The Green Pastures

"The Green Pastures" is a far from perfect film and I am pretty sure quite a few folks would be offended by the picture. In fact, the DVD begins with a written disclaimer that explains that the content is offensive when seen today. Obviously, times have changed and the film's patronizing style is out of style in the 21st century--but it's also a film you should see as there really isn't anything like it--even MGM's "Cabin in the Sky". And, in some ways, it's rather beautiful.

The film features an all-black cast--something very unusual for a production from a major studio. It consists of young black children listening to Bible stories and shows the kids' conception of what these events must have been like. The stories are seldom literal--and are quite different from the Biblical originals (such as having only one plague instead of the ten from the story of Moses). But there is also a certain beauty in the stories that show a literal physical God interacting with angels and people on Earth. Sure, it's NOT something that seminary professors would heartily endorse, but the film isn't meant to be literal.

As I said above, the stories are all done with a black cast--even Rex Ingram as God (called 'Da Lawd'). And, although patronizing in style and possessing a few awful stereotypes (such as folks shooting dice), the film is also gentle and good-natured and I assume the film was NOT intended to harm anyone. In other words, the manner is not one to put down black America but perhaps unintentionally minimizes them by often portraying them with a certain child-like innocence. You just have to see it to know what I mean.

So how did this film manage to still get an 8. After all, it surely has a lot of problems! Well, the artistry is the reason. Along with some very nice acting, the film has terrific sets, nice direction and is just lovely. See this one.

The origins of The Green Pastures are from the anthology of stories published by writer Roarke Bradford who entitled his volume Ol Man Adam An' His Chillun. Written in 1928 it was adapted into a play by Algonquin Round Table member Marc Connelly and for an incredible 640 performances during the height of the Depression. In 1936 Warner Brothers purchased the rights and did this film version of the play utilizing a whole load of black players in the film colony.

The Green Pastures got two revivals on Broadway, but you don't hear of it being revived in the post Civil Rights era. It hasn't had the staying power at all of Porgy and Bess which had similar origins.

The story is told from the eyes of a child in a rural black church's Sunday school who is hearing the story of Genesis and imagining what the people would be like in her mind. De Lawd is played by Rex Ingram and this would become two of his career roles, the other being the genie in The Thief Of Bagdad. Personally I can imagine him being God far better than George Burns.

The characters of the Bible are for these people invested with a lot of human qualities, more like the Greek and Roman deities of antiquity than the traditional white Christian view. My favorite scene is the one where the only good man in a world awash with sin is that preacher Noah played by Eddie Anderson. When Ingram visits him and tells him he's starting over and to build an ark and take male and female of everything for breeding, Anderson starts haggling with De Lawd over the amount of spirits to be taken on this sea voyage for medicinal purposes only you understand.

Of course the Ark does its 40 days and 40 nights thing and then just sails around until some land starts to emerge. Personally back in those days polygamy was in and I never understood why Noah and the boys didn't have some extra wives along. The task before them might have been fun, populating the earth again, but it sure put a strain on their wives.

A film like The Green Pastures has a childlike innocence about it, it would have to in order to succeed on stage and screen. It's not likely to see any revivals due to changing times and sensitivities. But it remains an entertaining if quaint vehicle today.

The Green Pastures enacts Old Testament Bible stories as seen through the eyes of rural black children. The movie begins in a ramshackle church, generations ago, presumably in the Deep South. As the Sunday School teacher relates the Bible stories we are transported to Heaven to witness the Creation, the Banishment from the Garden of Eden, the Flood, and the Exodus. An all-black cast, speaking in the rural idiom, and set in modern day (1930s) surroundings makes for one of the most unique movies you will ever see.

All the pieces fit together perfectly. It's a joy to watch, deeply spiritual, and the gospel choir accompaniment is an added treat. Grade A.

Before I get into the film itself, here's the little known back-story. Roark Bradford, a white Tennesseean, was mesmerized as a boy by the sermons of a black preacher named John Wesley Henning (aka "Preacher Wes). Rev. Henning entertained and educated his audiences with imaginative biblical tales done in a fashion in which his rural black audiences could relate. Years later in 1928, Henning's twists on biblical tales were the basis of Bradford's book "Ol Man Adam and His Chillun." Marc Connely enjoyed the book, and the result was the play and film "The Green Pastures." The film and play adds the charming frame device of Mr. Deeshay, a black Sunday school teacher telling the Biblical tales from Bradford's text with Noah, Adam. Moses, et.al. as Southern rural blacks. Much has been said about the dialect and stereotypes. Fact is, the dialect is pretty close to the truth of this time and place, as my parents were of that generation (there is a reference to "Sonny Kick Mammy Wine." My parents would make me laugh at their description of a popular moonshine called "Fight Your Mama" that was supposed to have been so potent that it would make the drinker do as the title suggested).

However, the film, as well as much of Bradford's work, is filled with moving truths about the human condition. Witness the dialog between a pre-Rochester Eddie Anderson as Noah and the dignified Rex Ingram as God, as well as the observations about human nature made throughout the film. As for ending, I won't spoil it, but the final scene before the credits says the true message of the film without saying a word. Watch it with an open mind, enjoy, and think.

Incidentally, in 1963, the great comedian Mantan Moreland (who had a bit part as an angel in "The Green Pastures") went back to the source and recorded an album of tales from the source "Ol Man Adam And His Chillun." It's as delightful as the film and along with the original books, make a great addendum to the film.

I first saw "The Green Pastures" quite by accident as a 13 year-old while visiting grandparents in Detroit, Michigan many, many years ago...I never forgot it.

Years later, in college, while on a date, I was telling my date about it and we stopped by the school library so I could find a copy of the play to show her...she loved it, too. I've since bought the tape and watch it every now-and-then when I want to smile and feel good.

I remember asking my mom about the movie when I first saw it and always remembered her response..."how do you think the little black children in the movie pictured God and others in the Bible?" And that, of course, is exactly what Marc Connelly was trying to get us to think about.

Though the original play/movie may have met resistance in the South, it was a hit in New York. To the eternal historical revisionists of today who see nothing but stereotypes and negative images, I'd suggest you take another look.

Country folk of the early part of this century did talk with accents and few had much education (whites as well as blacks). The dialog of the film is less a contrived stereotype than it is a snapshot of what the simple life was like. It's not hard for me to imagine a dedicated Mr. Deshee teaching kids in Sunday School about the good book. Nor is it hard to understand why they might picture pharoe's guards in double-breasted suits like the gangsters in the news of their youth, or relating any number of other scenes to what was familiar to them.

Connelly was not trying to convert viewers to religion...he was trying to get those already converted to see the personal relationship with God enjoyed by all his children, regardless of their station in life.

There are no whites in the movie, just as there were no whites in the immediate community where the story takes place. This movie was not made with the burden of every social dilemma we've struggled with over the years. To blindly force modern perceptions and racial baggage on it does nothing but dampen the simple joy of this unique gem.