So grotesque it verges on the operatic, The Way of the Strong, written by William Counselman and Peter Milne, was described by Columbia as the story of “the world ugliest man, who can bear anything except the sign of his own face in a mirror”. Mitchell Lewis plays “Handsome” Williams, a hulking gangster whose misshapen face is criss- crossed with scars. The beauty underlying his brutish exterior is shown by his tenderness toward Nora (Alice Day), a blind violinist who works in his cafe and falls in love with him, thinking he is truly handsome. But when she realizes for the first time how he looks, she recoils. “Handsome” sacrifices her to a good-looking rival, then shoots himself in the head as he drives his roadster into the sea. Of the many suicide attempts in Capra films, this succeed (the other is is The Bitter Tea of General Yen), and it is a particularly startling ending for a supposedly “optimistic” director.

Joseph McBride, Frank Capra: The Catastrophe of Success, Simon & Schuster, New York 1992 (revised edition, St Martin’s Griffin, New York 2000)