CheerupSilver Very Cool!!!

Huievest Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Helloturia I have absolutely never seen anything like this movie before. You have to see this movie.

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

daris3 My parents took me to see this movie when I was 6. All I remembered was that the old man was a lovable, kind person who counterfeited one dollar bills to help others. For 20 years he produced only a handful of bills each year, often spending the money on the kids in the neighborhood. The title comes from the fact that all the serial numbers end in 880. I remember being so sad at the end. For years I talked about this movie without remembering the title. No one seemed to have seen it. Now, 60 years later, I know the title and have had the opportunity to see and enjoy it again. Knowing the title, I can now purchase a copy to enjoy over and over. Having just seen it 15 minutes ago I am still teared up. The ending is very emotional and speaks to the goodness in people's hearts.

Irie212 I realize that 9 is an incredibly high rating, but I stand behind it. It's also high given that I was ready to bail after the first three minutes of this film-- blatant pro-Secret Service propaganda, complete with a stentorian voice-over. But then the characters show up: Burt Lancaster at his most charming, Edmund Gwenn doing his peerless benevolent eccentric, and a positively luminous Dorothy McGuire, exuding intelligence, wit, and gutsiness.The title comes from the case file number (880) of a real-life counterfeiter—Emerich Juettner, ,a.k.a. Edward Mueller. The feds gained such respect that they called him Mr. 880—and his story deserves a film. Mueller (called "Skipper" and played by Gwenn) did indeed live in New York as a small-time counterfeiter who, amazingly, was as incompetent at etching a passable $1 bill ("George Wahsington") as he was competent at passing his queer money without detection for 10 years (1938-48).The addition of Lancaster's and McGuire's roles is pure poetic license, but their duo only enhances the story because of the clever interlocking structure of the plot, and the often crackling dialog between them and with others, notably the wry and dry Millard Mitchell.The hackneyed old phrase applies—I laughed (or at least smiled frequently), I cried (got teary-eyed once or twice), I got caught up in it. The point at which Burt and the feds are closing in on the dear old paperhanger, and McGuire is in a moral quandary about whether to help them or protect him, is so well done that it generated the same quandary in me—what would I have done?? It's a question I couldn't answer, and one that increased the tension that built to the courtroom scene and denouement."Mister 880" needs to be seen, right through to the end, which I won't spoil. But I will add a marvelous coda: Ultimately, the real Mr. 880, Juettner, made more money from this film than he did from a decade of counterfeiting—though of course, if he hadn't counterfeited there wouldn't have been a movie to profit from. So we get both poetic license and poetic justice.

bkoganbing Burt Lancaster was always one who took firm control of his career. He got out of the studio system very early in Hollywood and was always the one who called his own shots. I'm guessing that he probably owed someone a favor which is why he did Mister 880.It's not that Mister 880 is a bad film, but it's most definitely not a Burt Lancaster project. Burt and leading lady Dorothy McGuire play a definite second fiddle to Edmund Gwenn as the whimsical old neighborhood character who does some counterfeiting on the side when he runs short of money.The title stems from the number on his file with the United States Secret Service. Mister 880 isn't even that good a counterfeiter, but his case has been put on the agency back burner for years while they assign top priority to organized gangs of counterfeiters. Gwenn does his work on cheap office supply paper with a hand press. He even spells Washington wrong on the one dollar bills he prints. And he's been getting away with it for years because of the small denominations.McGuire comes to Lancaster's attention as she gets stuck with one of Gwenn's phonies. He's the agent who the New York office finally decided to assign to the 880 case. Of course the usual romantic complications get in the way of the case, but not forever.Edmund Gwenn is one of those delightful character actors you cannot help but like. His charm is infectious, never more so than when he won that Oscar for Miracle on 34th Street. His character of the Skipper is in the same vein as Kris Kringle in Miracle on 34th Street. Who could not like Edmund Gwenn and therefore who could not like Mister 880.

Ishallwearpurple When I first saw this in 1950 I just loved "the Skipper" and every time I watch it, as I did yesterday, I fall again. A very good actor who just melts your heart in his characterizations.Burt Lancaster as the Agent trying to solve an old case that has bugged the Secret Service for a decade; and Dorothy McGuire as the U.N. interpreter caught up in the investigation are fine. When they are in the restaurant purring at each other, while saying serious things about the case, it is a wonderful scene. Fine direction and acting.I watch it as the beginning of my holiday "classic" film month. Nothing to do with Christmas, Thanksgiving or New Years. But it does end with the music to Auld Lang Sang playing in the background and the spirit is that of a holiday movie. A treat and I give it 9/10.Jane