Word: joads
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Because the picture deals with everyday U. S. types, casting was all-important. Key character was Ma Joad (Jane Darwell). If she was wrong, the picture could never be in focus. She is magnificent. Russell Simpson is owlish Pa Joad. He is also a million men who plough, seed and harvest U. S. farms. Only star used was Henry Fonda (Tom Joad). For him the part was a throwback to one of his best roles, the young lineman in Slim. Others like John Carradine, Charley Grapewin, Zeffie Tilbury, John Qualen, Eddie Quillan, Frank Darien have played minor roles in pictures...
...people die on the march. There are great simple moments like the burial of Grandpa (Charley Grapewin). Wisely Nunnally Johnson has retained only the bare bones of dialogue from the novel. So the burial scene is terser, more moving in picture than in book. High point is still Tom Joad's quiet rebuke when the irreligious Preacher (John Carradine) does not want to speak at the grave: "Ain't none of our folks ever been buried without a few words." There is the note Tom Joad writes to bury with the body: "This here is William James Joad...
...central figures are the large Joad family, Oklahoma sharecroppers, who lose their 40-acre farm to the bankers, sell their possessions for $18 to gyp agents, buy an ancient jalopy for $75 from racketeers, head out on Highway 66 for the land of plenty promised in a come-on California handbill. With them - the 13th passenger -goes lanky, philosophizing Preacher Casy, hillbilly Moses turned rustic socialist. Hero of the Joads is tall, homely son Tom, a paroled convict. Heroine is Ma Joad, strong, patient, dreaming of "a white house with oranges growin' around...
...pleasant period in a Government camp, a self-governing oasis unloved by big absentee growers. Before the season is out, Rose of Sharon's young husband has deserted, her baby is born dead in a filthy tent, Tom is in hiding for killing a vigilante. But Ma Joad says: "We ain't gonna die out. People is goin' on-changin' a little, maybe, but goin' right...
Despite these scarehead advance notices, the Freethinkers' meeting resulted in no rows, attracted 900 people, deist or otherwise, who felt in safe enough company with such speakers and endorsers of the congress as H. G. Wells, Sigmund Freud, Havelock Ellis, George Bernard Shaw, C. E. M. Joad. G. D. H. Cole, J. B. S. Haldane, Bertrand Russell, Edouard Herriot, Somerset Maugham. Typical subjects for discussion at the meetings: Science and the Churches; Youth, the Schools and Free Thought; Present Religions Reaction and the Menace of the Vatican...