I think there must be no more than one copy of this movie in the Chicago area, and I was lucky enough to persuade some friends of mine that it was the most important movie to see on our movie night, which took place almost two weeks ago. It was serendipitous that the folks I was gathering with were apathetic about the movie selection, because John Ford's The Sun Shines Bright (1953) was the very next movie in my queue for this never-ending Ford Film Marathon (dude, it's been going on since September). No surprise that this very scarce movie can't be found on DVD (at least not to my knowledge), so we had to deal with the metallic fuzz of a VHS tape, which had to have originated some time in the 80s.
But who cares, because this is the film of Ford's that Rosenbaum and others say is his best. Yep, that's right, they say it's even better than The Searchers or Clementine, or even Stagecoach. The movie was shot on black and white film stock rather than color stock, which was standard by the time of the film's release. It's headlining actors are all non-stars, and if you didn't know about Ford from the credits, it might initially look to be a cheapie B-movie from a no-name director. All of Ford's hits are studded with stars like John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Katherine Hepburn--all of the big guys. So why the heck did he retreat to such simple style?
Well, I have no idea. Though, it lived up to a lot of its hype, despite its racist portrayal of blacks in a turn of the century south, and some rather dense and hard to hear dialogue. A number of times we had to stop and rewind the tape to figure out what the characters where saying, and the conflict was dealt with so subtly that all of us were never entirely sure what was wrong, and which character was connected to which. The general story, however, concerns a daughter whose mother's identity is hidden from her. Sadly, with the passage of two week's time, and the starts and stops of the screening, I get a little hazy relaying exactly why this was so.
Suffice it to say for now that it is about a family caught between two social worlds: one that is progressive in dealing with a post-war southern society, and one that is distinctly rooted in antebellum culture. Ford is the man of Westerns, and in The Searchers, for instance, the final shot frames Ethan (John Wayne) in a doorway, looking outdoors. He staggers, we guess aimlessly, into the dusty west alone and unsure. Then, comes The Sun Shines Bright that shows its main character in one of the film's final shots, from the opposite angle: he slowly walks into the house away from the outside world, presumably where the culture and history with which he identifies remains intact. How's that for a history lesson? Aahh, the good old days.
Also, please note my absence from the week of January 15th-January 22nd. I traveled back to New York for my sister's wedding, which brings me to this: Congrats to Amanda and my new brother (in-law), Marc! Cheers, you two!
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