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Fantastic!

best movie i've ever seen.

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

One point for Spencer Tracy doing what he can with a bum script. But Mickey Rooney's toweringly awful ham performance sinks the movie. Even in the thirties people must have been exchanging uncomfortable glances or staring up at the ceiling during Rooney's multiple scenes of yelling, outrageously bogus sobbing, defiant bullying and generally chewing the rug. Bar none, the worst acting ever to hit the screen.It would be nice to have a real movie about Boys Town with some other adults besides Flanagan in it, some details about the misery of street kids in those days, and perhaps a word or two about the total lack of any Girls Town back in the day, though the fate of female street kids has always been grim.

It's been some years since the story about the Catholic Church sheltering pedophile priests came to light.I do hope it's only a minority.But it's comforting to watch a movie based on this wonderful priest ,Father Flanagan (brillantly portrayed by the great Tracy)If there are saints in the universe,he must be one of them.After listening to the story of a prisoner about to be executed -a victim of fate more than a criminal-,the man of God decides he would take in all the boys standing in great danger of going to the dogs in a town he would build for them.One of Flanagan's most salutary qualities is his superb tolerance :before lunch,every boy prays his own God ,not only Jesus (they are even allowed to have no God),which was revolutionary!thirty years later,when I was in a catholic holiday camp,we had to pray and thank OUR Lord before we ate.Many viewers will praise Mickey Rooney and he is impressive as a "gangster in miniature" ,but my favorite is the adorable Pee Wee!

"Boys Town" is pure formula by today's standards but is still entertaining to watch. The movie's weakness is that it portrays just about everyone as a bit too saintly, even the criminals in the story. Mickey Rooney's acting is almost continually over the top and is in jarring contrast to the other boys. Meanwhile, Spencer Tracy's portrayal of Father Flanagan is that he's a man seemingly without flaw. You like Flanagan but it's sometimes hard to identify with a man who seems to be impossibly saintly. Still, Flanagan in this movie just doesn't talk the talk, he walks the walk. There are virtually no movies today about Christians living out their values and changing the world around them.A side note about Tracy's Oscar for this movie. After he won it, a flack for the Academy announced that Tracy was donating it to Boys Town. Except no one had asked Tracy if he was doing so. Tracy would've looked terrible for refusing to do so after it had been announced so a compromise was struck---Boys Town got the Oscar to display and Tracy was given a duplicate for his mantle. Some other actors have donated their Oscars---Shelly Winters gave her Oscar for "The Diary of Anne Frank" to the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam. Bing Crosby donated his Oscar to his alma mater, Gonzaga University.

Nominally the founding of Boys Town by Father Flanagan and his push to prove that there are no bad boys.Its as syrupy and sweet as they come. I doubt very much that the film is very close to what happened since everything in Spencer Tracy's hands is bound to be okay. I have no idea why but I was moved to mistiness a couple of times. Of course there is never any doubt that Boys Town will grow and thrive and of course Mickey Rooney's bad boy with a heart of gold is much too good to be true and is bound to do the right thing in the end. Still its a grand little film of the sort they don't make any more (and would be laughed off the screen if they did). Absolutely worth a look see when it reappears on TV or as a rental.(my only real problem is that Spencer Tracy won his second Oscar in a row for his portrait of Father Flanagan, either they really liked him or the other nominees weren't very good since the role is truly unremarkable, well played, but nothing special.)