Don't Make a Scene: The Grapes of Wrath

The Story: Labor Day weekend. The Grapes of Wrath, comrade.

There have been a couple of "scenes" that I've had in "the works" for awhile, that I've put off and put off because 1) they're on the longish side with a great many screen-caps (which is time-intensive) and 2) one of them is by a director that I'd represented in the past couple months and I try to mix things up, variety-wise (unless there's a specific reason to do it—the scenes from Casablanca "deconstructing Rick", for instance). So, I was getting to the deadline and nothing to show for it.

Then, TCM had a "John Carradine" Day during their "Summer Under the Stars" month-long event they schedule in August. And I happened upon "Grapes of Wrath" while channel-surfing, only about a half-hour into it. The thing about this particular Darryl F. Zanuck-John Ford collaboration is that it is quite the dense and compact little movie and where Gregg Toland's camera under Ford's direction offers wonders to behold.

Like this scene. Looking at the script, you can tell that Ford is focusing on the family, rather than cutting—as the script indicates—from the death of Grampa Joad to the make-shift marker for his grave, the flyleaf of a Bible, which is being amended as we enter the scene.

Ford starts the sequence with the family, their only source of light on the highway being their truck's headlights as Tom Joad (Henry Fonda) is doing the writing, then cuts to the page as he reads aloud. The cut to the page would have been jarring to audiences and as the film concentrates on the Joads' journey with few distractions, this provides a smoother transition.

Ford always excelled at portraying funerals, but—as here—he made sure they were visually stunning, but kept them short, just another ritual that binds people together, even though they're missing one of their own.

 

This one's lovely, but Ford doesn't "put an 'amen' to it" and, in the spirit of the "words" over the grave "gets on to it." The living have more living to do, the loss being just one more blow on their journey. 

 

(By the way, if you're wondering what the "omnes" means in that deleted section, it's Latin for "everybody."

 

The Set-Up: The Joad family has had their land foreclosed on and, with word that there are jobs in California, start the long road down Route 66, every meager thing precious to them packed into a single dilapidated truck. The last thing to be packed was Grampa Joad (Charley Grapewin) who was determined to stay and not go to California until the family conspired to liqueur him up and  load him up in the back. But Grampa is true to his word; he never makes it to California.

 

Action.

The scene dissolves to an insert of a NOTE. It is written awkwardly in pencil on the flyleaf of a Bible. Tom's voice recites the words. 

TOM'S VOICE This here is William James Joad, dyed of a stroke, old old man. 

TOM His folkes bured him becaws they got no money to pay for funerl

TOM ...s. 

TOM Nobody kilt him. Jus a stroke an he dyed. 

A GRAVE, at night. In the clump of woods, lighted by two lanterns, The Joad tribe stands reverently around an open grave. 

Having read the note, Tom puts it in a small fruit jar and kneels down and, reaching into the grave, places it on Grampa's body. 

TOM I figger best we leave something like this on him, 

TOM ...lest somebody dig him up and make out he been kilt. 

(Reaching into the grave) 

TOM Lotta times looks like the gov'ment got more interest in a dead man than...

TOM ...a live one. 

PA Not be so lonesome, either, knowin' his name is there with 'im,  

PA ...not just' a old fella lonesome underground. 

TOM (straightening up) Casy, won't you say a few words? 

CASY I ain't no more a preacher, you know. 

TOM  We know. But...

TOM ...ain't none of our folks ever been buried without a few words. 

CASY (after a pause) I'll say 'em--

CASY an' make it short. 

(All bow and close eyes) 

CASY This here ol' man jus' lived a life an' jus' died out of it. 

CASY I don't know...

CASY ...whether he was good or bad, 

CASY ...an' it don't matter much. 

CASY Heard a fella say a poem once, an' he says, "All that lives is holy." 

CASY But I wouldn't pray for jus' a ol' man that's dead, because he's awright. 

CASY If I was to pray I'd pray for the folks that's alive an' don't know which way to turn. 

CASY Grampa here, he ain't got no more trouble like that. 

CASY He's got his job all cut out for 'im--

CASY so cover 'im up and let 'im get to it. 

OMNES Amen. 

The scene fades out.

 

The Grapes of Wrath

Words by John Steinbeck and Nunnally Johnson

Pictures by Gregg Toland and John Ford

The Grapes of Wrath is available on DVD and Blu-Ray from Fox Home Video.