Friendly Persuasion

Friendly Persuasion (1956) starring Gary Cooper, Dorothy McGuire, Anthony Perkins. A pacifist Quaker family, living in southern Indiana during the Civil War, struggles to maintain ideals while under threat of attack by Rebel raiders. Surprisingly, the war section of the movie occupies only a fraction of the screen time; much of the rest of the film is filled with comic vignettes from the lives of the main characters. Cooper stars as Jess Birdwell, the patriarch of the family, and McGuire plays his minister wife, who tries to restrain her son Josh (Perkins) from going off to fight the Rebels. The film starts slowly but builds momentum until the final action scenes put an exclamation point on the story. Very entertaining, well acted, and ultimately moving. (English subtitles are available for the hearing-impaired.) Grade: B+