The Grapes of Wrath

The adaptation of Nobel Prize-winner John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of dirt-poor Dust Bowl migrants by 4-time Oscar-winning director John Ford starred Henry Fonda as Tom Joad, who opens the movie returning to his Oklahoma home after serving jail time for manslaughter. En route, Tom ...more

John Ford's The Grapes of Wrath is arguably the director's greatest movie, and the rare Hollywood film superior to its literary source (a view shared by the novel's author, John Steinbeck). Indeed, it is the movie that sums up the impact of the Great Depression, at least on rural America, better than any other film of its time (and there were hundreds that tried, by everyone from Frank Capra to Preston Sturges). From the opening shot of Tom Joad's return to the ruined land where he grew up, the ...more