| Genre: | Classics |
| Year: | 1940 |
| Rating: | ? |
| Length: | 129 min. |
| Country: | USA |
| Cast: | Heny Fonda, Jane Darwell, and John Carradine |
| Credits: | Directed by John Ford (bw, 35mm) |
Synopsis: As Woody Guthrie pointed out, Ford's Grapes of Wrath concentrates on inhoate struggles of the evicted dust bouwl victims to produce a leader. Pa Joad, Ma Joad, and Preacher Casey each try to lead, but each has weaknesses. Only the slow simplicity and strenght of Tom Joad, convincingly played by Henry Fonda, is adequate to the task. He comes to lead not because he responds to a revolutionary rhetoric, but through the daily experience of dust, hunger, brutality, and exploitation. Ford tells the story with genuine artistry. he does not blurt out his message, but lets it come across in close-ups of faces, and in long shots of the desolate countryside and the murky interiors with only outlines of faces visible. There are no great swelling musical passages, only bits of a song or a tinny instrument at a camp.
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