Make Way for Tomorrow
Directed by Leo McCarey
When you’re seventeen and the world’s beautiful, facing facts is just as slick fun as dancing or going to parties. But when you’re seventy… Well, you don’t care about dancing, you don’t think about parties anymore, and about the only fun you have left is pretending that there ain’t any facts to face. So would you mind if I just kind of went on pretending?
Lucy Cooper in Make Way for Tomorrow
Upon the conclusion of watching Make Way for Tomorrow, I sat up to grab tissues to sop the tears and snot off my face while moaning, “Why do I do this to myself? I know this movie is going to make me sob uncontrollably, yet I picked it for us to watch anyway!”
Make Way for Tomorrow has been hailed by many critics as Leo McCarey’s masterpiece. The director of The Awful Truth, Love Story, and An Affair to Remember claimed that Make Way for Tomorrow was his favorite film of any he ever made. Orson Welles infamously said it was the “saddest movie ever made”, and Roger Ebert included it on his list of Great Movies.
So what did Michael think?
Michael: For the life of me, I don’t remember why I wanted to watch this movie.
Jordan: When I first bought it you said you really wanted to see it!
Michael: I know! I just can’t remember why. Even reading the description on the back of the case just now, I don’t know what about it made me really want to see it. I loved the last half hour. If the whole movie was like that last half hour, it would’ve been wonderful. I didn’t like the first two thirds. I don’t know if it was the style of filmmaking at the time or what, but it just seemed like everyone forgot their lines. There were just so many pauses between talking, and everyone was mumbling like they didn’t know what to say. I was like, “Hurry up, already!”
Jordan: It was a style of filmmaking at the time. Either everything was going at breakneck pace or they were giving room for the audience to really pay attention to what was going on.
Michael: I would’ve preferred it to be at a breakneck pace. It was just so slow! It reminded me of my Meisner teacher in college tapping his pencil when we weren’t present in the scene. “React! You’re not reacting!”
Jordan: But they needed that space! McCarey was giving the actors the space to have all these emotions and then for the audience to see them. It was 1937; they didn’t have method acting yet, not like we have now. It was a whole different style.
Michael: I guess. But did they have to mumble like that? It really picked up in that last third, though. I teared up, but I wasn’t going to bawl over it. I think it was because only those last thirty minutes grabbed me. If the whole thing had grabbed me, I would’ve been much more emotional.
THE SPOILERS ARE AHEAD (unless you clicked those in bedded links above) TURN BACK NOW, OR FOREVER REGRET YOUR FOLLY (or just enjoy the review)
The plot revolves around an elderly couple, Barkley and Lucy Cooper (Victor Moore and Beulah Bondi), who have lost their house during the Great Depression. They have to turn to their five adult children (one of whom lives in California and never appears onscreen) for help.
Michael: I got the impression that fifth kid was well off. She is out there striking it rich in the gold mines!
Jordan: It seems like something happened with the family, like she’s the black sheep or something, and she was like, “Fuck you all, good bye!”
Their kids don’t know how to help their homeless parents–two of them only have enough space to house one parent each, another has a husband who categorically refuses to take in his in-laws, and the fourth is so irresponsible he can’t take care of himself, much less provide for his parents. (Did I mention the fifth child was in California and completely absent? Michael: Maybe she wanted to make it big in Hollywood and only has a dingy studio apartment.) The decision is made for the couple to split up, each one living with one of the children who has space, until such a time comes that they can live together again. The father goes to the country and the mother goes to the city, 300 miles away from each other.
Michael: It was hard to watch. I really don’t like watching stories where children don’t have time for their parents. No one wants to live with their parents as adults, they want to have their own lives. But I can’t fathom this idea of turning to your parents and saying, “Oh, you can’t take care of yourself? That’s a pity.” It wasn’t important enough for their children to keep them together.
Jordan: Well, the point was they logistically couldn’t keep them together. That’s what a lot of those pauses you had problems with were allowing to happen. They made space for the audience to see all sides of the situation.
Michael: I liked that it opened like a play. The credits said it was a play before this. It had a very stagy feel at the beginning, with all the kids coming home to ma and pa’s house. I kept wondering why it has never had a revival with James Earl Jones and Phylicia Rashad starring in it.
Jordan: I’d see that! I don’t think the play is anything like the movie. Leo McCarey was famous for rewriting the scripts on set and tweaking things day-to-day. Otherwise, that’d be perfect casting for a revival!
McCarey was a master when it came to understanding human beings. He never treated his characters with derision, taking great pains to make sure that if a character was going to be an antagonist, their actions would be understood.
There is a wonderful scene about a third of the way through the film. Lucy’s daughter-in-law, Anita (Fay Bainter) hosts an evening bridge lesson as a way to procure income for the family. She has no idea what to do with Lucy while the students are in the house because there’s nowhere for her to be; the bridge lesson takes up the entire living room, and she doesn’t want to consign her mother-in-law to her daughter Rhoda’s (Barbara Read) bedroom. McCarey uses this scene to show the audience how awkward everything is for all the family members. Lucy doesn’t know what to do or where to be. She wants to be with other people, she wants to sit comfortably in her rocking chair, she doesn’t want to be ostracized, but she also doesn’t want to be in the way.
The scene begins with a shot of Anita teaching her students the basics of bridge. This is a middle aged crowd, dressed up in evening wear, so they are obviously making a night of this activity. In the middle of Anita’s lecture, Mamie the maid (Louise Beavers) walks into frame with Lucy’s rocking chair to set it in the only available space: an area directly behind Anita. As Mamie sets the rocking chair down, she gives Anita a charged looked.
Michael: I loved Louise Beavers. She looks at Anita like, “She said it. You know what this is.”
Lucy comes in, sits in the rocking chair, nods to her daughter-in-law, and begins to rock. Anita attempts to continue with the lesson, but the sound of the chair is distracting. At first Lucy doesn’t seem to notice she’s interrupted the lesson. She eventually realizes she’s making too much noise, but by then she doesn’t know what to do. Anita decides it’s better to just have all her students begin playing. What follows is a sequence of events where Lucy tries to talk to some of the students, begins looking over shoulders and revealing what people’s hands are, and telling stories to everyone. We as the audience know she doesn’t mean any harm; she just wants to socialize.
Michael: I could definitely end up being Lucy in my old age, just holding court in front of all these people who just don’t give a fuck and telling stories and then being like, “Oh…I guess I should just go to bed…” *peers*
As the audience, we can see how awkward Lucy is being, how uncomfortable some people get, how amused others are, how upset Anita becomes that the evening is not going the way she desires.
Michael: I don’t know if [McCarey]’s such a good director. One of the things my professors in college were really big on was “If you want to see how good the director is, watch the ensemble.” And I feel like the party goers in that scene couldn’t decide if they were annoyed or entertained by Lucy.
Jordan: I loved that! I thought it was exactly right. Every person was reacting in some way, and it was all individualized. Nowadays those types of scenes are staged like “And then the whole room turns to the awkward person and glares at them!” It pisses me off because there’s always someone in the crowd who would think the person being awkward is actually amusing. The bridge scene in this movie is not set up that way; people didn’t know how to react to her and became individualized in their reactions.
Michael: It seems like the same people were making wildly different choices from one moment to the next. “Oh, I’m annoyed, now I’m intrigued, now I’m sad, now I’m annoyed again…”
Jordan: I liked it because I felt it was honest reactions to what was going on. Think about it: you’re in someone’s house, paying them to teach you how to play bridge, and their mother comes in and starts talking to you. At first you’re like, “Oh! Oh, yeah, I’ll be friendly towards her.” And then she keeps talking to you and you’re like, “Oh, I didn’t know being friendly would mean I have to keep engaging with you while I’m trying to learn how to play bridge… Now this is weird, I feel awkward, I want to go back to my game, go away from me now. Oh, now she’s leaving, and I feel bad. I didn’t mean to hurt her feelings.” And you don’t see this range of expression in background players nowadays; the background extras are just background. Except maybe that one person…
Michael: Who’s just acting the house down boots to get that camera time.
Jordan: Exactly. And usually making wrong choices to do it.
Michael: These people were all acting very much. It was a very active ensemble in that sense, but none of them were scene stealing. No one was giving you the full layout after the music ended.
(That’s a Teen Witch reference for those who don’t know. And if you don’t, do yourself a favor and watch at least the “We Like Boys” dance sequence and discover the joy of watching what he’s talking about.)
Meanwhile, Barkley is dealing with living in close quarters with his second daughter by leaving the house every day. He walks down to a general store run by an older shopkeeper named Max Reubens (Maurice Moscovitch) who delights in Barkley’s company. He likes Barkley so much that he becomes annoyed with his other customers for even being in the store, going so far as to tell a child to just get his own candy and leave the money (frisking the kid before he leaves, of course, since you can’t trust children) and deny a woman a newspaper since it’s his last one and he wants to give it to Barkley.
Michael: The Jewish shop clerk was excellent!
Jordan: He was great!
Michael: He made a lot of good acting choices. He and Mamie made some of the best choices in the movie.
Jordan: I think that was also a Leo McCarey thing, where he wasn’t going to have just stereotypes; if they were a character in the movie, they were going to be real people. It may be a “black maid” and a “Jewish shop clerk”, but McCarey is going to give them enough space to be real instead of just stock characters.
When Barkley becomes sick and bed ridden on his daughter’s couch (they don’t have a house big enough for him to have his own room), Max attempts to pay a call and bring some of his wife’s soup to help Barkley feel better. Tensions flare when it is apparent the daughter doesn’t want anyone coming to see her father, let alone giving him soup.
Michael: I have to give that daughter some credit. She took in her mumbling, shuffling father, and all she had was that couch. And her husband was unemployed, so they’re all kind of stuck in that room together. But she didn’t have to be such a bitch to Max!
Jordan: Yeah, I was definitely like, “Why is she being such an asshole?!” but then I realized, “Oh, she’s embarrassed!” She doesn’t want people to know her father has to sleep on the couch. Her father is telling her constantly she is doing everything wrong. She can’t take care of him, she doesn’t know how. She doesn’t even know how to make soup! Her dad keeps telling her that her mother would take care of him better, but there’s no real way for her mother to be there to help. What is she supposed to do? You start to realize she’s doing the best she can and constantly feeling nothing is good enough. You kind of understand why she later urges the doctor to say that a warmer climate would be better for her father so she can send him to live with that unseen daughter in California. It’s a terrible thing to do, but you understand why she’s doing it.
There are many moments in the film where McCarey spells things out for you. (This is mainly responsible for the slow pacing with which Michael was so annoyed.) But there are plenty of other moments where things are not spelled out.
Michael: Maybe audiences at the time were more attuned to filling in the blanks. I feel like movies at this time gave you lots of blanks where you’re supposed to know what goes in there.
Jordan: McCarey gave you lots of blanks, not movies in general at the time. This is one of the reasons why people consider Make Way for Tomorrow McCarey’s masterpiece. He trusted the intelligence of his audience…
Michael: Fool.
Jordan: …and he was going to give the audience enough to be interested and fill in the blanks themselves.
Lucy finds out her granddaughter Rhoda has been sneaking out to meet boys. Anita keeps mentioning that Rhoda used to have all “her friends” over to the house, but now that Lucy is at home all the time, Rhoda feels she can’t have anyone over. Lucy doesn’t want to tell Anita that Rhoda is sneaking about with potentially unsavory characters. She cautions Rhoda about going out with a particular 35 year old gentleman, but Rhoda is 17 and doesn’t want to listen. When Rhoda doesn’t return home that night, Anita is frantic. After receiving a phone call in the morning (which Lucy answers and relays the messages, despite Anita standing there wanting the phone) Anita explodes at Lucy, blaming her for her daughter’s inability to bring friends to the house, for not telling her what her daughter was up to, and for disrupting their lives in a way that will potentially lead to her daughter’s ruin.
Michael: But we never find out what actually happened!
Jordan: We do know it’s something illegal because when Anita is talking to her husband later they mention how Rhoda is being “kept out of the case”. So someone has legal representation for some reason.
Michael: I did not care for Anita’s acting choices at all!
Jordan: I thought she did a great job! You could see her struggling with what was happening. She doesn’t want her mother-in-law living in her home, but she also doesn’t want to kick her out because she knows none of Lucy’s other kids are going to be as nice or want to take care of their mom. I understand her concern about not being able to entertain her daughter’s friends at home and now she’s gotten into trouble. Though I will say I was like, “Girl, she’s 17. She’s going to get in trouble anyway!”
Michael: Can you imagine dating a 17 year old at your age? I guess that was a thing at the time, the 17 year old girls saying, “I need to hurry up and get married” and the 35 year old men saying, “I need a 17 year old girl to birth and take care of the children!” And Anita’s later monologue to her husband is really chalked up to the values of the time. She talks about how she’s worried her daughter is going to go out and get a job and an apartment of her own, and I’m like, “Yo. Your daughter is full ass grown.”
Jordan: But this is before women’s lib, even before America entered World War II.
Michael: Yeah, we needed Rosie the Riveter to come along. At this point, it was all “Our daughter stays in our house until she marries, and then she moves to her husband’s house.”
Jordan: Which is why they think she needs to entertain her friends at home so they can keep an eye on her. And this notion isn’t as dated as you may think. Can you imagine if your niece said she was going on a date with a 35 year old man?
Michael: Oh, I’d be on that first train down to help my brother kick that guy’s ass! But Anita’s just yelling at Lucy. I really wanted Lucy to say, “Listen, I didn’t make your daughter a whore.”
One of the things that really highlights the frustration of old age are how many times Barkley Cooper tries to get a job so that he can provide for his wife again. The audience knows it’s not going to happen. He has mobility issues. He says he’s a bookkeeper, but he can’t see well enough to read anymore. He just can’t get hired. The film conveys this frustration and illuminates the underlying truth of the situation so well. Up until the very end, when Barkley and Lucy are reunited for only five hours while they wait for Barkley’s train to California, he still attempts to find work.
Michael: What a just rip-your-heart-out-of-your-chest moment where he runs into that clothing store with the “Help Wanted” sign, saying, “Let me just pick up something real quick.” And she knows, even though they just have hours left, he’s still trying to get a job so that they can stay together. And he can’t. And he comes out saying, “Oh, they didn’t have what I wanted in my size.” Like…beautiful!
The following sequence follows Lucy and Barkley as they spend their final hours together. They revisit the hotel where they stayed for their honeymoon and are treated with the warmest welcome from the receptionist. The manager of the hotel comps their drinks and invites them to stay for dinner. Lucy is initially concerned with disappointing their children who have all gathered to have a family meal with them that evening, but Barkley takes care of it with a quick phone call.
Michael: That moment where he is on the phone with the daughter (who had enough space for the both of them but whose husband refused to take them in) and it’s heavily implied he tells her off right there, I wanted to know what he said! I wanted to hear the “Go fuck yourself!” moment!
Jordan: But it’s not about the “Go fuck yourself.”
Michael: I know it’s not.
Jordan: That’s what I appreciate about this film. McCarey still gives you that “fuck you” moment without spelling it out and making it the focal point of the scene. If he had us hear what Barkley said to his daughter and then the daughter telling her siblings and all their reactions to what was said, the focus would be pulled from what we’re actually experiencing during that moment, which is this couple spending their last moments together. That’s the focal point of the scene.
After dinner, Lucy asks Barkley to dance, but by the time they reach the dance floor the music has changed from a traditional waltz to a modern uptempo song. The band conductor sees that Lucy and Barkley are suddenly at a loss of what to do, and he immediately stops the current song and makes the band play another traditional waltz. He gives them a wink as they begin to dance together for the first time in years. All too soon they need to rush to the train station so Barkley can get on the train to California. Once he leaves, they know Lucy will be sent off to live in a home for elderly women. What follows is the most honest, beautiful, and devastating scene in the film.
Michael: It captured that feeling so well, that feeling of, “I have to say good bye, and you’re still here.” It’s very difficult to do, and they captured it very well.
Jordan: There’s that last shot of Lucy as the train pulls out of the station. She looks so conflicted and crushed and scared. I love that final shot.
Michael: Yeah, it’s beautiful. And Beulah Bondi performs it perfectly!
Jordan: It’s really powerful to end on that shot instead of doing the usual Hollywood convention of her smiling and reflecting, “Oh, we had a lovely day!” That would’ve made you feel better about the whole situation, and this ending doesn’t.
Michael: Yeah. It’s not an ending you can feel good about.
Jordan: Which many people think is the reason the movie flopped during its initial release. The studio wanted them to stay together. (Which is even more different than the ending of the original novel where three months after they separate Barkley dies and that’s when they tell Lucy she’s going to live in a home.) I think the film is more realistic and gives you more to explore with all the characters.
Michael: And you can look at that ending in one of two ways. The husband seems to be saying, “I’m never going to see you again,” and the wife has that line to the granddaughter earlier in the film to let her keep hoping. There will be audience members who walk away saying, “They’re never going to see each other again.” Then there will be audience members, and I think I’m one of them, that say, “Well….they might.” There’s hope in that ending.
Jordan: I think I’m both types of audience members all at once. Which is why I cry so hard at the end. *wipes away tear, blows nose*
Michael: The whole time they paint this picture of this nice older couple who had such a wonderful life together, but their kids are all assholes! So, like, they might not have been good parents.
Jordan: They even talk about how the father wasn’t really around helping out, that she was raising five kids basically on her own. They may not have necessarily been bad parents, but I did wonder how the kids were actually raised. I mean, they were apparently raised to be very independent. And Lucy and Barkley didn’t ask their kids for help until they absolutely had to. They obviously thought their kids couldn’t help them, and the kids initially said they could’ve helped sooner until they really thought about it.
Michael: I feel like the lesson this movie teaches is: Your kids are assholes, and New Yorkers are awesome! I was half expecting the train conductor at the end to say, “Well, get on the train with him, then!” But, you know, you can’t trust Amtrack even in the 30s.
Michael’s Rating: Four Want Ads or Two and a Half Rocking Chairs (take your pick)
Jordan & Michael Watch Movies! 