The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

Film: The Grapes of Wrath

Director: John Ford

Country: USA

Released: January 1940

Runtime: 129 minutes

Genre: Drama

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Influenced: Kurosawa, Sergio Leone, David Fincher, Spielberg, Tarantino

John Steinbeck's novel Grapes of Wrath (arguably one of the greatest ever written by an American) was published in April 1939, so it's remarkable that this film was released just 9 months later. This may be a story about the Great Depression and how The Dust Bowl phenomenon brought desperation, desolation and mass migration to thousands of poor Americans, but it's clear Ford is also telling a story about the Irish Famine through the prism of American history. Ford explicitly said that he made the film because it "was similar to the famine in Ireland, when they threw the people off the land and left them wandering on the roads to starve".

But watching the film now, it's also clear that its theme of economic migration is timeless – nowadays, we see similar forced migration caused by climate change affecting coastal communities, especially in the developing world. Ford employed screenwriter Nunnally Johnson to soften the book's angry radicalism and replace it to some extent with compassionate humanism, and we can see in the way the director films the Joad family – including dramatic close-ups and sweeping panoramic shots – that he has great empathy for them as they leave their Oklahama home to become migratory farm labourers (the very bottom of the heap) in California.

The scene early in the film of the Joad family being told to vacate their land by a man in a car passing the buck shows the faceless nature of capitalism – it's not his fault, it's not the company's fault (Shawnee Land & Capital), not the bank's fault (some anonymous manager in Tulsa), but just some mysterious capitalist forces these humble folk couldn't possibly understand (or fight against). Through the Joads' struggles, Ford calls attention to the need for a more equitable distribution of wealth and resources, an the film's musical score, which incorporates folk and blues music, adds to the emotional impact of the story. Musicians like Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen all wrote songs inspired by The Grapes of Wrath.

Producer Darryl F Zanuck was nervous the film might be viewed as pro-Communist, such was the "red scare" climate permeating America at the time, but he needn't have worried – Steinbeck's portrayal of the plight of the Okies is a fair one, if a little overly sentimental at times. Henry Fonda as Tom and Jane Darwell as "Ma" lead a fine ensemble with a restrained distinction that also informs cinematographer Gregg Toland’s moody black & white realism. Ford won consecutive Oscars for this and the even more sentimental How Green Was My Valley (1941).

"I'll be all around in the dark - I'll be everywhere. Wherever you can look - wherever there's a fight, so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever there's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there. I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad. I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry and they know supper's ready, and when the people are eatin' the stuff they raise and livin' in the houses they build - I'll be there, too." - Tom Joad