1940年，英国船只SS格伦凯恩号上的一众船员，正在为这艘船从西印度群岛到巴尔的摩再到英国的危险航行做准备。

In 1940, there are two John Ford pictures,THE GRAPES OF WRATH and THE LONG VOYAGE HOME, entering the Oscar race (with 7 and 6 nominations respectively including BEST PICTURE), the former won him the second of his unsurpassable record of 4 wins in BEST DIRECTOR category.

As of today, THE GRAPES OF WRATH has retained its renown as an irrefutable American classic, sourced from Nobel winner John Steinbeck’s seminal novel censuring the capitalistic exploitation to the have-nots, viz. the Depression-era displaced Oklahoman sharecroppers who are forced to leave their dust-ridden native lands to seek sustenance in the California, the land of honey and milk.

Their exodus is encapsulated by the Joads family, starting as a family of 12, they trundle a jalopy through various migrant camps, buffeted by hardship, maltreatment and bereavements. When they finally fetches up in a clean camp conspicuously organized by the ministry of agriculture, they cannot credit their luck. Ford and his scribe Nunnally Johnson dull the edge of Steinbeck’s stark depiction with a more sanguine prospect, a self-policing grassroots community can outfox the corrupted authority and downplay the “red scare” that is very prominent in the novel (anyone who dares to demand fair wage is gauged as a “red”?).

Viewed as a cracking poverty porn, THE GRAPES OF WRATH possesses that reassuring tact of resisting overplaying the story’s mawkish sentimentality, if your highest tolerance is famished kids begging for food, you’re in for an easy ride. Visually and sonically, it shows up Ford’s directorial sway and cinematographer Gregg Toland’s striking chiaroscuro ambience in the highest order, the murkiness of inequity revs up against the howling wind and shadow-scape.

Henry Fonda received his first Oscar nomination for his devoted portrayal of Tom Joad, the ex-con whose propensity for violence makes him an easy mark, and Fonda utilizes his four-squareness to max out great fortitude and curdled indignation, finally, his extraordinary application culminates in the crescendo where he speechifies Steinbeck’s hyperbolic manifesto of social justice with flying colors, the delivery’s virtuousness is so sweeping that even the most cynical mind could only be cowed by its eloquence and grandeur. By the same token, Jane Darwell, who plays the matronly Ma Joad, won an Oscar for her stirring, full-blown oratory that is often esteemed as the highest achievement of theatrics, her “we are the people” valediction is an irrefragable mood-boosting coda that hits the bull’s-eye.

But one must contend, a singularly exceptional John Carradine is left unsung as the lapsed preacher Jim Casy, a messianic figure who has to be sacrificed to illuminate the multitude, Carradine’s cragginess fascinatingly jars with Casy’s angelic innocuousness and selfless sagacity, he might have lost his faith, but the aureola of benediction never deserts him.

THE LONG VOYAGE HOME, whose soundstage artificiality does vitiate the plausibility of an open-sea voyage, concatenates four Eugene O’Neal’s seafaring plays into one feature by Dudley Nichols, and Toland’s groundbreaking prestidigitation of coaxing light and shade again is the main star here, creating a pre-film noir atmosphere of mist, ambiguity and desolation, often on a dime.

The story is a tetralogy roughly consisted of a roisterous comedy of brawl and exotic girls, a treacherous waterborne adventurer, a WWII paranoia thriller and a blokeish escapade onshore, as a result its prevailing tone fails to cohere, the film feels haphazard, episodic, most of its time unengaged. The comical part is a mess, Ford is ill at ease with frivolity, the studio-bound finitude (a waterlogged deck mostly) doesn’t broaden his imagination of nature’s elemental ferocity and all the commotion around a hidden German spy among the crew leans to preposterousness.

Luckily, at audience’s pleasure, the ship crew onboard makes do what is at their disposal: Barry Fitzgerald is a vividly fussy steward named Cocky, who looks so far from a sea dog, you might expect him to take a pratfall just by entering the forecastle; John Qualen as Axel, has the most maddening foreign accent but you may forgive him for his earnest (he also shines in a cameo in THE GRAPES OF WRATH, you can see his range); Ian Hunter is the loner harboring a secret disgrace, and Ward Bond is generously allotted a lengthy part when his Yank is in extremis.

A young Wayne unconvincingly plays a Swede named Olsen, looks wet behind the ears and only too naive to fall prey to skulduggery on the land (Natwick, a celluloid debutante, has a small but striking appearance as a reluctant decoy), he is humbled by a more world-savvy Driscoll (Mitchell), the leader of the gang, Mitchell excellently plays him with gusto and facility. But the film is a downer entombed in nostalgia and homesick (accentuated by Richard Hageman’s forlorn score) ever since the frothy gaiety is scuppered in the beginning, not least for the unexpected ending. Reckoned as the first Ford picture that deals with the ongoing WWII (though obliquely), THE LONG VOVAGE HOME’s pathos is rather different from the populist affirmation distilled from THE GRAPES OF WRATH, whereas the latter in a towering landmark in Ford’s estimable filmography, the former could only settle for a minor grade in juxtaposition.

referential entries: Ford’s HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY (1941, 7.3/10); THE QUIET MAN (1952, 7.4/10); René Clément’s THE DAMNED (1947, 7.3/10).

Title: The Grapes of WrathYear: 1940Country: USALanguage: EnglishGenre: DramaDirector: John FordScreenwriter: Nunnally Johnsonbased on the novel by John SteinbeckMusic: Alfred NewmanCinematography: Gregg TolandEditing: Robert L. SimpsonCast:Henry FondaJane DarwellJohn CarradineDorris BowdonRussell SimpsonCharley GrapewinZeffie TilburyO.Z. WhiteheadEddie QuillanFrank SullyDarryl HickmanShirley MillsFrank DarienJohn QualanGrant MitchellWard BondRoger ImhofRating: 8.2/10

Title: The Long Voyage HomeYear: 1940Country: USALanguage: English, SpanishGenre: Drama, WarDirector: John FordScreenwriter: Dudley Nicholsbased on four plays by Eugene O’NealMusic: Richard HagemanCinematography: Gregg TolandEditing: Sherman ToddCast:John WayneThomas MitchellBarry FitzgeraldIan HunterJohn QualenWilfrid LawsonWard BondMildred NatwickArthur ShieldsJoe SawyerDouglas WaltonCarmen MoralesRafaela OttianoConstantine RomanoffLee ShumwayBilly BevanJack PennockRating: 7.0/10

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