Mr. Deeds Goes to Town

Everyone knows this as a renowned classic film. Hick (played beautifully by Gary Cooper) comes to big town, acts like a hick, everyone jerks him around, he eventually gets legally accused of being too weird for the big city. How many films have been spawned from this one? (I can think of 3 off the bat.) As much as I wanted to like this film, there was something that I couldn't shrug off. The film does a good job of making Cooper a hick who's a lot wiser than the city folk, but does he have to resort to violence every time he gets upset? This happens repeatedly throughout the film, and even towards the end during the court scene, when the film is redeeming itself, blammo! It's there again. I can watch movie violence when it's accounted for (either it's war, or gangs, or sexual, so its motivations are at least clear). But in this case, it makes no sense. If the filmmakers are trying to show how wise he is, why show his irrational, violent side all the time? You could say times were different then, but I would still say that the violence sticks out like a sore thumb.

year: 1936
length: 115 min.
rating: 3.0
IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0027996/combined