Oscar categories for the great movies of 1939.
ReplyDeleteI usually don't have any trouble following along in your Oscar posts and agreeing or disagreeing and picking a favorite. But 1939 is TOUGH!
I think Gone with the Wind is the winner in this category from what was nominated, but throw in The Women and it gets a lot tougher!
And I don't even want to make a final choice for Best Picture! I was already having trouble choosing between The Wizard of Oz and Hunchback and Stagecoach, but now that I've been reminded of The Women, I don't think I have the strength to choose!
1939 is difficult. That's sort of the point behind doing the whole year in January. I want to put it behind me because I think all of these categories are going to be hard to decide.
DeleteIt was a hell of a year, and that makes these choices difficult.
Gone With the Wind could easily have drowned by the shear scale of the story, but manage to keep it together. That is really enough to win this award. Of the nominees I agree on Ninotchka as 2nd. For the rest I would have replaced them with other movies not nominated. The Stagecoach and Wizard of Oz were robbed by not getting nominations.
ReplyDeleteI agree on both Stagecoach and The Wizard of Oz. I think I might also add Of Mice and Men because it's a very accurate and excellent adaptation of the book to the film.
DeleteSo many amazing movies to choose from in 1939, one the best in American film history, and while the Wizard of Oz is still my favourite from that year, I think Oscar did get it right in this case as well.
ReplyDeleteHard not to love The Wizard of Oz. Actually, it's hard not to love a lot of the movies from 1939.
ReplyDeleteThe others have already said it, but there were so many great movies this year it's hard to say what should and should not have been nominated. Other than The Wizard of Oz I haven't read any of the source material for any of the nominees, or possible nominees. That makes it hard to tell which one might have done the best job adapting the story from a different medium into a movie that worked, What makes a great novel or stage play often does not work for a movie, and vice-versa.
ReplyDeleteUnless I missed it, nobody has mentioned the important name of Sidney Howard. Howard did a lot more on the screenplay for Gone With the Wind than Margaret Mitchell did. His adaptation (and I have read the book) is probably the most deserved Oscar that Gone with the Wind received. But I also liked Ninotchka very much and one of the reasons is the great screenplay. So I agree with your top two choices.
ReplyDelete@Chip--The main reason I'm spending January in 1939 is because it's a hard year on all counts. None of these is going to be easy.
Delete@Chris--Good point. I didn't specifically give the credit to Mitchell for the screenplay, just the novel, but Sidney Howard does deserve the lion's share of the credit. Ben Hecht worked on it, too, but it was still mostly Howard's work.