OVP: Tom Sawyer (1973)

Film: Tom Sawyer (1973)
Stars: Johnny Whitaker, Jodie Foster, Celeste Holm, Warren Oates, Jeff East, Kunu Hank
Director: Don Taylor
Oscar History: 3 nominations (Best Costume Design, Art Direction, Song Score)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

As we move forward with our five-day tribute to the films of 1973, we're going to move from Oscar winners to mere nominees, and not ones where we have an acting nominee in sight.  The works of Mark Twain have been countlessly told on the big-screen, but it doesn't appear Oscar cared for an installment of his bibliography more than 1973's Tom Sawyer.  The film is a pretty faithful adaptation to the original novel (which is good fun even if literary titans frequently dismiss it on the way to Huckleberry Finn), but with a catch-this is a musical.  Something I didn't know when I started watching it, to be honest-I assumed the Song Score citation was because we were going to get a bunch of 1800's classics played in the background, not because we'd see actually singing onscreen.  But that's what happened, and honestly-it just enhances the "good fun" angle.

(Spoilers Ahead) For those of you who somehow missed this tome in your childhoods, the story of Tom Sawyer goes as follows.  Tom (Whitaker) is a young scalawag, always into mischief, and being raised by his Aunt Polly (Holm) much to her consternation (even though she loves him).  Tom's only true friend is Huck Finn (East), an orphan boy that is even more on the outskirts of town than Tom.  The two boys witness the murder of the town's doctor, and know that the man accused of the murder, Muff Potter (Oates) was really innocent, and it was Joe (played by Hank, and yes in a sign this was written 150 years ago, his name in the movie comes with a racist moniker that I'm not going to repeat, so he'll be referred to simply as "Joe" in this article), a mean local man, who actually killed the doctor.  Tom eventually confesses despite a blood oath between the two, fraying their friendship, but endearing him to local girl Becky (Foster), who is his love interest.  The film ends with Joe getting arrested, Huck setting off on the Mississippi (the film would get a less critically-successful musical sequel about Huck), and Tom maturing into a young man.

The film, as I said, is really devoted to the original text-almost every major scene in the novel, from the whitewashing to Tom's "engagement" to Becky to Huck nearly being adopted are all there.  But they are set to music.  With one exception these are pretty inconsequential, though they're well-staged.  Celeste Holm and her two onscreen children singing "Tom Sawyer" is witty & delicious (who knew Celeste Holm would take so well to a musical?) and the entire "Gratification" number would make Oliver proud.  The best, though, is "River Song," which to me comes across as a classic-it's refrained multiple times, and is performed by country music star Charley Pride.  The score was written by John Williams (yes THAT John Williams) and the Sherman Brothers, and though it never quite makes it to the same level as "River Song," I enjoyed it.

The film's other two nominations were for Costume and Art Direction.  Neither of these is particularly special.  It's fun to see little Jodie Foster armed with light blonde hair (her hair looks so much like my childhood best friend and next door neighbor when I was growing up that I did a spit take when I first saw her onscreen) in random assorted outfits, but this is fitting if not all that interesting period work.  The art direction is the same-the best set designs were the steamship, which wasn't built for this film specifically (and apparently is something you can still tour/ride in Wisconsin), and the rolling hillsides, which, again, is more a location scout than an art director's job.  Still, this is good, wholesome fun.  Nothing groundbreaking, but enjoyable.