Casy: I wouldn't pray just for a old man that's dead, 'cause he's all right. If I was to pray, I'd pray for folks that's alive and don't know which way to turn. The Grapes of Wrath is very much the classic I was expecting. It is probably the best example of the human struggle to better one's life. The story is one of
the most known, as most read it before their out of high school. It's setting is the depression era dust bowl. There's a lot of bad going on and not a whole lot of good. Everyone struggles to find work so that they can feed their families. But work isn't easy to come by. Watching The Grapes of Wrath now, during this economic climate is rather sobering.The story follows one family, the Joad family. Tom has just been released from prison and makes it home just in time; right before his family was to set off from their land. They have lived in Oklahoma all their life, but the land is turning a profit or any crops and the government is taking it away from them. So the Joad's decide to do what everyone else is doing, and head for California in hope of finding the land they were promised. Handbills don't always tell the exact truth though. California is just as much a struggle as Oklahoma.This is only the second John Ford film I have seen, but I'm already seeing why he is so highly regarded. He captures the hardship of the depression like no film I've seen. He does it extremely well, but also never overplays it. He let's the Joad family speak for themselves. Their hungry, their tired, and their poor. Something else Ford does really well is showing the different ends of the spectrum, when it comes to people helping people. Their are always people that will help and their are always people that will exploit. In one scene the Joad's go into a diner and the workers there give them food at a discounted cost because they see how hard they got it. Then when they actually get work, all the employers are just exploiting how poor the workers are. Grapes of Wrath is often regarded as one of the best American films ever. It's a movie that everyone knows about and it's influence is just about everywhere. It's one of those movies that everyone almost has to see before they die; a true classic in every sense of the word.
January 28, 2012
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