Tortilla Flat (1942)

Tortilla Flat (1942) is an American drama film directed by Victor Fleming and starring Spencer Tracy, John Garfield and Hedy Lamarr. The screenplay is based on the 1935 novel by John Steinbeck about a group of work-shirking, wine-guzzling tramps.


Belgian collectors card by Kwatta, Series C, no. 154 Photo: MGM. Hedy Lamarr and John Garfield in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942).


Belgian collector card by Kwatta, Series C, no. 166. Photo: MGM. Hedy Lamarr and John Garfield in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942).


Belgian collectors card by Kwatta, Series C, no. 174. Photo: MGM. John Garfield and Spencer Tracy in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942).

A little idyll filled with solid humour and compassion

Crafty Pilon (Spencer Tracy) lies in the sun and thinks beautiful thoughts, especially about how to take advantage, nicely, of his pals. Their biggest concern each day is how they're going to acquire wine. pilon is one of the poor but lazy paisanos, living along the coast of California. His young and magnetic sidekick Danny Alvarez (John Garfield) inherits from his grandfather two houses in Tortilla Flat, in the central coastal area of California, just outside the old seaport town of Monterey. So Pilon decides to take advantage of him and brings in all his friends to live in one of the houses.

One of the friends, the Pirate (Frank Morgan), is a paisano who goes around with a bunch of dogs. He lives like a tramp but has plenty of money hidden in the woods. He is the only one in the group who does odd jobs. The Pirate is trying to save money to buy a silver golden stick for the Statue of St. Francis in the local Catholic Church. Pilon endeavors to steal the money, until he discovers that the Pirate intends to honour St. Francis for healing his sick dog. The dog is later run over and killed.

When the house of the paisanos burns down, Danny offers his friends to move into the other house with him. In gratitude, Pilon tries to make life better for his friend. Things are fine at first until Danny meets a pretty girl named Dolores (Hedy Lamarr). Then Danny begins to grow less irresponsible, to the horrified disgust of Pilon. Danny actually goes to work in a fishing business.

A misunderstanding caused by Pilon about a vacuum cleaner that Danny had bought for the girl enrages Danny. He becomes drunk and a bit crazy. He almost dies in an accident while interrupting the girl at her work in a cannery, but through Pilon's prayers, he is restored to health. Danny marries his sweetheart, with the promise that he will become a fisherman, now that Pilon has raised the money to buy a boat.

The film's happy ending is different from the novel's ending, in which Danny dies after a fall. Film critic Bosley Crowther of The New York Times gave the film a positive review, writing that the film "is really a little idyll which turns its back on a workaday world...it is filled with solid humour and compassion — and that is pleasant, even for folks who have to work". Frank Morgan received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his poignant portrayal of The Pirate.


French postcard by Editions La Malibran, Saint-Dié, no. CA 22. Photo: M.G.M. Spencer Tracy, Hedy Lamarr and John Garfield in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942).


Spanish postcard, no. 4072. Photo: M.G.M. Hedy Lamarr and John Garfield in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942). The Spanish title is La vida es asi.


American postcard by EKC. Photo: W.T. Gray, Los Angeles. Hedy Lamarr.

Sources: Bosley Crowther (The New York Times), Wikipedia (Dutch, German and English) and IMDb.

Spencer Tracy

American actor Spencer Tracy (1900-1967) was one of the major stars of Hollywood's Golden Age. He was the first actor to win back-to-back Oscars for Captains Courageous (1937) with Freddie Bartholomew, and for playing Father Edward Flanagan in Boys Town (1938) with Mickey Rooney. Considered by his peers as one of the best Hollywood actors, Tracy was noted for his natural performing style and versatility.


Italian postcard by C.C.M. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer.


British postcard. Photo: Fox Films.


British Real Photograph postcard, London, no. FS 153. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM). Victor Fleming and Freddie Bartholomew in Captains Courageous (Victor Fleming, 1937).


British postcard in the Film Partners series, London, no. P 230. Photo: George Hurrell / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Spencer Tracy and Joan Crawford in Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).


Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 71. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Spencer Tracy in A Guy Named Joe (Victor Fleming, 1943), released in Italy in January 1949 as Joe il pilota.


British postcard in The Picturegoer Series, London, no W 738. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer.

Supporting the King of Hollywood

Spencer Bonaventure Tracy was born in 1900 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His parents were truck salesman John Edward Tracy and Caroline Brown Tracy. He had an older brother, Carol.

'Spence' attended no fewer than six high schools and later attended Marquette Academy along with Pat O'Brien. The two left school to enlist in the Navy at the start of World War I. He was still at Norfolk Navy Yard in Virginia at the end of the war. At Ripon College, he did well in the lead of 'The Truth' and decided on acting as a career.

In New York, he roomed with O'Brien while they attended the Academy of Dramatic Arts. In 1923 they both got nonspeaking parts as robots in 'R.U.R'. In stock, he supported himself with jobs as a bellhop, janitor and salesman. John Ford saw his critically acclaimed performance in the lead role in the play 'The Last Mile' and signed him to Up the River (John Ford, 1930) for Fox.

Despite appearing in 16 films there over the next 5 years, Tracy never achieved star status at Fox. During his stint, the studio had floundered and was absorbed into Darryl F. Zanuck's 20th Century Pictures. In 1935 MGM bought Tracy's contract from 20th Century-Fox. Louis B. Mayer thought he would be a good second lead, particularly in support of the studio's #1 male star, Clark Gable.

He made three smash hit films supporting Gable and inevitably lost the girl to the man they called "The King" of Hollywood. After a few years of playing second-fiddle to Gable, Tracy came into his own. He became the first actor to win back-to-back Oscars for Captains Courageous (Victor Fleming, 1937) with Freddie Bartholomew and Lionel Barrymore, and in a project he initially didn't want to star in, Boys Town (Norman Taurog, 1938) with Mickey Rooney. He was nominated again for San Francisco (W.S. Van Dyke, 1938).


Italian postcard by Cinema-Illustrazione, series 2, no. 36. Spencer Tracy and Jean Harlow in Goldie (Benjamin Stoloff, 1931), a remake of Howard Hawks' silent film A Girl in Every Port (1928).


British postcard in the Film Weekly series, London, no. 2.


British postcard by Film Weekly in the Film Shots series. Photo: Fox. Colleen Moore and Spencer Tracy in The Power and the Glory (William K. Howard, 1933).


British postcard by Art Photo, no. 164. Photo: George Hurrell / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Spencer Tracy and Joan Crawford in Mannequin (Frank Borzage, 1937).


British postcard in the Picturegoer, Series, London, no. 1163a. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 1203/1, 1937-1938. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer (MGM).


Dutch postcard by J.S.A., no. 24. Photo: 20th Century Fox. Spencer Tracy in Stanley and Livingstone (Henry King, Otto Brower, 1939).


Belgian postcard by Les Editions d'Art L.A.B., Bruxelles, no. 2016. Photo: MGM. Claudette Colbert and Spencer Tracy in Boom Town (Jack Conway, 1940).

One of MGM's top stars

By the 1940s, Spencer Tracy was one of MGM's top stars. Tracy made nine films with Katharine Hepburn, the first of which was Woman of the Year (George Stevens, 1942) and the last Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (Stanley Kramer, 1967). She also became his flame for the rest of his life.

After the war, Tracy was nominated for the Oscar for Father of the Bride (Vincente Minnelli, 1950), Bad Day at Black Rock (John Sturges, 1955), The Old Man and the Sea (John Sturges, 1958), Inherit the Wind (Stanley Kramer, 1960), Judgment at Nuremberg (Stanley Kramer, 1961), and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (Stanley Kramer, 1967).

He had a brief romantic relationship with Loretta Young in the 1930s and a lifelong one with Hepburn beginning in 1942. His Catholic beliefs precluded ever divorcing his wife, Louise Ten Broeck Treadwell, whom he had married in 1923, though they lived apart.

Tracy suffered from severe alcoholism and diabetes (from the late 1940s), which unfortunately impacted his willingness to accept several tailor-made roles in films that would become big hits. Although his drinking problems were well known, he was inarguably considered one of the best actors in Hollywood among his peers (he had a well-deserved reputation for keeping co-stars on their toes for his oddly endearing scene-stealing tricks) and remained in demand.

A few weeks after completion of Stanley Kramer's Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (Stanley Kramer, 1967), during which he suffered from lung congestion, he died of a heart attack. Longtime companion Katharine Hepburn did not attend his funeral out of respect for his family. Tracy is interred at Forest Lawn, Glendale, CA, in the Garden of Everlasting Peace. Tracey and his wife had two children, John Ten Broeck Tracy (1924-2007) and daughter, Louise Treadwell 'Susie' Tracy (1932). Son John was born deaf. His wife, Louise, became an activist for deaf education, establishing the John Tracy Clinic at USC.


Belgian collectors card by Kwatta, Bois D'Haine, no. C. 174. Photo: M.G.M. John Garfield and Spencer Tracy in Tortilla Flat (Victor Fleming, 1942).


German collectors card in the 'Filmgrössen aus aller Welt" series II. Spencer Tracy in A Guy Named Joe (Victor Fleming, 1943).


Italian postcard by B.F.F. Edit., no. 3628. Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer.


British postcard, no. 70. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.


Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 47. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Spencer Tracy and Signe Hasso in The Seventh Cross (Fred Zinnemann, 1944).


Vintage postcard, no. 751. Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Irene Dunne and Spencer Tracy in A Guy Named Joe (Victor Fleming, 1943).


Belgian collector's card. Photo: MGM. Valentina Cortese and Spencer Tracy in Malaya (Richard Thorpe, 1949).


Belgian collectors card by Kwatta, no. C. 232. Photo: MGM. Spencer Tracy in Father of the Bride (Vincente Minnelli, 1950).


Belgian collectors card by Kores "Carboplan". Photo: Metro Goldwyn Mayer. Spencer Tracy and little Ruta Fox in Father's Little Dividend (Vincente Minnelli, 1951).


American postcard by The American Postcard Co., Inc., no. 286, 1981. Photo: Roddy McDowall.

Sources: Ed Stephan (IMDb), Wikipedia and IMDb.