| The Grapes of Wrath
(1940, 128 min.) Directed by John Ford Screenplay by Nunnally Johnson, based on a novel by John Steinbeck
The film's road trip is a spiritual journey for the film's three main characters - Tom Joad, Ma Joad, and the Rev. Jim Casy. They confront unbelievable human tragedy at the hands of nature, which becomes horror in the hands of other humans. Tom, Ma and Jim must each decide how to respond.
Film Essay by Charles B. Slocum. Mr. Slocum has worked in the entertainment industry for almost 20 years in a variety of financial and strategy positions,most recently as Director of Strategic Planning for the Writers Guild of America. Prior to the Guild, Charles worked for Paramount Pictures in television finance, for NBC as a game show judge, and for ABC in audience research. Charles has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and a B.S. in Public Communications from the Newhouse School at Syracuse University Discussion Panelists: Michael Badalucco, Rosalinda Guillen, Peter Malone, msh The Grapes of Wrath Screening
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The
Battle Hymn of the Republic appears inside the cover of the first edition
of The Grapes of Wrath. Steinbeck's artistic nod imposes the
full weight of God's necessary wrath on the Joad family journey.
Only the light of the wrenching civil war that almost fractured one nation
under God could pierce the darkness of the dust bowl depression years.
This deep well of meaning invests the novel, and the film based upon it,
with enduring gravity.
The
story addresses its difficult questions in Christian terms - with figures
of Christ and Moses found by many of the film's interpreters. This
is no allegory, though; the characters are far too human. What's
more, the theology of the film is far from orthodox. It is left to
the viewer to square Jim's sacrifice, Tom's vigilance and Ma's endurance
with the Sunday Sermon at Church. Steinbeck's rejection of the priorities
of capitalism displayed a politics that would have others testifying before
Congress a decade and a half later. The journey through those issues
is one we have yet to complete.