Grapes of Wrath

Henry Fonda plays Tom Joad in this black and white movie. There is something both nostalgic and haunting about black and white photography. The scenes in the Joad's old homestead are extraordinary in their beauty yet they convey a sense of abandonment and of a past that has gone forever foretelling what will lie ahead for Tom, Casey and the Joad family.

While it is known that Steinbeck consulted on the screenplay it was a pity, though probably in keeping with the times, that the continuity does not always make sense. Characters just disappear, chunks of the book are left out and one wonders why so many of the scenes were so obviously set against immovable backdrops. This affected the sound so that one felt one was at the theatre as the voices sort of echoed. The film ends with one of Ma Joad's long monologues of homespun philosphy rather than with the uniquely poignant and, to me anyway, life-affirming scenes in all literature. Monologues with their intense focus on one person's face are almost unknown in modern films (Hunger is a recent exception and much was made of the dialogue in that film) and black and white filming lends itself to this well. The character cannot escape our scrutiny, we see every line and wrinkle, every twitch and twinkle in their eye - perhaps film actors today would prefer us not to see so much? We enjoyed that.

The book can be read in two ways, either all the way through (a lot of pages indeed) or alternate chapters which contain the story with the intervening ones being commentary on the state of society, politics, history and the ruthlessness and also desperation of people when nature turns against them.

Steinbeck does not, unlike many American authors, bring in religion at all. Indeed it is noticeable that the family do not say grace, nor read from the Bible when they bury grandpa, and Casey's loss of faith may well mirror Steinbeck's - I don't know and guess I'll have to read up on that.

We talked long into the night and ended with Austrian Coffee Cake.