Up until today, the oldest movie I had watched in 2026 was 1957’s The Seventh Seal. Which is definitely old! But I thought I could do a little better. After having skipped over the choice on Tubi a couple of times, I finally sat myself down and decided to go a full eighteen years older and watch 1939’s Mr. Smith Goes To Washington.

Despite his having a frankly excellent surname, I’ve never really gotten into Jimmy Stewart as much as I should have. I’ve never enjoyed the entirety of It’s A Wonderful Life, for instance. So why choose this particular film? I wish I had a good reason for you. I perused Tubi for a while one day, and it just struck me as perhaps one of the classics that I’m “supposed” to have seen. And I found myself actually wanting to see it!

Mr. Smith Goes To Washington opens with the death of a United States Senator. In the wake of his passing, the governor of his home state is set upon by wealthy influencers to appoint a toadie to the open seat. The proposal of this decision is met with anger from his constituents, and while eating dinner with his family, the governor hears another option from his kids: a popular youth ranger named Jefferson Smith.

After some wrestling with the choice, the governor appoints the presumably easily manipulated Smith to the open seat. Smith, played by beloved actor Jimmy Stewart, hits Washington with all the glee and wide-eyed wonder of a small child tourist. When he finally gets around to getting seated, he starts senating… but finds out he is way over his head.

TWO UPS AND TWO DOWNS

+ Fantastic performances from Jimmy Stewart, Jean Arthur, and Claude Rains. It’s great to see the Saunders character, played by Arthur, be a woman who actually drives the plot and empowers the characters around her and isn’t just an object or a love interest. She pushes Jeff forward and provides the motivation and information he needs to go where he needs to go. It feels like she is an especially progressive character for the 1930’s!

And Jimmy Stewart shows such growth and development over the runtime as a character. At first, he is timid and awed by everything, and it shows in his speech and posture. But as the film moves along and he gets coached by Saunders and starts his mission, everything about the performance changes. And by the time you get to the climax, the stuttering young man who averts his gaze is long gone and is replaced by a much more confident Senator who wants to do the right thing.

Rounding out the core cast is Claude Rains, the erstwhile Invisible Man, as Joe Payne, Mr. Smith’s co-Senator from their unnamed state. He struggles with his morality throughout the picture, but consistently gets cowed into doing the wrong thing. Until the denouement anyway, when Smith cows him into doing the right thing. He’s a pretty easily led senior Senator, it seems. But Rains plays him with forcefulness and nuance! 

+ The story starts off so innocently and innocuously–a young Senator gets thrust into office as the best available option, and he wants to start a camp for boys in his home state–but it ends up being about all the corruption and awfulness of politics and big money. The story, like Jeff Smith’s character, shifts slowly and with tact, and before you know it, the stakes are considerably higher than you could have conceived through the first two acts.

Additionally, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington is a story that’s more relevant now than it was at its own time (but more on that in a second), and it will probably be relevant forever, sadly. It’s an ageless film. Sometimes movies from the distant past can come across as a bit archaic or of-their-era, but not this one!

– Boy, if the talent behind this picture thought big money and a corrupt press and politics-as-usual were bad in the 1930’s, I would hate to see what they think of the 2020’s. You wish this is the kind of movie that would make things better, but we as a country (I’m American, obviously) are actually far worse off.

So yes, this is a Down towards modern society as a whole. It’s not the best kind of Down to give, but hey… Good Movie is Good, and it didn’t leave me with a lot of nits to pick!

– I am not sure if this is the fault of the remastering of the original film or if the copy remastered was beat up or what, but there are some scenes with very rough editing and cuts. Dialogue breaks abruptly and there are cuts in moments where it doesn’t seem like there should be. Characters will be chatting away about the plot, and there will be a sudden, harsh cut between each line of dialogue. If it’s not a technical issue from the film, it’s really strange editing by Frank Capra.

Also, while I’m on the subject of abruptness, the movie just… ENDS so suddenly. I wanted some follow-up to the conclusion! I’ve watched enough Universal Horror movies from the 30’s and 40’s to know this was the modus operandi of films of this era, but it is so jolting that there is a resolution to the problem, then the credits immediately hit.

OVERALL

Mr. Smith Goes To Washington is a very powerful picture that is buoyed by some tremendous performances. It’s both uplifting because of the story and the hopefulness it inspires, and yet also depressing because of the fact that things are even worse off now than they were at the time of filming. But aside from the emotions it inspires, it’s still an unimpeachably made movie by some talents at the top of their craft.