Word: banke
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Recently the Greek government deposited in Kalavryta's bank 230 million drachmas (about $250,000). Also in the town was a heavy shipment of U.S. food parcels. The Communist guerrillas, from their spies, heard about this loot...
Fifty townspeople had run away. Last week 30 of them came back to find all the money and food gone (except for a few hidden loaves of bread); the bank, the police station and the post office burned to the ground...
...called a handful of others, all former Government administrators: Dr. Calvin Hoover, dean of the Graduate School of Duke University; Richard Bissell, professor of economics at M.I.T.; Dr. Edward Mason, professor of economics at Harvard; Wayne Chatfield Taylor, onetime president of the Export-Import Bank. They said they would rally around. That was Wednesday morning. Bellboys were bringing so many telegrams to Hoffman's ninth floor Statler suite, costing Hoffman so many quarter tips, that he finally ordered all wires held at the desk until they could be brought up in bundles...
...real thing --and so it is presented. The plot closely approaches soap-opera funny business in places, but any hokum is carefully avoided by careful character delineation and a constant vote of the ridiculous. It is hard to believe that the family would remain convinced that Mama's imaginary bank account was real; but acceptance of this anyth is so credibly presented that it isn't questioned. Well selected close-ups of the children's faces enhance the authority of Mama; and her parental fast-ones are soon accepted as bona fide gospel...
...story is essentially Mama's courageous fight to bring up her kids, keep down her relatives, and make the money go around. Her fictitious bank account is a comforting (if non-existent) reserve, and next to Mama, the Bank is the most wonderful thing in life. Uncle is also wonderful (well-played by Oscar Homolka) for he tells off all the persnickety aunts; but he's somewhat terrifying and always drunk...