Roy Del Ruth - It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947)

It was remade in Bollywood twice… Pugree (1948) and Dil Daulat Duniya (1972).

It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947) is a comedy film directed by Roy Del Ruth and starring Victor Moore, Ann Harding, Don DeFore, Charles Ruggles, and Gale Storm. Herbert Clyde Lewis and Frederick Stephani were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Screenplay, but lost to Valentine Davies for another Christmas-themed story, Miracle on 34th Street.

PLOT:
Aloysius T. McKeever (Victor Moore), a drifter, takes up residence in a Fifth Avenue mansion that is boarded up whenever its owner, Michael J. O’Connor (Charles Ruggles), the world’s second-richest man, winters at his Virginia estate. McKeever eventually takes in former GI Jim Bullock (Don DeFore), who has been evicted from a building O’Connor is tearing down to build a new skyscraper, and then 18-year-old Trudy “Smith” (Gale Storm), who is actually O’Connor’s runaway daughter. Jim soon invites fellow soldiers Whitey (Alan Hale, Jr.), Hank (Edward Ryan), and their families to share the sprawling mansion when they can’t find their own place.

When Trudy meets her father, she tells him that she is in love with Jim. She has not told Jim who she really is because she wants to win his love without his wealth. She then persuades her father to pose as a homeless man named “Mike”. McKeever reluctantly takes Mike in, but treats him like a servant. When Mike has had enough, he gives Trudy 24 hours to get the squatters out. Trudy calls Palm Beach and enlists the help of her mother Mary (Ann Harding), who is divorced from Michael. Mary comes to New York and poses as another homeless man to join the other squatters. McKeever, sensing that Mary and Mike have feelings for each other, pushes them to get closer. Eventually, Mike tells Mary that he is a changed man and proposes to her. Mary accepts.

Jim comes up with the idea of converting an unused post-war military barracks into much-needed housing. McKeever persuades him to bid on a military camp in the New York suburbs. Jim and his friends raise money from hundreds of other ex-soldiers in the same situation. O’Connor also wants the property, and a bidding war ensues before O’Connor discovers who his competition is. In an attempt to get rid of his daughter’s suitor, he makes sure that the construction company Jim approaches for his conversion project rejects him and instead offers him a well-paying job in Bolivia, on the condition that he be single.

While celebrating Christmas Eve together, the residents are stopped by two police officers, but McKeever convinces them to let the families stay until after New Year’s. Jim then reveals that the camp has been sold to O’Connor and that he is considering the job offer in Bolivia, leading Trudy to break up with him. When Mary and Trudy discover how Mike has been manipulating the situation, Mary believes that he has not changed after all and that she and Trudy will leave for Florida. Shameful, Mike arranges a meeting with “O’Connor” for Jim and his partners, who are dubious but agree. At the meeting, Mike reveals his true identity and transfers ownership of the camp to them, on the condition that they not reveal his identity to McKeever.

That evening, everyone shares a New Year’s Eve dinner before restoring the house to how they found it. Mike, Mary, Trudy, and Jim bid McKeever farewell as he heads to the O’Connor estate in Virginia, still unaware of the truth. Mike tells Mary to remind her to nail the board into the back fence through which McKeever accesses his property, intending to bring McKeever in through the front door next winter.

It.Happened.on.Fifth.Avenue.1947.576p.BluRay.AAC.x264-HANDJOB.mkv

General
Container: Matroska
Runtime: 1h 54mn
Size: 3.13 GiB
DXVA: Compatible
Minimum settings: Met
Video
Codec: x264
Resolution: 790x576
Aspect ratio: 1.372
Frame rate: 23.976 fps
Bit rate: 3 672 kb/s
Audio
English 2.0ch AAC LC @ 224 kb/s

https://nitro.download/view/215EB45C698AECB/It.Happened.on.Fifth.Avenue.1947.576p.BluRay.AAC.x264-HANDJOB.mkv

Language(s): English
Subtitles: English