Watch Make Way for Tomorrow For Free

Nice effects though.

Don't listen to the negative reviews

A Masterpiece!

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

I'd done some homework prior to seeing what many consider Leo McCary's best film (himself included) and have to say I was rather disappointed. Yes, the story is timeless and for audiences seeing 50 years in the future it will still be relevant. I don't think that in itself is a mark of quality. As for the performances I feel as though Bondi is trying a bit too hard here and it feels a bit contrived to me. It wasn't as though I didn't feel anything towards the films conclusion, its just that I kind of feel it wasn't earned.

Something I thought about, and felt more deeply, near the end of Make Way for Tomorrow, is that people who are married and have had the immeasurable luck to have been married for many years and have been happy, will take more from this film than those who haven't. This doesn't mean that it's not for anyone - everyone, really - looking for a moving story of life in all of its simplicity and at the same time aching and bittersweet complexity, but the couple at the center of this story, Barkley and Lucy, are apart for two-thirds of this story and find one another again after months apart, and they couldn't be happier. It's something that lasts, despite everything. Actually, *because* of everything, that their happiness together can weather whatever comes, and they are, in their simple presence in the lives of others, something to behold.Maybe they both know things will never be the same again; the wife, and mother of their five children, knows that Barkley could never take it if he knew what she plans to do, to put herself into a retirement home, and as she notes to her son this will be the one secret in her life. But they have their day and evening together, walking around New York City (which, by design at times due to the rear-screen-projection, has an abstract quality reminding me a tiny bit of Murnau's Sunrise), and have what could be called 'adventures'; with a car dealer thinking, from afar, that this elderly couple are full of dough; they stop off at the hotel they spent their honeymoon; they have cocktails and talk tongue-twisters; they go into the ballroom and dance to the big band playing which, perhaps sensing organically how different the mood is, change from something fast to something slow (it was this point, I should add readers, that I started to tear up, I can't explain why).This makes up the last third of the movie, and it may be what people remember most about the film. I think Leo McCarey knows this and directs this in a way that everything is building up to this. The story is set in the depression-era, so the socio-economic context doesn't have to be said, it's simply there and people know what's up (or down), and the Coopers have not been able to make payments (Barkley tells the children this and they act indignant that they weren't told sooner - it's clear from the father and mothers' expressions that they were too embarrassed, the generation keeping things unsaid that should be coming back around).So the parents are split between the children since none of them can house them both, and the despair sets in that grows over time: Barkley gets sick, Lucy becomes something of a nuisance (unintentionally of course) to her daughter-in-law's bridge club, and there's lies forged between grandmother Lucy and granddaughter Rhoda, and a foreign shopkeeper trying to help Barkley a little bit is met with scorn by his daughter. It's been said that this inspired Ozu with Tokyo Story, and it's easy to see why because everything is laid out simply and no one is out to be really *bad* per-say, but things get misspoken, little lies form, personality and behavior build over time and the small pressures surrounding people who do care and love for one another becomes greater.I have to wonder if this story would work in today's world, and I think it could up to a point (there's probably better programs to assist the elderly, or perhaps more distractions in other ways like TV), but the time it was made makes it very much a product of the depression, not unlike The Grapes of Wrath though that was more starkly political. If there's any politics to this it's at the familial level and subliminal; McCarey and the actors are out to express things emotionally, and everything builds up to something whether we think it will or not. His compositions also are simple and direct enough, giving us editing that gets to a reaction from Lucy or Barkley just when needed, the time to see their emotions rise or fall, listening or not listening as case may be. In its small way it's monumental, if that makes sense. While Ozu shows his influence from here, I might slightly prefer this film's take on this subject matter.But despite it being about people who are beyond my years, I kept thinking about my wife and I and what is in store for us years from now. We're living in a completely uncertain and chaotic world, and yet by the end, for all the sadness that is likely to come in some form or another, but love is what holds up people just as much as it can break them down in the most horrible circumstances. Barkley and Lucy love another, and their strength is in that. I loved this movie so much.

This movie is not ALL about old parents and their's five children. Many reviewers kinda miss a point I think.This movie is also about LOVE.A love, for which we all seek, all dream to feel, TRUE LOVE. A love, so strong and pure, that will melt your heart and make you weep. A love, some say old fashioned, but love doesn't got old. It evolves in something more, a commitment, partnership, respect, care for each other and even children. In this case, 5 of them. And they love them all. Closing scenes give us, powerful goodbyes. Oh, and it's not that their children don't love them. BUT....

Anita (Fay Bainter) and Barkely (Victor Moore) are living comfortably in a large house which is soon to be foreclosed on. The couple calls a meeting with their children (there are five, but only four show up for the bad news) to tell them that they will have to be moving out. The situation, how to care for parents when they need help as they get older, is very much a contemporary concern. It seems that with a little tweaking this story could be updated to 2015, but this movie plays it so straight that I am not sure it could be made now. "Nebraska" comes to mind, but it has a lighter touch.There was not much of a safety net in place In 1937--Social Security had yet to write its first check--so financial considerations were then often the instigators for a family's facing taking care of parents, while age itself is a common instigator now. But the resultant experiences are the same. In the movie the parents are split between two of the children's families. The younger people have their own lives, and dealing with an older person landing in the family is difficult, for both the children and the parents. What happens is played out in a realistic way and is completely understandable. One is tempted to judge the children as selfish, but there are really no enemies here.I found a lot of the scenes to be simultaneously sad and humorous. For example, Anita gets on the phone during her daughter's teaching a bridge class and is so loud that an awkward silence falls over the entire class of a couple dozen people. Only one land line per house and no cell phones then.Some delights are to be had for a contemporary audience such as seeing how people dressed in 1937--the women's hairstyles, dresses, and hats are so appealing that it makes me think that we have lost a lot in having moved to casual comfort. At the age of 70 Anita and Barkley are viewed as being quite old. This is hard to accept until you understood that the average lifespan in 1937 was about 62. So, an updated version would have to have the old couple be in their 80s. The picture quality and sound on the Criterion Collection DVD are remarkably good.Be aware that Orson Welles called this the saddest movie he had ever seen.