Here's everything that happened to the Bailey Family, to Bedford Falls, and even to the world when George Bailey opted to not be a part of it. It's a Wonderful Lifewas neither the first nor the last film to inject the audience into what's better known as 'The Butterfly Effect,' but perhaps no other production has done so with such bittersweet respect to the lovely burdens of life.

With the fabric of his well-spent life in shambles, George can only watch as the world he felt so betrayed by crumbles without his existence. The warped reality of George's life overcomes him. RELATED: Best Christmas Movies Of All-Time Potter (Barrymore) – and as he prepares to commit suicide, he's granted this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

That being said, his selfless nature, by this point of the film, has landed him in a pretty terrible financial situation – 'you're worth more dead than alive,' sulks the town's greedy old hag Mr. Though it takes him a very long time, and perhaps the most surreal experience any man has had to endure to realize it, George Bailey's life, full of love and friendship, is as grand as one could ever wish for. The film follows what can only be regarded, as the title suggests, as a wonderful life: George's life. It stars James Stewart as Bailey (his first acting role since returning from a heroic tour in the armed forces), as well as Donna Reed, Lionel Barrymore, Thomas Mitchell, Henry Travers, and H.B. George Bailey, the main character in Frank Capra's 1946 film It's a Wonderful Life, is given what his guardian angel calls a great gift – the opportunity to see what the world would be like had he never been alive – but what exactly happened when George Bailey decided to never be born? Directed by Capra from a screenplay co-written by him, Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, It's a Wonderful Life has since become regarded as not only one of the most cherished holiday traditions, but among the greatest films of all time.

How long is it's a wonderful life