Frank Capra’s You Can’t Take It with You is one of those movies that seems almost impossibly optimistic by modern standards, yet remains charming because it commits so completely to its belief in the goodness of ordinary people. Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, the film is a warm, funny, and occasionally sentimental celebration of living according to your own values rather than chasing money and social status.
Buy You Can’t Take It with YouThe story centers on the Vanderhof family, an eccentric household whose members pursue whatever makes them happy. Patriarch Grandpa Vanderhof, played wonderfully by Lionel Barrymore, walked away from the business world years earlier after realizing that he didn’t enjoy it. His family and friends have followed his example. They make candy, play music, paint, dance, blow up fireworks in the basement, and generally refuse to behave as respectable society thinks they should. Their unconventional lifestyle is thrown into conflict with the Kirby family, wealthy industrialists who are determined to make a fortune through a major real-estate deal.
At the center of the story is the romance between Alice Sycamore (Jean Arthur) and Tony Kirby (James Stewart). Alice is the one relatively conventional member of her family, while Tony comes from the rigid, wealthy Kirby household. Their relationship brings the two families together and exposes the enormous difference between their philosophies of life.
James Stewart is particularly appealing as Tony. He gives the character an innocence and sincerity that make it easy to understand why he is drawn to Alice’s family. Jean Arthur is equally good as Alice, combining intelligence, warmth, and comic timing. But the movie belongs largely to Lionel Barrymore, whose Grandpa Vanderhof is the embodiment of the film’s philosophy. He isn’t interested in being rich or respectable. He simply wants to enjoy his time on Earth and help other people do the same.
Capra’s direction gives the film its distinctive combination of comedy and idealism. The Vanderhof household is chaotic, but the chaos feels joyful rather than destructive. The movie’s funniest moments often come from the contrast between the family’s eccentricity and the seriousness with which the outside world regards money, business, and social position.
The film does become somewhat preachy, particularly as it approaches its conclusion. Its message that money isn’t everything is hardly subtle. Nevertheless, You Can’t Take It with You earns much of its sentimentality because it genuinely believes what it is saying. In an era when Depression-era audiences had plenty of reasons to worry about money and security, the movie offered a fantasy in which happiness could be found by simply refusing to let money determine the value of a life.
What makes the film endure is that its central question remains relevant: What are you actually going to do with your life? Grandpa Vanderhof’s answer is simple. Don’t spend your limited time doing things you hate merely because society tells you that you should.
You Can’t Take It with You may be old-fashioned, but its warmth, humor, and optimism remain infectious. It is a movie that asks us to take life a little less seriously and to remember that the things that make us happy are often worth more than the things that make us rich.
