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Critics Consensus: An excessively sentimental piece of propaganda, Mrs. Miniver nonetheless succeeds, due largely to Greer Garson's powerful performance.
Critic Consensus: An excessively sentimental piece of propaganda, Mrs. Miniver nonetheless succeeds, due largely to Greer Garson's powerful performance.
All Critics (25) | Top Critics (8) | Fresh (23) | Rotten (2) | DVD (2)
Under Sidney Franklin's watchful supervision and William Wyler's masterly direction the story has become the most stirring, heart-clutching picture of our times.
Mrs Miniver as a whole certainly is very silly sometimes... and yet, and yet. Sometimes through its sheer unselfconscious earnestness, it packs a punch.
That almost impossible feat, a great war picture that photographs the inner meaning, instead of the outward realism of World War II.
A poignant story of the joys and sorrows, the humor and pathos of middle-class family life in wartime England.
The most famous and perhaps most effective propaganda film of World War II.
Classic soap opera in which good old British understatement has a field day, everybody is frightfully nice, and sentimentality is wrapped up in yards of tasteful gloss.
Mrs. Miniver eventually settles down to be a well-made and quite conventional war-film.
[A] superb wartime melodrama.
Regardless of its Hollywood trappings, this remains one of the best movies about a brave era in British history.
Winning WW II story of british pluck that manages to side-step the propaganda trap.
Plays out as a soap opera melodrama about a gracious family handling the wartime strife with aplomb.
Frightfully nice, it's like war at teatime.
A middle-class family endures World War II. Essentially propaganda, Mrs. Miniver exalts the bravery of common people in extraordinary circumstances. Of course, "common" in this uniquely British sense involves a life of luxury, and while the class issues of British society are treated tangentially, the most pressing aspect of the film is how the characters rise to their circumstances. Mrs. Miniver's courage when confronted by a marooned German soldier, Mr. Miniver's excursion on a fishing boat, and their son's flying missions are all examples of common bravery. Most of these scenes are subtle and individually compelling, but the film amounts to a simple extolling of the everyday, and as a result it becomes locked in its political message. One scene that bothered me from a feminist perspective involves Mr. Miniver smacking his wife on the bottom after he finds out she is responsible for the marooned German's capture. The patriarchal necessity that the man be the locus of courage was yet another reminder that this film is confined to its era. Overall, while there is some good acting, war propaganda can only go so far.
Super Reviewer
It really hasn't aged all that well, but this is nonetheless a decently well made and well-intentioned World War II drama. What sets it apart from contemporary films about WWII is that it came out during the war, and was thus focusing on current events, specifically the impact of the war on the homefront, which, in the case of the film, happnes to primarily focuses on the war's effect on the Miniver household, mainly the title character- a nice lady from Britain's upper crust. I liked the choices they made in terms of setting and how it focuses less on the soldiers and more on those who did their part to support the war effort off the battlefield. Being that it is a Hollywood production that apparently got great acclaim from Churchill, the film tends to stick out as being a very idealized and sanitized melodramatic propaganda piece. There are soem really moving scenes though, and, like I said, the film is well intentioned, but as a result of all I've just said, the film is extremely biased and seems rather quaint and safe by today's standards. Aside from this, the film takes a while to really get going, it's rather uneven, and there's a fair amount of screentime where the title character isn't even the focus or present in the events. It's not a waste though. The perforamnces are decent, the subject matter interesting (even if the execution could use some work), and, as I said, there are some really moving sequences that are quite well done, especially the bomb shelter sequence. All in all, a noble film, but nothing really all that great. I can see why it was popular and acclaimed upon its release, but this is one of the many cases where the decision to give it the BEST PICTURE award hasn't stood the test of time. You should still perhaps give it a watch, but if you want a propaganda piece that is something of a masterpiece (and please don't take this recommendation out of context), see Triumph of the Will instead.
A pretty good drama about life during WWII, which came out during WWII. Not really exciting, but the actors are good.
mmmm, propaganda....
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