Gotcha beat, the only parts of "It's a Wonderful Life" I've seen are the occassional clips that wind up in random movies like "The Ref". So I've never really watched even part of the movie itself without some sort of extra layer of protection. Never understood what anybody sees in the movie, looks annoyingly soppy.
I've seen the movie quite a few times, and what I find fascinating about it is the way I pick up on a couple of new, subtle things in the movie every time. I'm convinced it's one of the best movies ever made, because of the underlying themes, historic context, mythical "Everyplace, USA" setting, etc. The character development in that movie is exceptional -- especially when you see how the personalities of some characters change dramatically in the two different settings (the "real" world, and the world in which George Bailey was never born). And some of the filmmaking techniques were novel at the time -- like the key turning points in the movie where George freezes in his tracks and the camera zooms in on his face to reinforce the importance of the moment.
Don't feel bad about not liking the movie, though. It was apparently not a very big box office draw back when it was released in the 1940s.