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Imserba Webstore - Mrs. Miniver
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List Price: $19.98
Our Price: $17.49
Your Save: $ 2.49 ( 12% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
Starring: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, John Nesbitt, Kai-Shek Chiang
Directed By: Allan Kenward, Basil Wrangell, William Wyler
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
Brand: Warner Brothers
EAN: 9780790746647
Feature: Winner of six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, this memorable spirit-lifter about an idealized England that tends its prize-winning roses while confronting the terror of war struck a patriotic chord with American audiences and became 1942's #1 box-office hit. Greer Garson gives a formidable Oscar-winning performance in the title role, comforting children in a bomb shelter, capturing an enem
Format: Black & White
ISBN: 0790746646
Label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2004-02-03
Running Time: 133
Studio: Warner Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1942-06-20
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Features
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Winner of six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, this memorable spirit-lifter about an idealized England that tends its prize-winning roses while confronting the terror of war struck a patriotic chord with American audiences and became 1942's #1 box-office hit. Greer Garson gives a formidable Oscar-winning performance in the title role, comforting children in a bomb shelter, capturing an enem
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Editorial Reviews:
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Winner of six Academy Awards(R) including Best Picture, this memorable spirit-lifter about an idealized England that tends its prize-winning roses while confronting the terror of war struck a patriotic chord with American audiences and became 1942's #1 box-office hit. Greer Garson gives a formidable Oscar(R)-winning performance in the title role, comforting children in a bomb shelter, capturing an enemy parachutist and delivering an inspirational portrait of stiff-upper-lip British resolve. When Hitler did his worst, Mrs. Miniver did her best. Year: 1942 Director: William Wyler Starring: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A favorite classic
Comment: Mrs. Miniver is one of my favorite classic films. It is a beautifully filmed movie with an excellent cast in Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Dame May Whitty, Theresa Wright and others. It is a story of Kay Miniver and her family and their attempts to keep life as sane and normal as one can while their country is at war and bombing raids are an almost every night happening.
It is as realistic as Hollywood was at the time in most films. Sure women didn't really go to bed in full make-up, nor did married couples sleep in twin beds, but if that is where your focus stays then you are missing what I think the movie is trying to tell you. That despite war, bombings, death and destruction, life goes on. We all try to keep moving forward every day and maintain some sense of what we percieve as normalacy in our lives. That is true during times of peace and war.
There is propoganda as in almost all of the war films of the era. But it is also a time when the stars of Hollywood were going off to war themselves. (Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart, the director of this film-William Wyler and many others) Or traveling with the USO or selling war bonds. It only follows that the message would transfer to film. And I believe there was a bit of government encouragement to make these types of films as well.
If you enjoy a well made film that tells what I think is a really great story then try this one.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Shameless, Fussy
Comment: According to Juliet Gardiner in her social history WARTIME, many Brits despised Jan Struther's "Mrs. Miniver" column in THE TIMES during the early years of the Second World War, fighting it maudlin and unrealistic. Struther's sentimentalization of the British bourgeoisie keeping their upper lips stiff in wartime was exactly what Hollywood wanted, however, and the 1942 Warner Brothers film version by William Wyler shamelessly drained every last ounce of lachrymosa out of the material. Kay Miniver, as Greer Garson plays her, could not be less of a creation of the Home Counties and more of Hollywood: she gurgles over her children, delivers happy paeans to her purchasing powers, and even wears full make-up to bed. She even speaks in Received American Theatrical Pronunciation, suppressing her own native British accent to make the film more palatable to American audiences (as do all the other British actors in the cast, including Dame May Whitty as the local titled harridan hiding a heart of gold). Of course she's completely indomitable, and stares down a grubby wounded German parachutist who looks like something out of an Egon Schiele painting.
The film is historically important for its popularity which supposedly rallied millions of Americans to the British cause during the war (or so claimed no less a figure than Winston Churchill). And it does feature Teresa Wright delivering one of her usual excellent and intelligent performances as the titled dragon's granddaughter, who becomes engaged to Mrs. Miniver's son. But the film just isn't very enjoyable, even in keeping an eye towards the values and conventions of its day: it's first half is deadly boring, and you find yourself waiting for war to be declared, but even after that happens there are far too many close-ups of the characters nervously moving their eyes from side to side as bombers buzz overhead. Unfortunately the most fun you'll probably have in the whole thing is looking at Garson's fussy outfits, particularly her hats and brooches.
Customer Rating:
Summary: War Comes to Britain
Comment: The film begins in prewar England. People go about their lives. [No mention of the Great Depression here.] People are concerned with their pleasures and annoyed by changes in society. The Minivers live in a large house with servants. "What is money?" Are people wasting time on the vanities of life? What will their son learn at college? Do class privileges affect a mere flower show? Do students learn a new attitude at college? Is this to inculcate political views that differ from their home life? Who benefits?
The people are in church when a message arrives: they are at war! They have to defend their freedom. Will they be bombed now? Horace is the first to leave. Vin prefers the RAF. Does the naming of a rose symbolize social changes? There are blackouts at night. One German plane was shot down, the pilot is at large. Mr. Miniver patrols at night with a rifle. Vin is in the RAF as a pilot officer. A night time call summons Mr. Miniver to the river patrol. The boats are filled with gasoline and sent to Ramsey. A fleet of small boats will rescue the British Army from Dunkirk. Mrs. Miniver finds that German pilot in her back yard! When he faints she calls the police. He predicts thousands more will come to bomb England, and shows himself to lack diplomacy and good manners.
Mrs. Miniver researched the Beldon family history for an amusing scene. Time moves fast during a war. The family has a bomb shelter with a poison gas detector. The sound of explosions symbolize the air war. ]Don't put cans on the top shelf!] The children are frightened. Their house was damaged but life goes on. Lady Beldon announces the winners of the flower show. The station master wins for his Miniver rose. Then there is an air raid warning siren. Cars can't use lights at night. A two-engined plane crashes in flames. Some bullets hit the car. Carol is wounded but the ambulances are busy. They meet in the damaged church. The sermon gives hope to the people, to inspire them to fight the enemy. [A message to the audience.] This low-keyed story shows some of the effects of war on ordinary people. Later films would be more dramatic, and better.
The English aristocracy own about 90% of the land. The villages must respect their lords and ladies or suffer for it. Even if they own a home they only lease the land from the aristocracy. In effect, it's a company town. Was Mrs. Miniver too young for a 20-year old son? [But not for marriage.] Helmut Dantine was a political refugee from Nazi Austria, and like others played the enemy. Richard Ney later wrote "The Wall Street Jungle", a guide for investors.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Grandma Nana
Comment: Greer Garson did a beautiful job in this movie. Always enjoyed it and am now happy to own it for frequent viewing.
Customer Rating:
Summary: WHAT A GOOD MOVIE!!
Comment: MY GRANDFATHER TOLD ME ABOUT THIS CLASSIC AND WAS SO EXCITED WHEN I RECEIVED IT!! THE STORY IS SO INTERESTING.
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