I saw this film when very young back in the 70s, and didn't remember much about it except that it had some sort of big problem. Saw it again recently, and realized what the problem was right at the end of the film.
Other than being quite melodramatic with many caricatures, Michael Caine with a southern accent, uneven and moving between seriousness and lampooning, I realized the ending was really miserable.
All the other things could be forgiven since the film does capture a viewer's interest, but the ending is such that it seems about 20 or 30 minutes of film was left on the cutting room floor. We have a tragic incident where a white farmer's son is killed in an ill-planned blasting by a KKK styled group of men, and barely a minute after he is set out on a neighbors table, the father is back outside promising to rebuild with no sense of anyone grieving.
Then a couple more minutes pass, and he and his black neighbors are marching to his property with tools and implements, pushing past the Sheriff, to put the farm back into order, with no resolution or prosecution of those responsible for killing the child. It's as if a whole sequence is missing, meaning the boy's funeral, an investigation and the capture of the main character who caused the death, or at least that he has some sort of retribution for his murderous act. It just seems like the editors were told by the producers to make cuts because the film was already too long.
Besides this weird and unsettling rushed ending, the whole setup of the film seems much more like the 1960s when it was filmed rather than the 1940s when it supposedly took place. Had it been about a Vietnam Vet returning home and fighting against a corrupt and bigoted system, rather than a WW2 Vet, it would have been more believable. Even some of the attitudes and clothing, and soundtrack seem more 1960s, when it was filmed, than 1940s. Indeed the battle against racial inequality as presented here is more believable as a 1960s attitude, as it seems more modern than the attitudes of the 1940s.
Other than these two problems, the film is a fairly mediocre but entertaining melodrama, with capital M.
Other than being quite melodramatic with many caricatures, Michael Caine with a southern accent, uneven and moving between seriousness and lampooning, I realized the ending was really miserable.
All the other things could be forgiven since the film does capture a viewer's interest, but the ending is such that it seems about 20 or 30 minutes of film was left on the cutting room floor. We have a tragic incident where a white farmer's son is killed in an ill-planned blasting by a KKK styled group of men, and barely a minute after he is set out on a neighbors table, the father is back outside promising to rebuild with no sense of anyone grieving.
Then a couple more minutes pass, and he and his black neighbors are marching to his property with tools and implements, pushing past the Sheriff, to put the farm back into order, with no resolution or prosecution of those responsible for killing the child. It's as if a whole sequence is missing, meaning the boy's funeral, an investigation and the capture of the main character who caused the death, or at least that he has some sort of retribution for his murderous act. It just seems like the editors were told by the producers to make cuts because the film was already too long.
Besides this weird and unsettling rushed ending, the whole setup of the film seems much more like the 1960s when it was filmed rather than the 1940s when it supposedly took place. Had it been about a Vietnam Vet returning home and fighting against a corrupt and bigoted system, rather than a WW2 Vet, it would have been more believable. Even some of the attitudes and clothing, and soundtrack seem more 1960s, when it was filmed, than 1940s. Indeed the battle against racial inequality as presented here is more believable as a 1960s attitude, as it seems more modern than the attitudes of the 1940s.
Other than these two problems, the film is a fairly mediocre but entertaining melodrama, with capital M.