Although there are several references to Miss Dove saving town from long ago bank failure, the actual flashback sequence to this incident was very puzzling and didn't begin to suggest how she'd rescued town from fiscal ruin.
Miss Dove simply cuts to front of line to make a deposit (a real stretch right there, when everyone in town is apparently in throes of financial hysteria), then wastes a few minutes by making chitchat and pretending pens don't write until 3 o'clock, when bank must close for the day. So what was to prevent rest of town from showing up to withdraw their money early next morning? As presented makes no sense, unless there was originally more to sequence that was edited out for whatever reason.
Also, hard to swallow the suggestion that citizens were somehow brought to their senses by seeing her show faith in the system by making a meager deposit. Up until the end of the movie, seems like most of the townfolk didn't even like her (everyone refers to her as "the terrible Miss Dove") or, at best, put up with her with begrudging respect.
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betsyh
15 years ago
Thanks to those who clarified the scene - that Miss Dove "filibusterd" until the bank's closing time and kept others from pulling their money out. I see I was mis-remembering there.
As to why that helped the bank? Well, in 1933 Roosevelt closed all the nation's banks for a four day bank holiday. I'm guessing that was to start the next day? Or else the theory was that the town's people had overnight to come to their senses.
This film was never meant to be anything but warm and fuzzy, nostalgia of a small town life that never really existed - very much like "It's a Wonderful Life", et al.
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miriamwebster
15 years ago
That particular scene was indeed "fuzzy"--but hardly "warm"--more like "half-baked." Realize this is stretching the point, but all she did was cut to the front of the line and waste two or three minutes during which time someone else would otherwise have yanked funds from bank; bank would have closed for the day anyway and people behind that person would still have wanted to get their own money out. Am I only one who expects movies to make even a modicum of logical sense?
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Wakanohana
15 years ago
I just finished watching the movie on TCM. While I don't think the bank president ever stated it explicitly, the fellow Miss Dove cut in front of had asked to withdraw his entire balance of $6700 or so, and it was my impression that the bank did not have that much cash.
So it is possible that those few minutes of "dithering" were enough to keep the bank solvent until the panic had passed.
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Fleur_de_lis
15 years ago
Of course they didn't have the cash. That's why there were runs. The woman saves them by forcing them past the 3pm closing town she had "saved" the town. It was never really explained beyond that scene and the offhand remarks made by the bank man from the rotary, but the implication is that enough people calmed down to save them from a repeat run.
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lm362
9 years ago
Movies should make sense and this movie does. Why do you assume that anyone would want to take their money out the next day? Maybe they would see her putting her money in the bank and believe they should keep their money in there, too. This scene ask the viewer to believe that people would be doing the right thing, which would be to leave their money in the bank.
Remember the bank run scene in It's a Wonderful Life where Jimmy Stewart asked people to take out only what they needed? Was the reaction of the townspeople realistic? Probably not, but that scene showed people doing what was right and not acting greedy or afraid, but having faith in what Jimmy Stewart's character told them. It and the bank scene in Good Morning, Miss Dove shows what people should do.
When I see the bank scene I think people felt that if she could trust her money at that bank then they could, too.
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