The Migrants

This movie was filmed at various locations in Cumberland County, New Jersey, where I've lived my whole life. I was five years old when this movie was filmed. I remember going with my parents one time to see the cast and film crew shoot a scene in a field near where I grew up. After the filming concluded, the cast signed autographs for fans at the local fire hall. It was all really great having Hollywood come to a small town like ours.

As a senior at an all-boys Jesuit high school, we the entire student body were required to watch this. It was part of the school's relentless insistence that we in all ways should be Men for Others.

I've remebered this film ever since as my awakening awareness of the poor.

Recommended by a friend, I reluctantly watched this film, dreading the thought of watching familiar actors reenact the Joad family. Instead, I was mesmerized by a life made real by the extraordinary talents of Cloris Leachman and Ron Howard. This IS the Joad family, as they existed in more recent times in the South. The film continues to haunt my thoughts years later.

Unlike today's younger family society that relies far too heavily on the government to put food on their plate (food stamps), a roof over their head (social housing), and a regular pay check (social and medical welfare) this family of nomads, the Barlow family, toiled in farmers fields picking fruit and/or vegetables from daylight to daybreak as they traveled in a caravan with other migrant workers from one farmers fields, to the next.

As much as the work needed to be completed by menial workers who were shunned from actually entering the towns, they toiled in the nearby fields and their foreman would go into town and pick up any supplies that the migrant workers needed and charge them a little more for his services.

This nomadic life still exists for many families, but mainly by immigrant workers who are not afraid of hard work unlike many North American people are today. The film has a stellar cast of A-lister actors and their solid performances are well worth watching. It is a tough life as migrant workers that they had no choice in becoming migrant workers as a family and it is a good reminder for all of us that our lives could be so much worse, so suck it up butter cup and appreciate what we have today.

A solid 6 out of 10 rating

Lots of low-key, powerful acting. The moments of emotional 'pay off' are built slowly and with great care. Did Ron Howard ever have a better moment on screen then the time he almost escapes the migrant life but finds himself trapped again when a family member dies and he is needed to work and cries out with real anguish "Nothing ever works out!"?

But the real gem of the film? It is the moment when Cloris Leachman 'loses it'. A sadistic sheriff is going to confiscate the family's pitiful but 'illegal' rabbit trap which is the only way they can put some meat on the table. Her authentic and 'full body' hysteria is the equal of her Academy Award winning moment at the end of The Last Picture Show. She literally holds nothing back - in both films it is scary its so good!

A young Sissy Spacek plays Ron Howard's sister and Cindy Williams (of Laverne and Shirley fame) is natural and delightful as Ron's girlfriend. The sets, people and detail are realistic and not 'prettied up'. When I look at all the crap on DVD, why can't they give this a decent treatment? Who wrote this? LANFORD Wilson, famous playwright and he used a TENNESSEE WILLIAMS short story as the basis - meeting and working it out with Tennessee!