Intruder in the Dust (1949)

Film: Intruder in the Dust (1949)
Stars: David Brian, Claude Jarman Jr., Juano Hernandez, Porter Hall, Elizabeth Patterson
Director: Clarence Brown
Oscar History: Despite being hailed as a landmark motion picture in its era and scoring a pair of Golden Globe nominations, the movie didn't win a single Oscar nomination.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

As a general rule, no films age more poorly than a social issue film.  Yes, visual effects films tend to look dated, and yes, comedies are reflexive of what is popular at that time, but social issue films are essentially ticking clocks.  Either the film is too timid with its subject or isn't ballsy enough to show the truth (this is why I took The Imitation Game to task) or the issue itself becomes so obsolete that the film feels like a relic.  Even truly great motion pictures like To Kill a Mockingbird and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, anchored by issues that are sadly still problems today, look older simply because they seem too naive-we know now that the world doesn't operate in a way with a Washington that works or a justice system that is fair, so we know not to expect the world that Senator Smith and Atticus Finch want in their struggles.  In fact, arguably the best issue films are the movies that rely more heavily upon human nature, that rare constant, than anything else.  The Grapes of Wrath still holds up well not because we're still suffering from a Dust Bowl (though considering conservative apathy toward climate change, give it a couple of years), but because the film is about man's struggle against the powers that be.  Tom Joad has existed in every era of civilization-the have not that is forced out for reasons no one knows.  The greatest issue film of them all, Citizen Kane, doesn't even ring like an "issue" film, principally because the destruction of wealth and power upon all those that attain it takes a second act to the struggles of a single man.  There's a reason that we call Citizen Kane one of the great films of all time-it's because it's a film that is universal, over seventy years later, to every person.

(Spoilers Ahead) Why, precisely, am I name-checking all of these films in regard to a film that you've likely never heard of?  Because Intruder in the Dust is one of those films that was a classic in its day, but unlike To Kill a Mockingbird and Grapes of Wrath, it hasn't survived in cinematic memory.  Perhaps because it inexplicably missed the Best Picture lineup (it made the New York Times best of the year list, at least), it's a film that hasn't survived in the face of more lauded classics, though it's still somewhat remembered today (the AFI listed it on their original ballot for its 100 Greatest Films, which is how I first became familiar with it).  The film is about an African-American man named Lucas Beauchamp (Hernandez) who is wrongfully accused of murdering a white man in 1940's Mississippi.  Beauchamp has a ticking clock around his neck not just because of the trial in an extremely racist society, but also because it's likely he won't survive to the trial, as the relatives of the man who died are planning on having vigilante justice.

Lucas enlists the help of Chick, a young boy in the community who has a complicated relationship with Lucas (played by The Yearling's Claude Jarman, Jr.) and his uncle John (Brian).  Along the way, they gain the help of an old woman (Elizabeth Patterson, whom you'll most likely recognize for her years on I Love Lucy as Mrs. Trumbull), who is certain of Lucas's innocence (and is proven correct).

The film is relatively predictable in its outcome, at least in terms of the guilty verdict.  Though Lucas is a mysterious man (not acquiescing to stereotypes of the day and a bit more defiant against injustice than you would normally have seen in a movie of the era), there's never any doubt that he's innocent, and as the film progresses it's pretty obvious who the actual killer is.  However, the film is quite fascinating in the way that it unfolds in regard to human nature.  Being that it's the 1940's, you know that love and harmony isn't going to break out, but it's actually quite telling in the way the script handles certain characters.  For example, Uncle John, who ultimately saves Lucas does not become the hero that Atticus Finch does.  Instead, he's only passably tolerant by the end of the movie, a pontificating man whom most modern audiences would regard as still "prejudiced" by any standard.  The fact that he was likely "accepting enough" for audiences of the era make his character more of an historic marker than a solely dated figure.

Instead it's Chick, a young man who has clearly been taught to be prejudiced but slowly can't realize why, who is the one who grows in the film, and Elizabeth Patterson's Miss Eunice who shows the most courage (standing up to an ugly mob without hesitation, she easily gets the film's best scene, and probably was the most likely to crack a nomination with the Oscars).  Juano Hernandez relies pretty heavily upon facial acting, frequently playing most scenes with quiet introversion, but I can see why he, at the age of 53 and several decades into his career, still managed a nomination for "Newcomer of the Year" at the Golden Globes.

So I'll give the film, which is always interesting and occasionally intensely so, a 4-star marker even if the plot is wholly predictable.  For those of you who have seen the film-what do you think?  Why do you think it hasn't survived in the way that To Kill a Mockingbird, which came out far after it, has?  And what other classics of their era have long since been forgotten?  Share in the comments!