When you think of a war movie, usually guns/battles/heroes/villains are involved right? While those stories dazzle on the big screen, usually that is at the expense of the humans engaging in those battles. What’s going through their heads? How are they dealing with what is going on? And most importantly, will these memories haunt them forever? The Best Years of Our Lives is the first movie that dared to focus fully on veterans instead of soldiers, and what is going on with them outside of any external conflict. Even though all of the battles in The Best Years of Our Lives take place inside people’s heads, the movie remains as captivating as any typical war movie because it brings back the humans from the most dehumanizing experience in any person’s life.
Like in real life, WWII has just ended, and everyone in the US military is happy for their victory. 3 men find themselves hitching a plain ride back to Boone City in the middle of the US: Captain Fred Derry (Dana Andrews), Sergeant Al Stephenson (Frederic March), and Petty Officer Homer Parrish (Harold Russell). The 3 bond during their trip over their times at war and become fast friends. Each of them also reconnects with their past lives: Derry searches for his wife (Virginia Mayo) who has moved out and not left an address; Stephenson moves back home with his wife Milly (Myrna Loy) and kids including his lovely daughter Peggy (Theresa Wright); and Parrish, now with hooks for hands, moves back in with his parents and hopes to start dating his high school sweetheart, Wilma (Cathy O’Donnell), despite his limitations.
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was coined in 1980, 34 years after Best Years of Our Lives came out. So all credit to Robert Sherwood (the writer) and William Wyler (director) for being 34 years the wiser. Their brilliance is on display in how varied and widespread effects of PTSD can be. There’s the obligatory screaming nightmare scene which you’d expect. But other characters aren’t as obvious with their pain; one of the men has grown a lust for excitement and adventure, manifesting itself in late alcohol fueled nights that just turn into alcohol fueled living. And then there’s the simple paranoia of the person you love leaving you because of how you’ve changed, which turns into isolation and depression. Each of our 3 leading army men go through as harrowing a journey back home as they did abroad, forcing these men to either run from or embrace their pasts as part of who they are, and learning to cope with the trauma they endured and realize that they can love and be loved again, as told subtly but perceptively by the Sherwood/Wyler combination.
But Sherwood and Wyler were not done. They also expanded the scope of their story to cover the post war experience for the veteran’s families and career prospects as well, giving us a full scope of life after the fighting has ended. Each of the 3 circles around Derry, Stephenson, and Parrish provide something interesting and complex to absorb. By far the most fascinating is Al Stephenson’s experiences. Careerwise, the bank he works at uses his heroic credibility to sell to veterans, but only the “good” vets, as the movie and real world have made clear that it’s easier to forget those brave people instead of trying to give them a leg up (also a key storyline for the other two soldiers). The sergeant’s relationship with Milly is extremely multi-faceted for the time, with the pair having really honest conversations about what is going on; their wonderful relationship is a nice juxtaposition with Captain Derry and his wife, who share no such bond, as Mrs. Derry has found a life of her own that makes her happier than a life with the current man she’s with, obviously heartbreaking but all too real. And then there’s sweet Homer, an affable simple man heartbreakingly alone because he’s worried about scaring people with his “claws.” The best emotional beats of the movie belong to the untrained but amazing Harold Russell, as he shows how Homer maintains his wonderful personality despite the obvious pitfalls of his appearance. Russell got the acting accolades at the Oscars, but everyone is excellent, in particular Myrna Loy’s Milly and Theresa Wright’s effervescent Peggy, a mother daughter acting duo for the ages.
The Best Years of Our Lives is a perfectly vague title clearly meant to imply some irony mixed with some reality. Personally? I think the title is not about the war or the timeline of the movie. No. Those are the transition periods where something is happening, people have to deal with it, then they recover from it, so they can go on and live those best years. The ending should basically have the “Happily Ever After” Disney cursive on it, but for a few sweet war heroes and the ones they love, I don’t think that’s too much to ask.