James Stewart: Screen Legend Collection

There's a risk in issuing star-driven collections of vintage movies labeled “classic” or “legend”: at some point you exhaust the supply of truly fine films and are compelled to fall back on relatively mundane efforts that are neither classics nor legendary. Universal Home Entertainment has reached that point with this five-film compilation starring James Stewart, the much beloved Everyman of American cinema. Next Time We Love (1936), which finds newlyweds Stewart and Margaret Sullavan struggling to keep their marriage together when career choices force them apart, was considered sloppily sentimental even upon its initial theatrical release. You Gotta Stay Happy (1948), an alleged screwball comedy featuring Stewart as a levelheaded pilot who tames ditzy heiress Joan Fontaine, is justly forgotten. The somewhat better Thunder Bay (1953) teams Jimmy with Dan Duryea in a semi-exciting but formulaic tale pitting Louisiana-based oil wildcatters against hostile Cajun fishermen. Shenandoah (1965) stars Stewart as an amiable Virginia patriarch who tries to remain neutral during the Civil War but is forced to take a stand when Union soldiers imprison his youngest son. The best movie in this extra-less three-disc collection is The Glenn Miller Story (1954), a largely fictitious biopic that features a topnotch Stewart performance and lots of terrific big-band music from the 1930s and ‘40s, but it's also available separately on DVD. Optional. (E. Hulse)