"GRAPES OF WRATH" UNSTOPPABLE VINTAGE

          Henry Fonda's career-defining role as Tom Joad, star of literary legend John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath, as interpreted by cinematic legend John Ford.
          The 1940 two-time Oscar-winning masterpiece from the director most associated with Westerns is fantastically shot in black and white showing the most beautiful kind of ugly.
          At the start of the story Tom Joad returns to his folks' house after a four-year stint in the pen for homicide. However, in that time everything has changed. Weather conditions and bank regulations forcing the Dustbowl Migration, the Joad family has pulled up old roots in Oklahoma to start life over in California with the promise of picking that sweet bringer of wine, the grape.
          Featuring Jane Darwell in her Oscar-winning performance as the sturdy, decent, and enduring matriarch, Ma Joad. (Years later she plays the Bird Woman in Mary Poppins.) Also co-starring John Carradine as the preacher who says, "Maybe there ain't no sin and there ain't no justice, it's just what people does."
          The language alone is enough to merit viewing. When Fonda gets a ride hitch-hiking, he says he'd a walked 'er but his dogs were pooped-out. Later, regarding the homicide, he says he knocked the other guy's head "plum to squash." And of Ma, Tom admits, "I nearly seen her beat a peddler to death with a live chicken."
          An impactful theme of the film: You can't trust authority when it swings a stick. (But a live chicken works fine.) This refers specifically to the abuses done to migrant workers. As is noted in the film, if someone can "get a fight goin', they can call in the cops, say things ain't orderly."
          Another important aspect of the film is the way it shows how government can be used by the people, and with genuine decency. Government housing from the Department of Agriculture, for example.
          One thing about the Joads, they're tough. They have nothing, but still help others when they can. And when their overpacked truck gets a flat, the kids just laugh. The Joads get a lot out of life with what little they've got, and they're a better kind of people than the ones who try to take advantage of them.
          The Grapes of Wrath is largely about the rich creating and abusing the poor, but it's also about people being human and decent.
          As pertinent now as it was when released, if not more so, The Grapes of Wrath is one of the few movies that belongs to everyone, and should be seen by all.
          Freely available online.


THE GRAPES OF WRATH
Starring Henry Fonda,
Jane Darwell,
John Carradine,
Charley Grapewin,
Russell Simpson,
Dorris Bowdon
Directed by John Ford
Written by Nunnally Johnson
Based on the novel by John Steinbeck
Runtime 129 minutes


Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
and 
TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE

SWEDISH BESTSELLER TURNS TOP-NOTCH FILM

          Hunt this one down.
          Unlikely title, unlikely poster, unlikely everything aside, A Man Called Ove (2015) is exactly the reason why film is an art.
          Based on Fredrik Backman's hit novel, Hannes Holm's adaptation is the amusing tale of a grumpy old man who wants to commit suicide. What makes it funny is that when he tries to do it, things keep happening that make him have to stop and grumpily help other people. Because they don't know how to do things right.
          Other people such as: the new neighbors Patrick and Parvaneh (Pars). The latter, who has two young daughters, is from Iran. (Here Backman, who is himself married to a woman from Iran, draws on personal experience.)
          For many viewers the description which best fits Ove will automatically call to mind the movie Grumpy Old Men (1993), starring Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau. This is not that movie. Marbled in equal parts with the humor is the drama of how Ove became embittered.
          Through periodic flashbacks we come to understand the course of his life. His mother died when he was a boy, and so his father raised him alone. Most movies that deal with parental relationships focus on one parent only. Nor does this film buck that trend.
          In a similar arbitrary choice, Ove is the sort of Swede who has decided to bestow undying affection for all Saab vehicles, and to feel the opposite toward all other car companies and all other cars, especially Volvo. This is because the character of Ove (sounds like "Oo-va" and means "blade" in Old Norse) is such an exacting fellow. Before anyone can sit in his car, he has to spread out newspapers over the seats in order to protect them. However, when trying to kill himself in his living room, he doesn't think to close the drapes. And can therefore be easily seen and interrupted.
          Rolf Lassgard's performance in particular merits note. He brings a lot of life to Ove, especially when grieving over his late wife, Sonja (Engvoll), whose grave he often visits. He spends most of his time fussing around his small neighborhood playing self-appointed enforcer of rules, picking up cigarette butts from the sidewalk, making certain that gates are properly shut, and generally going ballistic when he sees people driving where they shouldn't.
          In spite of this busy schedule he maintains, and in spite of his intractable demeanor, Ove develops an unlikely friendship with Parvaneh. And it is on this friendship that the story hinges.
          Tom Hanks, by the way, according to information found online, is looking into making and starring in an American version of the movie.
          Heartwarming but not sentimental, A Man Called Ove is a great little gem available through Netflix, Amazon, and wherever fine videos are sold.


A MAN CALLED OVE
Starring Rolf Lassgard,
Bahar Pars,
Filip Berg,
Ida Engvoll,
Tobias Almborg,
Chatarina Larsson,
Johan Widerberg
Written and directed by Hannes Holm
Based on the novel by Fredrik Backman
Runtime 116 minutes
Rated PG-13


Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
and
TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE
and hosts
FILM FOCUS
on
LAGRANDEALIVETV

"CHUCK BERRY LIVE" HIGHLY ROCKOMMENDED

          London, BBC Theatre, 1972:
          Wearing a snazzy psychedelic shirt with huge pointed collar, tremendous ruffles at the cuffs, and the purple bell bottoms of the gods, Chuck Berry rocks it his way, a true American original doing his inimitable and incalculably influential rock n' roll thing in front of an appreciative audience of English teens.
          The showmanship, the charisma, the physicality, the style of one of rock's few true first greats is on display for all to enjoy. Long and lean, sporting trademark sideburns, slicked-back hair, and tiny mustache, Berry delivers flawless verbal gymnastics, changing up and somewhat updating his staples, notably "Reelin' and Rockin'".
          It's easy to see now that Berry was at the top of his game eighteen years into his career. He does the duck walk, yes, but more impressive than that he does the splits, and hops around, still playing guitar.
          Included in his dynamic, fluid performance, Berry plucks terrifically with his guitar up on his shoulder against his neck. With his easygoing energetic style, it's easy to see why Chuck Berry so impressed and influenced the Rolling Stones' Keith Richards and countless others.
          Incidentally, 1987's concert film/documentary Hail! Hail! Rock 'n Roll shows some interesting moments between Keith and Chuck rehearsing together for the occasion of Chuck's 60th birthday. Berry had a temper. And Richards has said in multiple interviews that when he couldn't resist picking up and holding his idol's guitar, his idol caught him doing it and punched him in the face.
          A checkered past did little for polishing Berry's image, but, that also being the image of rock, not taking a polish arguably enhances the shine. Incredibly, two of his greatest contemporaries, Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard, still perform, as indeed did Berry himself until his passing just a couple years ago.
          It speaks to his talent as an artist that he was able to adapt as well as he did, psychedelia not being part of early rock, and he changes the songs so they don't sound locked into antiquity, but remain malleable and alive.
          In terms of his band, Rocking Horse, the members of which remain essentially faceless, the guy in the big hat with the long hair on piano--improbable as it sounds--does seem to rather clearly prove that Johnny Depp time-traveled. Which is bizarre because we didn't know he played piano.
          Preceded by Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters recording sessions of their own in London, Chuck Berry's performance captures him at his peak.
          Check out Chuck belting "Johnny B. Goode", "Let it Rock", and plenty more for an hour and forty-six minutes of magic freely available on YouTube.



         

And speaking of YouTube, look for
Stewart Kirby's Film Focus 
on LaGrandeAlive.TV

Film Focus, the Sentinel of Cinema





Stewart Kirby writes for
THE INDEPENDENT
and
TWO RIVERS TRIBUNE