"The 1946 Frank Capra movie, about a man who on one of the worst days of his life discovers how he has positively impacted his hometown of Bedford Falls, is beloved for extolling selflessness, community and the little guy taking on rapacious capitalists. Take those values, add in powerful acting and the promise of light in the darkest of hours, and it's the only movie that makes me cry."
"Last weekend, the Department of Homeland Security posted two videos celebrating its mass deportation campaign. One, titled "It's a Wonderful Flight," re-creates the scene where George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart in one of his best performances) contemplates taking his own life by jumping off a snowy bridge. But the protagonist is a Latino man crying over the film's despairing score that he'll "do anything" to return to his wife and kids and "live again.""
"The other DHS clip is a montage of Yuletide cheer - Santa, elves, stockings, dancing - over a sped-up electro-trash remake of Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You." In one split-second image, Bedford Falls residents sing "Auld Lang Syne," just after they've saved George Bailey from financial ruin and an arrest warrant. "This Christmas," the caption reads, "our hearts grow as our illegal population shrinks.""
The 1946 Frank Capra movie celebrates selflessness, community, and the small-town everyman. Pope Leo XIV listed it among his favorite films. The Department of Homeland Security repurposed the film's imagery in two holiday videos promoting mass deportations and voluntary removals. One video, "It's a Wonderful Flight," mirrors George Bailey's despair by showing a Latino man pleading to return to his family, then riding a plane and advertising an app for free self-deportation flights with $1,000–$3,000 holiday bonuses. The second clip juxtaposes Yuletide images and a sped-up pop song with a caption celebrating a shrinking 'illegal population.'
Read at Los Angeles Times
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