THE HUMAN COMEDY (1943) Mick at his mushiest

88-year old Mickey Rooney, who in 2008 still wears his baby face from the '30s and '40s, was always good – but never mushingly better than in THE HUMAN COMEDY. Sappy and preachy but exceptionally moving, it presents a slice-of-idealized life during World War II, via many subplots, about a small-town family awaiting the return of their eldest soldier-son (Van Johnson, cast in so many war flicks that he deserved a Purple Heart). Everyone in the star-filled cast is fine, but Mick’s coming-of-age role as Homer Macauley steals the show and in fact earned him a second Oscar nomination. Also look for him as the definitive Puck, the part he was born to play, in MGM's MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM (1935).