By Armond White

Fox Home Entertainment

In grad school, Ford's adaptation of Steinbeck's novel felt sentimental and laughable. Today, its purity and simplicity seem almost miraculous. One of the original American road movies, it uses the Joad family to discover what America actually is, rather than its symbolic, patriotic myth. This new transfer preserves the different shadings of black, white and gray that cinematographer Gregg Toland achieved, enabling the film to fluidly change tone—from documentary to expressionist atmosphere to a kind of mellow, unaffected tenderness.

No longer burdened with being a definitive literary adaptation, Wrath can now be appreciated on Ford's own merits. It is tough Americana, constantly reexamining itself just as the Joad family keeps running into examples of both American hostility and a burgeoning, struggling political generosity. (The diner scene isn't yet as famous as Tom Joad's final speech, but it shines as a quintessential example of the range of our national character.) Ford's prestige allowed him to get away with some then-shocking instances of realism, such as Henry Fonda saying "hell" to chide Jane Darwell's Ma Joad. But their plangent mother-son emotions are deeper than mere realism. These poor folks are emotionally rich.

Armond White