Bayou (1957)

Director:

Harold Daniels

Writers:

Edward I. Fessler (screenplay)
Edward I. Fessler (story)

Release Date:

June 1957 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Tagline:

Somewhere, a 15-year old girl may be a teenager... in the Cajun country, she's a woman full-grown! ...and every Bayou man knows it!

Plot:

A New York architect meets a Cajun beauty in a remote bayou village.

Plot Keywords:

Grindhouse | Cult Favorite | B Movie | Psychotronic | White Trash

Cast

Peter Graves	...	Martin Davis
Lita Milan	...	Marie Hebert
Douglas Fowley	...	Emil Hebert
Jonathan Haze	...	Bos
Ed Nelson	...	Etienne (as Edwin Nelson)
Eugene Sonfield	...	Jean Tithe
Evelyn Hendrickson	...	Doucette
Milton Schneider	...	Cousine
Michael Romano	...	Felician
Timothy Carey	...	Ulysses (as Tim Carey)

Directed by
Harold Daniels

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Edward I. Fessler		screenplay
Edward I. Fessler		story

Produced by
M.A. Ripps	....	producer

Original Music by
Edward I. Fessler
Gerald Fried

Cinematography by
Ted Saizis
Vincent Saizis

Film Editing by
Maurice Wright

Costume Design by
Leon K. Zainey

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Harry Templeton	....	first assistant director

Sound Department
Don McKay	....	sound mixer

Visual Effects by
Louis DeWitt	....	photographic effects
Jack Rabin	....	photographic effects

Music Department
Gerald Fried	....	conductor
Gilbert D. Marchant	....	music editor (as Gilbert Marchant)

Production Companies

• American National Films

Distributors

• United Artists (1957) (USA) (theatrical)
• Cinema Distributors of America (1961) (USA) (theatrical) (retitled re-release with new footage)
• Peerless Films (1967) (Canada) (theatrical)
• Continental Video (1985) (USA) (VHS) (as "Poor White Trash")
• Monterey Home Video (1996) (USA) (VHS)
• Sinister Cinema (2001) (USA) (VHS) ("Poor White Trash" version)

Also Known As:

"Poor White Trash" - USA (recut version)

Runtime:

83 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Sound Mix:

Mono

Filming Locations:

Barataria Bay, Louisiana, USA

Company:

American National Films

Trivia:

Repackaged as "Poor White Trash", The film ran for years on the south's drive-in circuit on a successful double feature with the similarly themed "I Hate Your Guts" (aka Shame).

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Polyester (1981)

Soundtrack:

BAYOU SONG

What a Wonderful Swamp!

Many know the story of this notorious trash classic. United Artists released it as LEGEND OF THE BAYOU in 1956, and it went nowhere. Infamous exploitation guru M.A. Ripps acquired re-release rights, slapped on a new wraparound and title, and sent it out to drive-ins across America with a lurid ad campaign that whet the appetites of all but the dead ("Due to the abnormal subject matter depicted in POOR WHITE TRASH, no-one under 17 will be admitted, and armed policemen will be on hand at all times!!!") And there the legend ends for most people, who've never seen the film, due to reviewers dismissing it as "mediocre", "boring," "a real nothing," etc. But in fact, PWT is a well-crafted, steamy and gripping melodrama with gorgeous black and white photography and enough over-the-top performances to put it on anyone's cultfilm faves list. Graves, fresh from IT CONQUERED THE WORLD, is engaging as Martin, wimpy white-bread architect who learns he must fight, and fight dirty, to survive in backwoods America (and get the sexy chick). Milan is fiery and flirty as the sultry half-breed, speaking with a French accent but looking more like an Italian maid or Gypsy fortune teller. Tim Carey plays the villain, a nasty Greek jerk named Ulysses, in a performance that can only be described as breathtaking. U's Cajun dance, in which he grabs at himself up and howls like a wolf, looks like a cross between convulsive seizure and autoerotic stimulation, and is one of the most astoundingly bizarre moments in cultfilm history. And if that don't get you, how about everybody's favorite nebbish, Jonathan Haze, as Ulysses' deaf-mute flunky? Most of the remaining, peripheral characters talk in such a heavy (probably authentic) French/Cajun accent, you can't understand but half of it. Director Daniels really knows what he's doing. There's some great montage work and optical tricks worthy of the best foreign art film. There's an excruciatingly sensual rape scene, where Marie and Ulysses run through the dark woods and tangle in the muddy swamps, that's arty and sexual and very heavy (and also gives the film its notorious near-nude scene, as the busty Marie rolls around the mud in bra and panties). When, at film's end, Marie and Martin finally get it together, they do it in a shack during a curiously-timed hurricane, giving their animal passion a most apt and gripping visual metaphor. With this and A DATE WITH DEATH (the infamous subliminal motion picture) under his belt, Daniels is one of the unexplored enigmas of 50s indie filmmaking. And its all punctuated by a great, virtually avant-garde score by Gerald Fried, blending various ethnic musical motifs, including some percussive riffs that are downright experimental. Producer Ripps' addition to this flick, other than its healthy second life, is a silly wraparound wherein a wandering minstrel strolls through the shady glen, plucking a banjo and singing the title song, which sounds suspiciously like a rip-off of that old public domain chestnut, "Shortnin' Bread". Now, thanks to crystal-clear video, we can see, as opposed to being the laughable throwaway piece of trashfilm lore, what an astounding film this really is.