Philip French said "Huston's low budget masterpiece adaptation of Flannery O'Connor's 1952 novel about rival fundamentalist preachers in America's Bible Belt"
I think 'Wise Bood' IS a 'forgotten gem'. The fact that it was selected by PF is significant and John Huston is always interesting. In my opinion PF has chosen well, in accordance with a thorough understanding of what makes a movie into a 'classic', which has now become a much over-used word. I am not so sure of some of the others!/ In terms of form, I was impressed not so much by the visual composition of the film (which was remarkable) and sense of place, or by some long, sweeping takes; but also by the fact that many of the shots of characters talking, especially the protagonist, did not include reverse angle. Maybe this was because it was a low-budget film. But somehow it adds to the general atmosphere of alienation; the fact that everything here can only be obtained through the 'callous cash nexus': This ranges from putting a roof over your head to friendship, love and even religion! On that point, for me, Brad Durief's (?) character, the returning soldier, is a deranged version of the Knight in Bergman's 'Seventh Seal'. Like the Knight, he has been scarred physically and psychologically by war, and has lost his faith in God. He is also representative of the ignorant 'poor white' in the deep south. With no career to fall back on, he decides that becoming a preacher in the Bible belt might be a lucrative profession! This is very ironic, because he doesn't believe any more. Unlike Bergman's knight, he is not engaged in a struggle to regain his faith (to find some tangible evidence of God's existence), but to prove the non-existence of God by setting up the 'Church of Jesus Christ, without Jesus'! He takes to this with the religious zeal of a manic preacher./ After some reflection, I wonder if the original author, Flannery O'Connor, had been reading Nietzsche at the time: Was it not the latter who started the whole existentialism thing? Nietzsche writes about the madman who shouts, 'Whither is God...I will tell you. We have killed him - you and I....Do we hear nothing as yet as the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God....God is dead....What was holiest and mightiest of all...has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us?' But the preacher and his message has arrived too soon for this small southern town, for America even! As Nietzsche's madman says, 'I have come too early...my time is not yet.'
Huston was never known for 'directing' actors - instead, once cast, he left them to do their stuff. The perfectly cast Brad Dourif therefore pulls off an extraordinary performance here, in what mostly feels like a farce, but is sharply pulled back into tragedy. For me, Hazel appears to be rebelling against his own upbringing (note the opening montage of nostalgic b&w stills), but I appreciated the film's 'hinting' of his past, rather than it being fully drawn out to give an all too easy explanation of his fanatical character and motives. He does after all, return to a post-war world where neon religion, friendship, and love all cost a buck. You gotta be a gorilla to make a pal! Who wouldn't go to a Church of Christ without Christ? I thought the bleak, time-trapped Georgia was a fitting and beautifully photographed backdrop. Hazel's car was a great running symbolic gag of his 'drive' that was doomed to run out of gas. This american machine - 'built by no nigger' - that was his home, church/pulpit, and faith in the future, is inevitably riddled with holes, nicely illustrated by a 'nigger' pouring water clean through its coughing, dying heart. And with that, Hazel's Church without Christ dies too, and he ironically becomes a real-life martyr, contrasting with Harry Dean Stanton's all-seeing hoaxster. I liked how the big self-blinding scene was done as an uncut tracking shot of Hazel in the house where he goes in and out of the frame until he finally does the deed completely 'out of sight' of the audience. "I could see, but now I am blind... "!
3 comments:
I think 'Wise Bood' IS a 'forgotten gem'. The fact that it was selected by PF is significant and John Huston is always interesting. In my opinion PF has chosen well, in accordance with a thorough understanding of what makes a movie into a 'classic', which has now become a much over-used word. I am not so sure of some of the others!/
In terms of form, I was impressed not so much by the visual composition of the film (which was remarkable) and sense of place, or by some long, sweeping takes; but also by the fact that many of the shots of characters talking, especially the protagonist, did not include reverse angle. Maybe this was because it was a low-budget film. But somehow it adds to the general atmosphere of alienation; the fact that everything here can only be obtained through the 'callous cash nexus': This ranges from putting a roof over your head to friendship, love and even religion! On that point, for me, Brad Durief's (?) character, the returning soldier, is a deranged version of the Knight in Bergman's 'Seventh Seal'. Like the Knight, he has been scarred physically and psychologically by war, and has lost his faith in God. He is also representative of the ignorant 'poor white' in the deep south. With no career to fall back on, he decides that becoming a preacher in the Bible belt might be a lucrative profession! This is very ironic, because he doesn't believe any more. Unlike Bergman's knight, he is not engaged in a struggle to regain his faith (to find some tangible evidence of God's existence), but to prove the non-existence of God by setting up the 'Church of Jesus Christ, without Jesus'! He takes to this with the religious zeal of a manic preacher./
After some reflection, I wonder if the original author, Flannery O'Connor, had been reading Nietzsche at the time: Was it not the latter who started the whole existentialism thing? Nietzsche writes about the madman who shouts, 'Whither is God...I will tell you. We have killed him - you and I....Do we hear nothing as yet as the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God....God is dead....What was holiest and mightiest of all...has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us?' But the preacher and his message has arrived too soon for this small southern town, for America even! As Nietzsche's madman says, 'I have come too early...my time is not yet.'
Huston was never known for 'directing' actors - instead, once cast, he left them to do their stuff. The perfectly cast Brad Dourif therefore pulls off an extraordinary performance here, in what mostly feels like a farce, but is sharply pulled back into tragedy. For me, Hazel appears to be rebelling against his own upbringing (note the opening montage of nostalgic b&w stills), but I appreciated the film's 'hinting' of his past, rather than it being fully drawn out to give an all too easy explanation of his fanatical character and motives. He does after all, return to a post-war world where neon religion, friendship, and love all cost a buck. You gotta be a gorilla to make a pal! Who wouldn't go to a Church of Christ without Christ? I thought the bleak, time-trapped Georgia was a fitting and beautifully photographed backdrop. Hazel's car was a great running symbolic gag of his 'drive' that was doomed to run out of gas. This american machine - 'built by no nigger' - that was his home, church/pulpit, and faith in the future, is inevitably riddled with holes, nicely illustrated by a 'nigger' pouring water clean through its coughing, dying heart.
And with that, Hazel's Church without Christ dies too, and he ironically becomes a real-life martyr, contrasting with Harry Dean Stanton's all-seeing hoaxster. I liked how the big self-blinding scene was done as an uncut tracking shot of Hazel in the house where he goes in and out of the frame until he finally does the deed completely 'out of sight' of the audience.
"I could see, but now I am blind... "!
Episodic Southern Gothic.
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