The Sun Shines Bright

A masterpiece and reputedly John Ford's personal favourite from among his own movies. The sentimentality quotient is unnaturally high, even by Ford's standards and the racial stereotypes are appalling but this is still one of the cinema's greatest pieces of folk-art. It speaks of an American South about as realistic as the Ireland of "The Quiet Man" or "The Rising of the Moon", (another great, under-rated Ford film), where the old guard still cling to memories of a hopelessly romantic past, where blacks are treated 'honourably', even if their sole purpose is to play the banjo and the harmonica and in the name of the eponymous actor to 'Stepin Fetchit'.

By today's standards the film is anything but PC but it has an innocence that transcends its stereotypes and Ford handles the set pieces magnificently. In particular, the funeral of the 'fallen woman', (and mother of the heroine), that ends the film is deeply moving and is among the high points of Ford's work. The film itself is a remake of Ford's earlier "Judge Priest" with Charles Winninger in the role made famous by Will Rogers, but this is altogether superior.

This film although rarely shown, has one beautiful vignette after another. Although a remake of Fords JUDGE PRIEST,we see a small town,where everybody is brought together by Charlie Winninger who portrays Judge Priest. The scene where he campaigns for the decent burial for the Prostitute who has come home to die, just might be one of the finest sequences ever put on film. A film only Ford could pull off, and does!! Don,t miss this one.

It is a lovely film to watch. Archie Stout one of fords favorite cameraman, shot it. The last scene where Judge Priest is seen in the doorway echos the last scene in the Searchers. It is a film about loyalty, honor and redemption. But there are scenes where the black people of the town are shown to be childlike, and in awe of their white leaders. This marks the film as a product of a time long past. Some of the scenes of the black people are demeaning. But over all, Judge Preists sense of honor, his fairness to all, his sense of decency looms over the film. Ford makes Judge Priest (played by Charles Winninger in his best role) a heroic figure. But a figure that is isolated even in a crowd. A former bugler he is left to carry on the codes of honor and fairness that the old south thought it contained. People vote for him, return him to office year after year, yet he goes into his home alone. He is man out of his time. A man of the community but set apart from it by his strict adherence to his code. Some of the acting in the film is over acting. But the last fifteen minutes are lovely to watch.

John Ford had a fondness for The Sun Shines Bright. It's a beautiful tale of an honorable old man who even while facing a tough re-election for town judge refuses to be a hypocrite or play up to a lot of his town's hypocrites.

The film was done before as Judge Priest with Will Rogers in the title role. As good as The Sun Shines Bright is, it would have been even better had John Ford not chosen to use Stepin Fetchit in the same part he had in the original film. Stepin Fetchit is, well Stepin Fetchit. Funny thing is that a whole lot of black players are used in this film and their roles are not as stereotypical as his is.

Charles Winninger is every bit as good as Will Rogers in the lead. If you can imagine Captain Andy from Show Boat had he taken up the law instead of show business, you get some idea of what Judge William Pittman Priest is all about. Justice is blind in his courtroom, but it isn't deaf and dumb also. In Winninger's life as well as his courtroom.

He's up for re-election in his small Kentucky county and he's got a hard fighting opponent in prosecutor Milburn Stone. Priest is a proud Confederate veteran, but he's not above saving an innocent black kid from a lynch mob.

Nor is he above a little Christian charity when it comes to seeing a fallen woman who just came to town to see her daughter before she died given a proper funeral service. When no accredited minister will do the service, Winninger fills in at the pulpit and has some choice words taken from the parable about the woman caught in sin.

My favorite scene in The Sun Shines Bright is the funeral procession for the same woman. Winninger is the head of the local United Confederate Veterans and Henry O'Neill is the head of the local Grand Army of the Republic chapter. They are friends and friendly rivals. Yet on that day Republican O'Neill and Democrat Winninger both lead the funeral procession. Too bad our Republicans and Democrats of today can't agree on some common values.

How does this impact on Winninger's election? You'll have to watch the beautiful and poetic The Sun Shines Bright to find out.

'The Sun Shines Bright' is my all-time favourite movie and, though it is now more than 50 years old, there is not one better that has been made since. I first saw it on BBC TV way back and, having taped it for my own use, I never tire of it. The plot, based on stories by Irvin S. Cobb, is beautifully acted out, especially by Charles Winninger as Judge Billy Priest. The evolving drama is most moving. The post-Civil War period setting and atmosphere are perfectly caught by the greatest of all movie directors, John Ford, and the 'moral' (an apparently out-dated word, but still as relevant today as in the 1950s when the movie was made) of this splendid entertainment is still worth marking, learning and inwardly digesting. If Kentucky is still as it is pictured, even if in black-and-white, may I please move there right now?!