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The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Director: John Ford

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From Time Out Film Guide

This classic Ford film eclipses much of the action of John Steinbeck's well-known novel of the Oklahoma farmers' migration from the dustbowl to the California Eden during the Depression years. The Okies were unwelcome in California, of course; they threatened the jobs of the locals. The brutal police hassled and harassed them unmercifully. The migrants formed unions in self-defence and struck for decent fruit-picking wages. This inevitably multiplied the official violence. Ford's film, shot by Gregg Toland with magnificent, lyrical simplicity, captures the stark plainness of the migrants, stripped to a few possessions, left with innumerable relations and little hope.

Author: MH

Time Out Film Guide

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usman khawaja said...

Posted on Aug 11 2008 03:02 suffering defines human spirit of survival
steinbeck was giving a simple message -survival is for the fittest in any civilization whether democratic or fascist,here the oklahoma dustbowl is the land of dispossessed and their suffering is the message to the fulfillment of their broken dreams ,poverty can be a curse and it is restrictwed not only to africa but white american kids dying of kwashiorkor secondary to malnutrition.
ford gets the steinbeck message across with simplicity and the materialism is not crticised just observed as a reality while the people are evicted from ancestral homes and they die and starve on route 66.
the movie is sentimental ,emotional and intelligent all at the same time as human existence itself .
no body in hollywood today can even conceive much less execute this ode to the survival of the fittest in the land of oppurtunity with an underlying subtle satire but also a gentle tenderness for the dregs of humanity ,who are being persecuted as they are inferior in comparison to their peers .
the journey becomes a nightmare and a dream with a poetic pathos and it becomes art with a pulsating power as it is sincere and heartfelt .
steinbeck would be proud of ford's version and it still touches your soul ,as humanity and it's basic essential desires never get dated .
usman khawaja

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