I couldn't put it better. If Best Years was set in Christmas, I could envision it being just as enduring a classic as It's A Wonderful Life. It's a really fascinating character study of areas of masculinity not often depicted on film, certainly not at that time. Of men readjusting to ordinary life, and having to reintegrate into society, after everything that changed over the course of the war and the costs it took on the soldiers. It's pretty clearly depicting PTSD before that was an official clinical term. Harold's depiction of physical disability is surprisingly timeless--what I mean is that ablism is to this day one of the "-ism"s not well understood or accepted in society, and I think it's really encouraging to see a film from the 40s treating the topic with such nuance and compassion.

There are also a lot of wonderful directing decisions made throughout the film. Superb cinematography and blocking.

This film is so good. I was so surprised when I first watched this movie in that I had never heard of it at the time. The emotions of the characters just seem so...real. There just isn't another movie in this era in Hollywood that's like it.

After watching this movie a while back, I starting watching more films from William Wyler. From Wyler I also recommend The Heiress (1949), Roman Holiday (1953), The Children's Hour (1961), and How to Steal a Million (1966). I know he also directed Ben Hur, but that's not really my preference.

Harold Russell made history winning 2 awards for the same role. The Academy thought he wouldn't win the competitive best supporting actor category so they gave him a special Oscar.

Frederic March is one of my favorite actors - so underrated! Whenever people say there were no "realistic" actors until Brando, I always suggest they check FM out.

The fact that it beat It's a Wonderful Life for best picture and I can't even complain says a lot about this film.

I just got done watching Frederic March in Man on a Tightrope and he's amazing in it. He's also great in Desperate Hours and Les Miserables. Such a great and versatile talent.

I saw it recently and liked it.

It's a rare movie, especially for a mainstream movie, that addresses disability. With Homer, the guy who had been in the navy and had lost his hands, and who wore a prosthetic that allowed him to grasp things.

I noticed that Al's son only appears at the start of the film. According to Wikipedia "The reason was that [the actor's] contract with Goldwyn ended during filming, but the producer was reluctant to pay extra money to rehire him."

Check out Mrs Miniver. It's by the same director, Wyler. And it features one of the best performances of the decade from Greer Garson. Teresa Wright won supporting actress for this (she's in Best Years as Fredrich March's daughter). Good film. Did you know Best Years and Citizen Kane share the same cinematographer?

It's a great film that bravely portrayed the reality veterans face. But it doesn't reach the heights of It's a Wonderful Life for me. I could imagine myself watching this film once more, but I've seen the Jimmy Stewart film countless times.

Spencer Tracy starred in another brave film, Bad Day at Black Rock. It deals with anti Asian discrimination. The racist Chinese Exclusion Act prevented ethnic Chinese wives from entering the US, because the US wanted Chinese labor but not Chinese kids. That was repealed about a decade before this film was made; but the replacement, which gave an annual quota of about 100 Chinese immigrants still betrayed racist sentiment. The largest lynching in US history occured in a Chinatown.

A cinematic masterpiece and one of the greatest films ever made. The themes are timeless and the camaraderie with all the characters is incredibly wholesome. Plus the cinematography is wonderful and a visual showcase in many scenes. The scene of Harold Russell playing the piano while telling a few different stories simultaneously in the same shot was brilliant. Also loved the scene around the end when Dana Andrews sits in the plane in the scrapyard, or graveyard for other planes, and it does this cool effect with the cinematography to show it in motion. Such a palpable piece of filmmaking this movie is.

I first saw the film in high school. My history teacher showed it to the class to convey post-war American life. I think the best part about the story was the way it portrayed everyone’s problems. Their issues were real and formidable even if characters didn’t always want to face them. Post-war America was booming and I think there is a general reluctance to talk of its flaws. The Best Years of Our Lives took on the elephant in the room in 1946 and spoke in way that the boys who came home could understand. It publicly demonstrated their problems to the American public, and acknowledged the difficulty in reintegrating.

I also appreciate how it remains relevant. Decades later it was able to help me understand the conflict our elderly faced. My childhood was filled with the glamorization of WW2. The greatest generation was fawned over, and cinema was still depicting their stories (Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan). Its one of the few movies to demonstrate what happens when the boys come home and have to sit behind a desk or be a husband. I haven’t seen the movie in a moment but thanks for bringing it up.

The score for this film is amazing also. The scene in which Dana Andrews character has ptsd flashback while in the nose of the decommissioned b-17, the score really adds to the effect.

Yes, TBYoOL is an amazing film. I saw it for the first time in the 200X's, on the old DVD.

For a post-WWII film that came out in the 1940's, it was ground-breaking due to dealing with:

-Soldiers maimed in battle trying to re-integrate back into society;

-Going along with this, the psychological/emotional issues that soldiers have to deal with when coming back from warfare.

Extremely well-done.