History Film / TheMagnificentAmbersons

* BittersweetEnding: Isabelle is dead, and she and Eugene never married. George has been brought low enough to work for meager wages, and then he's injured in an automobile accident. The Ambersons are broke. But there's an implication that Lucy and George might get together after all, and Eugene takes some comfort in believing that Isabelle's spirit is with them and knows about his reconciliation with George.[[note]]This ending is lifted straight from the book.[[/note]]
** The somewhat happier note with the scene in the hospital hallway was the principal addition that lightened Welles' DownerEnding, which was more bleak, with Fanny alone in a boardinghouse and a final meeting with Eugene reminding her of what she'd lost. Storyboards and the film's cutting continuity show the scene.

* VideoCredits: Not only video credits, but narrated video credits, with Welles reading off the names of each actor and who they played in the movie. The credits end with Welles reading off his own credit over a shot of a microphone.[[note]]The mandatory copyright statement, [=IATSE=] union label, [=RCA=] sound system logo, [[UsefulNotes/TheHaysCode Hays Code]] seal, and ThisIsAWorkOfFiction disclaimer were all stuffed into RKO's stock TheEnd card.[[/note]]

%%* OldMaid: Fanny due to her crush on Eugene.

* RomanticismVersusEnlightenment: It's really hard to gauge where the film fits. The Ambersons typify an old world of spoilt decadence and snobbishness, while Eugene Morgan represents the modern industrious spirit. George Amberson Minafer is a {{Jerkass}} while Morgan is a nice guy. More importantly, Eugene Morgan is himself pretty skeptical if the automobiles he's building is going to bring progress:

* OedipusComplex: Isabel and George ALL. DAY. LONG.

* OldMaid: Fanny, mixed with UnrequitedTragicMaiden due to her crush on Eugene.

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by Creator/OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars Creator/JosephCotten, Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), Creator/AnneBaxter, Tim Holt, Creator/AgnesMoorehead, and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by Creator/OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars Creator/JosephCotten, Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Creator/AgnesMoorehead, and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].

* VideoCredits: Not only video credits, but narrated video credits, with Welles reading off the names of each actor and who they played in the movie. The credits end with Welles reading off his own credit over a shot of a microphone.

* AdaptedOut: Both Welles and the revised ending of the studios change the ending of the books: i.e. the events leading up to Eugene's visit to George at the hospital. A visit to a medium where Eugene actually interacts with the spirit of Isabelle. Welles and even the studio saw it as a clumsy DeusExMachina that went against the spirit of the story, and saw fit to change it, albeit to different ends.

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by Creator/OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars Creator/JosephCotten, Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead, and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars Creator/JosephCotten, Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead, and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].

-->'''[[OrsonWelles Narrator]]:''' The magnificence of the Ambersons began in 1873. Their splendor lasted throughout all the years that saw their Midland town spread and darken into a city. In that town in those days, all the women who wore silk or velvet knew all the other women who wore silk or velvet and everybody knew everybody else's family horse and carriage. The only public conveyance was the streetcar. A lady could whistle to it from an upstairs window, and the car would halt at once, and wait for her, while she shut the window ... put on her hat and coat ... went downstairs... found an umbrella... told the 'girl' what to have for dinner...and came forth from the house. Too slow for us nowadays, because the faster we're carried, the less time we have to spare.

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars Joseph Cotten, Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead, and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].

* LostForever: A good chunk of this movie was edited and thrown away by producers while Welles was abroad.

Creator/RobertWise, later a great director himself, did the editing as well as directing the reshoots mandated by RKO.

!!This film provides examples of:

** The somewhat happier note with the scene in the hospital hallway was the principal addition that lightened Welles' DownerEnding, which was more bleak, with Fanny alone in a boardinghouse and a final meeting with Eugene reminding her of what she'd lost. (Although this was changed from the book, so it was probably for the best.)

* BittersweetEnding: Isabelle is dead, and she and Eugene never married. George has been brought low enough to work for meager wages, and then he's injured in an automobile accident. The Ambersons are broke. But there's an implication that Lucy and George might get together after all, and Eugene takes some comfort in believing that Isabelle's spirit is with them and knows about his reconciliation with George.
** The somewhat happier note with the scene in the hospital hallway was the principal addition that lightened Welles' DownerEnding, which was more bleak, with Fanny alone in a boardinghouse and a final meeting with Eugene reminding her of what she'd lost.

''The Magnificent Ambersons'' is a [[TheForties 1942]] U.S. PeriodDrama, the second feature film produced and directed by OrsonWelles. Welles adapted Booth Tarkington’s Pulitzer Prize-winning 1918 novel, about the declining fortunes of a proud Midwestern family and the social changes brought by the automobile age. The film stars [[Film/CitizenKane Joseph]] [[Film/TheThirdMan Cotton]], Dolores Costello (Creator/DrewBarrymore's grandma!), [[Film/AllAboutEve Anne Baxter]], Tim Holt, [[Film/CitizenKane Agnes Moorehead]], and Ray Collins, with [[TheNarrator Welles providing the narration]].