God's Little Acre

God's Little Acre

Author	Erskine Caldwell
Language	English
Genre	Novel
Publication date	1933
Publication place	United States
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)

God's Little Acre
File:Gla1958.jpg
Directed by	Anthony Mann
Written by	Erskine Caldwell (novel) Ben Maddow (uncredited) Philip Yordan (screenplay)
Produced by	Sidney Harmon
Starring	Robert Ryan Aldo Ray Tina Louise Buddy Hackett
Cinematography	Ernest Haller
Edited by	Richard Meyer
Music by	Elmer Bernstein
Distributed by	United Artists
Release dates	August 13, 1958
Running time	110 min.
Language	English

God's Little Acre is a 1933 novel by Erskine Caldwell, which was filmed in 1958 by director Anthony Mann and lensed in black and white by master cameraman Ernie Haller [[1]]. The novel was so controversial that a literary board in New York attempted to censor it, leading to the author's being arrested and tried for obscenity. Exonerated after a jury trial, the author counter-sued the literary society for false arrest and malicious prosecution.

No less controversial was the film some twenty five years later, though this time there was no prosecution for obscenity. Though both book and film were laced throughout with racy innuendo calling into question the issue of marital fidelity, it was the film adaptation that may have been the more alarming, inasmuch as it portrayed a popular uprising, or Marxist insurrection, in the southern United States by millworkers laid off from work, but wishing to appropriate for themselves the means of production, this being their livelihood. Philip Yordan took credit for the screenplay, though it was actually written by Ben Maddow. Since Maddow was blacklisted for suspected Communist activities during the 1950s Red Scare, working without credit was the only way he could successfully submit screenplays.

When first released, audiences under eighteen years of age were prohibited from viewing what were perceived to be numerous sexy scenes throughout, though in recent decades the film's scandalous reputation has diminished. Though ultimately a box office failure upon first release, the film has frequently been aired on television. Due to a lapse in copyright after the bankruptcy of United Artists in the mid-1980s, the film is now in the public domain.

Plot

The film follows Ty Ty Walden (Robert Ryan), a widower, and his three daughters, living in the backwoods of Georgia during the Great Depression. While Ty Ty searches for gold on his farm, his son Will (Aldo Ray) cheats on his wife Rosamund (Helen Westcott) by committing adultery with Griselda (Tina Louise).

First Scene

A stirring musical track in the form of a ballad plays as the camera freezes on - and then pulls back from - a depiction of a distant bridge over an equally distant, slowly moving river. The camera is located so far away that it is not at all clear whether human figures should be seen in the foliage of the banks, or by the bridge. This scene has great significance in the film because it is nearly the same as the last scene in the film. The shot may also have been influenced by Jean Renoir's film (shot eight years earlier), The River where much of the symbolism of a river relates to the appearance of an unplundered genealogical reserve that current generations ought to be guaranteed from previous generations, but which are otherwise denied. In any case, the majority of the film lacks references to the river, and it never reappears until the last scene.

County election impends

The movie opens with Pluto Swint (Buddy Hackett) arriving at Ty Ty's farm to let the farmer know he's running for sheriff, and would appreciate it if he'd remember him when it came time to come to the polls and cast his ballot. When he arrives, he is invited to come around back where Griselda (Tina Louise) is taking a bath in an outdoor bathtub positioned near a handpump and spigot. She asks him to pump some more water into the bathtub but the camera never dips lower than the top of the bathtub.

Digging holes instead of farming

Ty Ty spends most of his time digging holes in his farm, constantly searching for the treasure his grandfather left him. Consequently, the farm has suffered from years of neglect. He could have turned a profit any time during those years if only he had bought some seed and planted it in the fields, but believing that a vast amount of gold had been buried somewhere on his property, he thinks that it is only a matter of time before he finds the place it was buried. In the book, Ty Ty remarks to Pluto that gold nuggets have been found on his land, here and there, but never more than a nugget or two. In the movie, however, his constant searching for buried gold appears to be making his farm worth less with each coming year.

The seductive lure of easy gold a mere shovel or two away is actually leading him to squander his inheritance. If his real treasure lies in his daughters, the viewer is invited to gauge the depth of that genealogical reserve, inasmuch as Griselda appears to be a woman of equally easy morals.

Finding and detaining an albino

In belief that having an albino human with him in his quest for treasure will bring him great fortune, Ty Ty transports and wrongfully imprisons a man, Dave Lawson (Michael Landon), with white hair and pink eyes, and demands he help him locate the buried treasure. He reasons that it is not actually wrongful detainer because the albino at any time could lead him to the treasure, and thereby earn his release.

Storming of the mills

Aside from the racy scene at the start of the film where Pluto Swint (Buddy Hackett) was manning the pump, and bringing water to an outdoor bathtub, it is understandable that the movie came very close to being blacklisted for the scene where town locals form an angry mob, and stage a spontaneous insurrection. Screen wire fences are scaled, and the lock to the main gate is broken. The workers, arriving in the middle of the night in an ever increasing number, rush against the main building, even as an onlooker tells them not to. It appears that the insurrection is hardly unwarranted, as a recent out-of-state corporate decision led to the mills being shut down. Since the entire town's economy depended solely on the presence of the mill staying open, the dilemma the people face is evocative of the dilemma later faced in the 1986 film Gung Ho. After they enter the factory, successfully flipping the circuitbreakers on, they revive the factory into a semblance of life.

Riot leaves one dead

Hearing of the rioters breaking and entering, the sheriff comes to the factory site and shoots an unarmed rioter for trespass. At this point the tide is turned irreversibly, leading to Pluto Spint's upset election as the new county sheriff, replacing the incumbent, and potentially leading to greener pastures for all concerned.

Where is God's little acre?

The viewer should not be settled with the trite explanation of what God's little acre really is. On the one hand, Ty Ty repeatedly vowed to give God all the treasure he found in a particular acre of his land, in the nature of a tithing, the last scene to the movie implies that the acre is not what it appears to be, and might even be the river that runs through the south, bringing moisture to the crops that need it so dearly. Ty Ty has been digging holes twenty or thirty feet deep, never once reaching the water table. His land is unusually dry and barren; it needs irrigation to produce any crops. It is also possible that the "little acre" more properly belonging to God is not within Ty Ty's acreage, but is rather the amount of land occupied by the mills that were shut down, and which the workers by God's law, ought to have a significant interest in.

Ty Ty's Explanation

Occupying a different acre of land every year, God's Little Acre seems to wander randomly about Ty Ty's farm. The book ends with Ty Ty's delivering a homily to his children that the real point of his dedicating an acre of land to God, was not in the amount of the money that the acre could produce, but the importance of his having God's interest close to him at home, and always immediately accessible for that very proximity; with that said, he decides to put God's Little Green Acre directly under the house where they lived. The discerning reader of the book, however, quickly notes the remarkable extent of the family's moral bankruptcy, and cheapness of life from the deaths of Will (the Marxist rabble-rouser, dying at the hands of the woolen mill's security guards) and Jim Leslie (demanding repayment of a loan, trespassing into Ty Ty's house to rape Griselda (in lieu of the loan's repayment), and consequently dying from a shotgun blast). Seen in that light, the barrenness of God's Little Acre, no matter where it is located, is commensurate with the barrenness of Ty Ty's land, and equal to the misapplication of his labors. If Ty Ty is a divine steward of land that is dedicated to God, it implies a complete disrespect for the duties at hand, and a peculiar over attention to the basest of human needs. Even if Ty Ty has misapplied his labors, the book offers us an interesting contrast to his situation. When Ty Ty drives over state lines to borrow money from Jim Leslie, the book mentions how Jim's wife was afflicted with venereal disease, apparently not brought on by her husband, but rather something that just happened.

Cast

Actor	Role
Robert Ryan	Ty Ty Walden, a widower
Aldo Ray	Will Thompson
Tina Louise	Griselda
Buddy Hackett	Pluto Swint
Jack Lord	Buck Walden
Fay Spain	Darlin' Jill
Vic Morrow	Shaw Walden
Helen Westcott	Rosamund
Lance Fuller	Jim Leslie
Rex Ingram	Uncle Felix
Michael Landon	Dave Lawson, the albino

External links

God's Little Acre at IMDb