It's a Wonderful World (1939)

Directed by W. S. Van Dyke II; produced by Frank Davis

Private detective Guy Johnson (James Stewart), whose principal assignment is to look after an habitually drunk millionaire (Ernest Truex), finds himself in trouble when his client is framed for the murder of a former girlfriend (Cecillia Callejo). Convicted of conspiracy for trying to hide the fall guy, Johnson goes on the run, chasing a single clue to the true killer’s identity and dubiously aided by poetess Edwina Corday (Claudette Colbert), whom he has kidnapped.

While the plot synopsis and cast of actors suggest the makings of a fun and fast-paced, semi-farcical adventure, It’s a Wonderful World falls surprisingly short of the mark – any mark, really. The original story by Ben Hecht should have been inventive; Hecht’s collaboration on the screenplay with Herman J Mankiewicz should have resulted in line after line of memorable dialogue. The leads should have made one of the best cinematic couples. In fact, none of this occurs.

The most prominent problem in It’s a Wonderful World is the script. Though it does provide an admirable set-up for the adventure, what follows seems a sophomoric attempt to resurrect 1934’s It Happened One Night (also starring Colbert). Instead of realistic interaction and dialogue between two credible characters, we have sight gags such as Johnson disguised in a Boy Scout uniform much too large for him and wearing Coke-bottle glasses. Instead of the leads falling slowly in love, we have Edwina deciding to follow Johnson anywhere, literally over-night.

Added to this is the juxtaposition between the humorous and the serious, certainly not always a bad thing. But here, the shift is almost split second, as between an innocent man’s murder and Johnson hiding himself in theatrical costume and fake accent. My complaint is less with content than with timing.

The characters are at fault, too. Stewart, usually the most likeable of movie performers, plays a money-hungry misogynist whose cynicism and lack of compassion are too much even for someone as un-politically correct as myself. His is, in fact, a quite detestable personality. His sole concern for the welfare of his client – facing execution the very next day – arises from the $100,000 bonus he was promised for getting him out of his murder conviction. And yet when Colbert’s poetess is shocked to realise this, she not only continues to help him, but leaves moments later to do so.

Colbert’s Edwina Corday is not as unappealing as Stewart’s character, though she will surely never be any filmgoer’s favourite. Clever and quick-witted, she nonetheless appears as if the writers were not sure if they should make her genuinely talented or a bit of a fraud. And the speed with which she becomes enamoured of Johnson is unbelievable, to say the least, even for a movie.

There are some bright spots to It’s a Wonderful World. Edgar Kennedy and Nat Pendleton play two of the stupidest policemen in Hollywood history, and take the film repeatedly into farce – but they are amusing. Equally amusing is Guy Kibbee, as Johnson’s partner, a tired old private eye. In terms of story, though, he provides another example of inconsistency: able to decipher a coded telegram sent to him by Johnson, he can’t put two and two together in order to credit his partner with having solved the crime.

It’s a Wonderful World amounts to little more than a curio in the lives of those who made it. The next movies for Stewart and Colbert were Mr Smith Goes to Washington and Drums Along the Mohawk, respectively, so clearly better things were ahead for both. Mankiewicz co-wrote Citizen Kane in 1941 and Hecht’s subsequent screenplays included His Girl Friday. Even director Van Dyke went on to the likes of the snappy I Love You Again. If It’s a Wonderful World is indeed a curio, the curiosity lies in the reasons it is such a failure.

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