Saw The Shop Around the Corner, a sweet film about a small shop which is nominally in Hungary (but is really in Anytown USA) and its employee's comings and goings. Everyone is adorable, everything works out for the best. It is centrally a romance that ties up just exactly on Christmas Eve. It was made in the 40s, so it's a bit mean to the leading lady at parts (there is an ongoing deception perpetuated by the man. When this trickery is revealed she seems to uneasily sublimate any outrage at being tricked. Hmm.) but the film is so overwhelmingly sweet, these moments of meanness are immediately forgotten.
And anyway the moments of bitterness add piquance to an otherwise overwhelmingly saccharine film. As it is it's not saccharine but it gets damn close at times. What the film is, primarily, is adorable. There's a scene where the blustery shop-owner is looking for a friend go have dinner and hang out with. He chats with each shop clerk, too proud to admit that he's simply lonely. After exhausting everyone, he discovers by chance that the errand-boy is an orphan and he then grandly invites him to a meal. Adorable. There is also a kindly old Hungarian man who exists solely as adorable comic relief. He exists solely to comfort the protagonists and the audience.
I was very taken by the film. It had the harmless sweetness of It's a Wonderful Life or of the plays of Thornton Wilder. It's not terribly progressive or challenging, but progressive challenging work is difficult to render adorably and adoration is what this film seeks. For the most part, it earns it. Good show.
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