It’s a Wonderful Life live stream
It’s a Wonderful Life is a beloved holiday classic for a reason. Here’s all you need to know to watch it online or on your TV.
In some households, viewings of the 1946 classic It’s a Wonderful Life are practically mandatory. That may not be such a terrible thing, given that it’s a genuinely good film beneath all of the cultural baggage.
Critics, however, didn’t think so upon the movie’s release. Few deigned to give director Frank Capra’s latest work anything more than a middling review. Bosley Crowther, of The New York Times, said that “the weakness of this picture, from this reviewer’s point of view, is the sentimentality of it—its illusory concept of life”.
In fact, It’s a Wonderful Life was an incredible loss for RKO Pictures. The studio lost a staggering $525,000 at the box office, which was pretty serious money in 1946. Even the FBI looked askance at the movie. Investigators thought that Potter, the villainous banker character, was created solely to cast capitalists in a poor light. “This… is a common trick used by Communists,” said an FBI memo released in 1947.
A lapse in copyright helped make the film a beloved classic. Thanks to a clerical error, the copyright for It’s a Wonderful Life was not renewed in 1974. The film’s images entered the public domain (though technically not its story) and stayed there until 1994. That’s when NBC got the exclusive rights.
The life of George Bailey
Unlike Mr. Crowther and his fellow critics, audiences have cottoned to the “sentimentality” of the story. It’s a Wonderful Life follows George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart), who is so distraught over his station in life that he’s ready to end it all. Thankfully, Clarence Odbody, Angel 2nd Class (Henry Travers) steps in.
The movie then switches directions and reviews George’s life up to that point. He’s a good, honest man who just wants local millionaire and banker Henry F. Potter (Lionel Barrymore) to step up, too. Potter, of course, doesn’t want to go to the inconvenience of being good.
This all leads to a plot point wherein a large amount of money is lost, Potter tells George that the younger man is worth more dead than alive, and George finds himself in that dark situation on a local bridge. Angel Clarence adds in a real whammy when he presents an alternate reality where George had never been born (spoiler: it’s not exactly great).
Interested? Here are all the details you need to either catch the film on TV or watch it online.
"Date: Sunday, Dec. 24Start time: 8 p.m. ETTV Channel: NBCLive Stream: Stream 1 | Stream 2"
Next: 12 best holiday horror movies
Whether you’ve seen it a million times or this is your first viewing, be sure to catch It’s a Wonderful Life this Christmas Eve!