Review of James Stewart Collection (Box Set)

Introduction

Of the truly great Hollywood legends, one stands head and shoulders above pretty much all else, and not just because he was a tall lad (6`3"). James Stewart, known to one and all as "Jimmy", was the first and greatest of the Everyman character actors - believable as a ordinary slob like the rest of us while still being a movie star - in an era when being a movie star put you in the same bracket as royalty and minor deities.

There`s honestly no such thing as a duff Jimmy Stewart movie, and in this box set you have some of the best movies Jimmy ever made. Destry Rides Again and Winchester `73 demonstrate his effortless mastery of the Western genre. Harvey shows off his accomplished hand at light comedy and Hitchcock`s suspense masterpieces Vertigo and Rear Window are among the best thrillers ever committed to celluloid. During his career, Jimmy tried his hand at (or was put into) everything from light comedy through musicals to westerns, and played good guys and bad guys with equal aplomb.

Universal only supplied prints of Winchester `73 and Harvey for this review, but fortunately I`m familiar with the transfers (previously individually available) of the other movies.

Winchester `73 was one of the many Westerns that Stewart starred in. The 1950 picture about "the gun that won the West" was made as the minor part of a two-picture deal Universal made with Jimmy to bring Harvey to the screen. Director Anthony Mann (El Cid, The Glen Miller Story) took the reins. Jimmy plays Lin McAdam, a frontiersman hunting down his father`s murderer and trying to recover his one-of-a-kind rifle, the eponymous Winchester `73. Shelley Winters, a glamourpuss back in her pre-Poseidon Adventure days when she was Marilyn Monroe`s flatmate, plays Jimmy`s love interest. Alongside Stewart as his sidekick is Millard Mitchell. Two years later he would feature in the role everybody remembers him for, as Studio boss RF Simpson in "Singin` In The Rain". Will Geer (Granpa Walton in The Waltons) plays Wyatt Earp and a couple of young contract players turn up quite a while before making their Hollywood mark - Rock Hudson as an Indian chief, and Tony Curtis, credited as "Anthony Curtis".

What makes Winchester `73 such a special movie is that the disc includes an audio commentary recorded for the laserdisc release featuring Jimmy Stewart himself. It was the only yak track he ever recorded before his passing in 1997.

"Harvey", also 1950, could not be further in nature from "Winchester `73". Alongside "The Philadelphia Story" and "It`s A Wonderful Life", it has to be one of Stewart`s finest performances and one of the best comedy movies ever made. Stewart made the role of amiable Elwood P Dowd so much his own on the stage and to such great acclaim that he was the only choice when Universal came to make the film (having spent $750,000 on the film rights). The screenplay was based on a Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Mary Chase, and describes the lifestyle of the aforementioned Elwood P Dowd.

Elwood is a dipsomaniac (although not once in the movie do you see him actually taking a drink). He`s not a drunk, he`s more of an amiable stoner, going through life looking on the bright side and bringing nothing but pleasure to the people he meets by way of his pleasant nature. He spent 35 of his 42 years on the planet trying reality and didn`t find it to his taste. Then he met Harvey.

Harvey is a Pooka.

A Pooka (to quote the movie) is a fairy spirit in animal form - always very large. The pooka appears here and there - now and then - to this one - and that one - a benign but mischievous creature - very fond of rumpots, crackpots, and…

But I won`t spoil that gag.

Specifically, Harvey is a white rabbit, standing 6`3½" and whenever Elwood introduces him to family friends, those friends tend to remember appointments they have forgotten and suddenly manifested ailments.

Josephine Hull, outstanding as one of Cary Grant`s loopy aunts in "Arsenic and Old Lace", won the 1951 Academy Award® for Best Supporting Actress for her twittery performance as Veta-Louise, Elwood`s well-meaning sister who tries to get Elwood committed to a sanitorium as he is driving away all of her respectable friends and any suitors for her spinster daughter Myrtle-May.

With the connivance of family lawyer and friend Judge Gaffney, Veta-Louise takes Elwood to Chumley`s Rest, a sanitorium, where her agitated manner in front of square-jawed psychiatrist Dr Sanderson (Charles Drake - no, not that one) gets her committed in Elwood`s place.

Realising the mistake, Sanderson and Nurse Kelly (Peggy Dow) release Veta-Louise while Dr Chumley (a magnificent performance by veteran actor Cecil Kellaway) and orderly Wilson (Jesse White in his best role) search the town for Elwood.

The movie is a magnificent evocation of the suspicion most of us have that the crackpots aren`t the ones with problems. It`s whimsical Hollywood at its best, just shortly before Tinseltown lost the knack of telling stories that embrace the fantastic rather than trying to find the prosaic.

Video

Both Winchester `73 and Harvey are cracking transfers, with excellent contrast. Both movies are monochrome and presented in their original 4:3 aspect ratios, but whatever you do, don`t let that scare you off. Hollywood produced its finest work before the advent of widescreen, CGI and Jerry Bruckheimer. Actors like Jimmy Stewart could act the likes of Tom Hanks off the screen with a meaningful silence, and the great cinematographers of the era could do things with lighting for monochrome pictures that make modern movies look like they`re lit with fluorescent lights.

Audio

Similarly to the picture quality, so what if these movies are presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono? So what if recording techniques of the past don`t carry the frequency range and fidelity of modern subwoofer-unfriendly blockbusters? Nobody was trying to blow you out of your seat in those days. They could get you off your fundament by genuinely frightening you back then, or making you laugh out loud.

Features

Harvey comes with a special introduction by Jimmy Stewart, illustrated with a photographic montage. It`s pretty special to hear him talking about the movie as it was as fond a memory for him as it is for the rest of us. There`s also the original theatrical trailer. Winchester `73 comes with a theatrical trailer and the aforementioned audio commentary recorded for the laserdisc edition by Jimmy himself. Both movies are fully subtitled for hard of hearing viewers, and in the case of Harvey, you might want to watch them to catch the subtleties of the marvellous dialogue.

Conclusion

Jimmy Stewart was - put simply - one of Hollywood`s finest, and most of the movies in this box set are among his best performances. You`ve probably heard people describing Tom Hanks as the "new" Jimmy Stewart, which does both him and Mr Stewart a great disservice. Treat yourself to seeing the original and seeing what Hollywood could make in its heyday. If nothing else, find out what a Pooka is.