Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is a 1939 film which tells the story of an idealistic young man who is sent to Washington to fill the unexpired term of a deceased Senator. There, he is taken under the wing of a corrupt senator whom he naively admires because he was his late father's best and oldest friend. As time goes on, however, the young Mr. Smith becomes increasingly dismayed by the corruption he finds in the halls of government.

Related Topics:
1939 - Film - Washington - Senator

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The film stars Claude Rains as the senior senator and James Stewart as the new recruit. Also appearing are Jean Arthur, Edward Arnold, Guy Kibbee, Charles Lane, and Thomas Mitchell.

Related Topics:
Claude Rains - James Stewart - Jean Arthur - Edward Arnold - Guy Kibbee - Charles Lane - Thomas Mitchell

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In the spring of 2005, media attention over the "nuclear option" focused extra attention on what was already the melodramatic climax of the film, when Smith launches a lengthy and defiant filibuster.

Related Topics:
Nuclear option - Filibuster

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The film was directed by Frank Capra, who also directed James Stewart in It's a Wonderful Life, and was written by Lewis R. Foster and Sidney Buchman.

Related Topics:
Frank Capra - It's a Wonderful Life - Lewis R. Foster - Sidney Buchman

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It has been deemed "culturally significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

Related Topics:
Library of Congress - National Film Registry

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The film premiered in Washington, D.C. on October 17, 1939. It was also made into a television series of the same name that ran during the 1962-63 season, starring Fess Parker and Red Foley.

Related Topics:
Washington, D.C. - October 17 - 1939 - Television series - Fess Parker - Red Foley

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Contemporary reviewer Otis Ferguson wrote in The New Republic:

Related Topics:
Otis Ferguson - The New Republic

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:Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is the story of how a leader of Boy Rangers was sent to the Senate by the state political machine because he was popular, honest, and dumb. Washington is a shrine to him. So as he gawps around lost for a whole day, throw in thousands of feet of what can only be called a montagasm, buildings, monuments, statues, immortal catchphrases in stone. But before we go any farther, what's the payoff? It is that this priceless boy scout grew up as the son of a small-town editor so staunchly against the interests that they shot him for it under the boy's nose; after which he read American history so widely and fiercely that he knew the Constitution and the cherry tree by heart.

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:The story goes farther, of course, more than two hours' worth. The boy thinks he falls in love, and then falls in love without thinking so. From these personal relations he learns that he has been a chump. He starts a filibuster (the honest-man-in-court scene Capra has found so successful he won't be without it) in which he says some fine things for liberty and the better world. And it is so harrowing on all concerned that just after he passes out his colleague shoots himself, and the American way is straight again. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA97/halnon/capra/smithrev.html

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