Shadrach

This is movie portrays childhood, summer and the 30s in a wonderful and poetic way. An old man's will to be buried in the land he was born is no easy subject to put up in a movie, but the makers managed to give this story a very touchy style which helped it a lot. Children should watch it and learn what the Depression was like and how close we actually are to those days (the boy is alive nowadays and has met a man who has been a slave - history's not that far at all). And they would also learn a very deep lesson on life and its ways.

For once Andie McDowell stars in a role different from the high-class girl she used to play (think about Green Card and The Groundhog Day). And for once Harvey Keitel doesn't get on my nerve!

I knew nothing of this movie, and chose it based on its stars, whom I have enjoyed in the past. The movie was an immensely pleasant surprise. I was most taken by intrinsic goodness and respect for dignity of the obviously low class, hard cussin', hard drinkin', smelly, Dabneys. Excellent.

I've read quite a few reviews here and at other sites, and this movie sure seems to be taking its lumps (although I did read some favorable reviews). I don't know, though -- I rather liked it. It is a simple and straightforward story. It is certainly sentimentalized to some extent, but I am not one of those people for whom that is anathema. Despite its hard times, depression-era setting and poor white trash characters, there is a certain amount of idealization in the film. My gut feelings are that in real life Mr. Dabney, being a product of his time, would be more hard-hearted towards old Shadrach. Andie MacDowell is likeable as Mrs. Dabney, but she looked far too healthy and aerobically svelte to be the beer-guzzling alcoholic mother of a large, unwashed, lice-infested family living below the poverty level. Just having her clutch a beer bottle in almost every scene didn't quite pull off the illusion. Despite its simplification of complex social issues, its idealization of human nature fondly remembered in old age left me with kind of a warm fuzzy feeling. Some reviewers have rated "Shadrach" as being of "TV movie" quality, but I think a vice common to many TV movies is avoided here. Namely, trying to deal with tough, complex issues comprehensively in 90 to 120 minutes. The story is scaled down to its essence, and as such is nicely handled in an hour and a half. While Shadrach himself is sort of an enigma, trying to tell the story of his 99-year-long life in any sort of satisfying way could have expanded the film to epic, miniseries length. A film which touches on the issue of slavery in America, even obliquely, is bound to leave a certain amount of people unsatisfied if it does not proceed to rail at length about Man's inhumanity to Man. I just don't think that was the point of the film, though, and no film can satisfy everyone's expectations. I just see this as a sweet, sentimental, (and sure, rather unrealistic) view of events in a certain time and place, as seen through the eyes of a child. The fact that in a dream sequence young Paul sees Shadrach being presented with a Micky Mouse watch in the middle of the 19th century illustrates that we are seeing a child's-eye view of this story. I liked "Shadrach" enough to buy the video, and I think it's gotten sort of a bum rap.

How refreshing it is to see a movie about northeastern North Carolina-southeastern Virginia that could actually have been filmed in the area and that features people who could actually have lived here! Well, it was a bit hard to believe that after living a hard life and birthing that many children, Andie McDowell's character would still look young, thin, and pretty. If I thought it would make me look like that, I'd take up drinking beer.

Amazingly, Harvey Keitel is believable as the irascible father, and his accent is even tolerable. Perhaps what is amazing is his versatility as an actor, since he was also believable as Baines in "The Piano," Auggie in "Smoke" and "Blue in the Face," the police detective in "Thelma and Louise," and all those heavies in all those gangster films.

What should you expect if you view this film? A glimpse at what this part of the world looked like before WWII and farm-to-market roads and typhoid shots and birth control; a child's-eye view of growing up in a rural family in the Depression; a story about doing what's right. I liked it.

Expanded from the short story of the same name from the little book "A Tidewater Morning" by William Styron, Shadrach is a wonderful film. If you haven't read the short-short story, you are in for a treat. When we are young, we feel a pull to leave; when we are old we are pulled back to where we came from. To walk from Alabama to Virginia to be buried where you grew up. A 100 year old former slave. That's a story.