Help me identify this film from the John Lewis advert?

[BOFster]

It's driving me crazy

Here's a link to the John Lewis advert- take a look at the old movie showing on the television at 1 minute in, please.

Everybody thinks it's from It's A Wonderful Life, the embrace you can see at 3:21 in this clip:

But it really really isn't.

Hooray. Classics.
Such a lovely thread for a wet Sunday afternoon

Thank you Amy

I'm still laughing to myself about midget car racing and at Sir Noel

i LOVE mimsy's film producers and i expect that's not far at all from the truth

i'm not disappointed with the real answer - it had to be something like that if they hadn't created it themselves, and it's been the catalyst for a great thread and distracted me from the penguin sex trafficking in the advert

apologies if this is old news, but did anyone else see the JL ad / babadook trailer mashup ?

darcey bussell did a recreation of some classic hollywood dances and iirc found it very difficult to get the right dress for cheek to cheek

Oh yes you made it to classics!

Somebody just posted this on Facebook - I'm sure we'll all get 12/12

www.quizfreak.com/can-you-name-these-12-famous-actors-from-the-1940s/index1.html

I got 11 out of 12. They were mainly easy ones though I think.

Full marks here

12/12. I owe it all to John Lewis

I've let the team down.

Me too Coumarin. 11/12

I refuse to watch westerns to fill the gap in my knowledge, though.

I couldn't get past the title having 1940s with the superfluous apostrophe.

just kidding. I got 12/12

Phew. What would a pedant do if they didn't?

I dream of a misty future where there are no superfluous apostrophes. It's beautiful there, and I am happy.

Or mis-identified actors?

Shall I just correct myself? Is it making you irritable?

Arsenic I think I failed on a Westerns actor too. They were the background soundtrack to my childhood Sundays. I refuse to watch them willingly as an adult.

Just make sure you have a spare 14 minutes and 33 seconds to enjoy it. I would be tragic to miss a second of it.

The teeny-tiny size of some of those women's waists is

I could watch that all day.

12/12 here too. Given that DH and I bonded over obscure B&W films of the 30's and 40's, I'd have been mortified to score anything less! (Especially since none of those actors is obscure...).

Anyway, delighted there's an answer and that it's not a mock-up; this has been a great thread.

Just don't get me started on the actual JL ad and the very disturbing expression on the mother's face as she watches the boy playing with the penguin toys. Maybe it's just me, but it seems to have a whole other, sinister, subtext going on

Did we find out the answer then? Please don't make me read the entire thread!

sorry jayne, you have to. it's a rite of passage

The answer doesn't matter that much.
The fact that there is an answer does.

I literally cannot tell you how much I have enjoyed this thread. So much so that I'm making a list of b&w films right this minute.

jayne It was a real film called Born To Speed

I got 11/12. I thought I knew what Rex Harrison looks like, apparently not. I wasn't sure about Gary Cooper either.

That was a very young Gary Cooper picture, wasn't it?

No idea, he's never really registered on my radar like Henry Fonda, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, Paul Newman, and Gregory Peck and others.

I probably mainly think of him in High Noon.