The Good Earth

Film

Epic films

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Time Out says

'Who wants to see a picture about Chinese farmers?' asked LB Mayer of his production chief Irving Thalberg. Thalberg had asked the same question about a Civil War picture called Gone With the Wind. The answer in both cases was millions, but in the case of The Good Earth the reasons are quite bewildering. A kind of 'Lychees of Wrath', it's a typically lumbering, cautious, overblown Thalberg project, saved by Rainer's genuinely moving, Oscar-winning portrayal of Chinese peasantry, and by an immensely spectacular storm of locusts. Thalberg died during the production, and Mayer accorded him a special tribute on the credits, the only time that the name of the last tycoon appeared on a film. (From the novel by Pearl Buck.) ATu.

Author: ATu

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Release details

UK release:

1937

Duration:

138 mins

Cast and crew

Director:

Sidney Franklin

Cinematography:

Karl Freund

Cast:

Keye Luke, Tilly Losch, Jessie Ralph, Charley Grapewin, Walter Connolly, Luise Rainer, Paul Muni

Music:

Herbert Stothart

Art Director:

Cedric Gibbons

Screenwriter:

Claudine West, Tess Slesinger, Talbot Jennings

Producer:

Irving Thalberg

Editor:

Basil Wrangell

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Comments & ratings

Rated as: 0/5 (0 ratings)

  • This film is one of the great neglected classics. The plot is shamelessly melodramatic and none the worse for it. Genuinely gritty scenes of peasant life, morally ambiguous characters, stunning set pieces such as the plague of locusts and the most terrifying riot sequence outside Eisenstein. Imaginative, erotic, heartrending, spectacular and with the most restrained use of soundtrack music in any Hollywood movie. A gem.

    PETER BENEDICT Mon Jan 18 2010
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