New on Blu-ray from Warner Archive is the excellent Intruder in the Dust, a thoughtful race drama directed by Clarence brown and based on the novel by William Faulkner. Progressive for its time, the film in one of the first great cinematic analyses of race relations in America.
Claude Jarman, Jr. (best known as Jody in The Yearling) stars as Chick Mallison, a young white teenager who observes the mob rule and bigotry of his southern town as they encircle Lucas Beauchamp (Juano Hernandez), a black man accused of murdering a white man. While most of the townsfolk are out for blood, Chick realizes the injustice that’s occurring. He’s not only sympathetic, but has a place in his heart for Beauchamp: once, when Chick was trespassing on his property and fell into a frozen creek, the old man took him into his home to warm up, even giving the boy his own dinner which his wife had prepared for him. Chick never forgot this kindness, nor the shame of his own condescending response, treating the hospitality as something transactional and trying to pay for that which was given freely.
Realizing this is a true opportunity to repay that kindness and do the right thing, Chick tells his story to his Uncle John, a lawyer, begging him to represent Beauchamp legally. But the real adventure begins when Beauchamp enlists Chick on a horrifying and daring mission: that very night, he must exhume the body of the victim and extract the bullets, which by their caliber will prove his innocence.
For me this was where the story turned the corner into something truly special, a young teen boy entangled in grownup peril, much like Twain’s Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn as they witnessed crimes and horrors in a world full of real dangers. On the one hand, the film is a race drama, but it’s also an intriguing and suspenseful murder mystery with grim twists and turns.
I loved this film and the drama of its characters. 14-year-old Jarman, a couple of years older than his role in The Yearling, has a true sense of emerging maturity as Chick. Beauchamp entrusts Chick not because of their relationship, but because he knows that the boy is not yet indoctrinated to the prejudices of their society, and therein lies his sole chance.
Beauchamp is also a wonderful character, and I love how Hernandez, who received a Golden Globe nomination for the role, portrays him: proud, unyielding, and dignified. I think this portrayal also helps to offset any potential modern criticism about white savior tropes – even when enlisting help, Beauchamp is always solely the master of his own fate.
There are a couple of other great supporting characters: Miss Eunice (Elizabeth Patterson), an elderly white woman who believes in Beauchamp’s innocence and aids Chick and Uncle John in trying to save him, accompanying the midnight grave-digging and getting maybe the best “hero moment” in the entire movie. And Nub Gowrie (Porter Hall), the father of the murdered man, who’s initially hostile to Beauchamp’s defenders, but changes course once he realizes his son’s true murderer may not face justice: his fatherly love, which is rather wonderfully portrayed, trumps his prejudice.
This is a terrific and surprisingly unsung film. A unique one, too, that’s equally an adolescent coming-of-age, a murder mystery, a racial discrimination story, and a legal drama.
Viewing the film through the lens of the present, it’s impossible not to compare it to another similar film, To Kill a Mockingbird, which has clearly overshadowed it. Both stories are about black men standing trial in the deep south, and were based on contemporary novels which were quickly adapted for Hollywood: The Mississippi-set Intruder in the Dust was published in 1948, the film version immediately followed in 1949. To Kill a Mockingbird was published in 1960, and its film adaptation hit theaters in 1962. It’s set in the neighboring state, Alabama. Both stories are strategically set in fictitious towns which won’t be found on any map, yet are pretty clearly standing in for the authors’ own hometowns.
Both films are excellent, though with its earlier precedent and more prolific author, one might expect Intruder to have the bigger cultural footprint. That clearly hasn’t been the case, despite it also being well-revered. I think there are a couple reasons for this. The first is Atticus Finch, Mockingbird’s deeply endearing and fatherly protagonist, portrayed to perfection in the film by Gregory Peck, who helped make him one of the most beloved characters in both literature and cinema. The second is the timing – Intruder was seminal, but Mockingbird was released at the height of the Civil Rights movement, making it much more of a landmark in the zeitgeist.
While Intruder in the Dust has been overshadowed, it’s still a powerful and really quite special film. Highly recommended!
The Package:
Intruder in the Dust is new on Blu-ray from the Warner Archive Collection, though it was originally an MGM production. The format is the usual style for the label: a standard blue Elite case featuring original poster art on the cover and the WAC’s characteristic black spine with gold lettering.
Special Features and Extras:
In addition to a theatrical trailer, the disc features a pair of MGM shorts from 1949, the sort that might have prefaced the film in theaters.
- Playlands of Michigan (9:11): An episode of James A. FitzPatrick’s Traveltalks series of theatrical travelogue shorts. Creator/narrator James Fitzpatrick, “The Voice of the Globe”, takes viewers of a trip through Michigan: lakeside frolics, a magic show, traditional dances with the descendents of Dutch settlers, and cruising around in dune buggies.
- The Counterfeit Cat (7:07): Tex Avery directs this MGM cartoon that plays like a knockoff of Sylvester and Tweety (who were new characters at the time). A stray cat hungers for a pet canary, but is stymied by the family dog. Undeterred, the cat poses as a dog to gain entry to the home, only to find the canary is more resourceful than he bargained for.
- Theatrical Trailer (2:30)
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