In Dubious Battle

source: In Dubious Battle

Did you like As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury? You'll want to check out In Dubious Battle, another classic story brought to the big screen by director and actor James Franco. During the Great Depression, migrant workers strike and fight for fairer wages, but since it's based off a John Steinbeck book, so you know it's going to be a touch more dramatic than Norma Rae. Nat Wolff is the main character, but if you've only seen him in quirky movies and can't take him seriously yet, don't worry. He's surrounded by such heavyweights you'll have plenty of other people to focus on. Nat teams up with James Franco and Ahna O'Reilly to stir up activism within poor laborers, and they infiltrate a group of apple pickers headed by Vincent D'Onofrio. Since this is a Steinbeck story, you'll be on the lookout for the "old man with the dog" character: Ed Harris briefly graces the screen, albeit sans canine. Ladies, if you had a crush on the blue-eyed charmer in the '90s, you might want to skip this one. Seeing so many familiar faces in the cast who have worked with Franco in previous films-Nat Wolff, Ahna O'Reilly, Ed Harris, Robert Duvall, Scott Haze, Bryan Cranston, Jack Kehler, Joel Marsh Garland, Selena Gomez, and Keegan Allen-is a big compliment. If someone is difficult or unpleasant to work with, actors generally won't flock to be a part of his next project. Having such a combination of stage and screen legends, including Sam Shepard, attaching their names to his film is a way of publicly declaring their respect for his talent. If you're a Steinbeck fan, or if you haven't seen one a James Franco directed movie yet, pick this one up. It's a very thoughtful piece, and it's great to see so many classically trained actors pooling their talents together. Granted, those who have obviously studied acting and had stage experience constantly show up the younger folks, but that's to be expected.

In my summer reading this year, I am catching up on the John Steinbeck novels I have missed over the years, and just finished In Dubious Battle this week. As other reviewers have pointed out, the movie version omits or rewrites many of the details of the book. But I found the film to be wonderfully faithful to the spirit of the novel, and certainly to the spirit of the labor movements of the 1930s. Moreover, I thought the casting was excellent. Vincent D'Onofrio wonderfully captures the character London. Nat Wolff and James Franco do an above average job of portraying the two radicals attempting to instigate the labor movement. Having Robert Duvall, Ed Harris, and Sam Shepard add their talents to their respective roles leant depth to their characters and a sort of weight to the film. Of course, for the most part, the female characters either did not appear in the novel or were completely reoriented by the script-writer and director. But the characters and actors here also, in my opinion, represented the spirit of the book and the times. I definitely recommend reading the novel before watching the film, but I liked the film very much.

My wife and I watched this at home on BluRay from our public library. In fact she only watched the first half of it because the story moves very slowly. The movie is a screen adaptation of a John Steinbeck novel of the same title. Steinbeck was a California valley and Stanford man, as was James Franco, who read Steinbeck's work in his younger days and made a personal connection with the author who incidentally died 10 years before Franco was born. In the movie, also directed by him, James Franco is activist Mac. We don't learn much about his backstory but he appears to be sympathetic to the cause of migrant workers and ultimately gives up his life for their causes. As the script at the end of the movie tells us, in the 1930s there were perhaps 2000 strikes, most of them ineffective, but ultimately led to recognition of workers' rights to organize and eventually laws regarding minimum wages. The core point in this movie is migrant workers were lured to pick apples in the valley at a promised wage of $3 per day, not much but in the Great Depression a livable wage. When they arrived, essentially broke, the owners would tell them that unfortunately they could only pay $1 per day, take it or leave it. Mac convinces them ultimately to stand up for their rights, to strike until they received a fair wage. Even though the movie is well under 2 hours it seems long because most of it moves slowly and we intuit where it is going ... several clashes between the migrant workers, the orchard owners, and local lawmen who don't want the trouble in their community. There are beatings and shootings, houses and barns burned down in the middle of the night. So in all it isn't a pleasant movie to watch but it depicts an important chapter in American history.

I give this movie a good 5 only for the story line. I'm over James reading a book and then turning it into his next movie project. Some are OK and some are just not worth it, this is one of them. He doesn't act as well as the other actors, mainly because he's too busy playing Director. Start making movies that have your own ideas, not someone else's book or play or whatever. The Actors who are still on top rely on those that write their own stories, please, James, do the same! The movies he has done lately are nothing but trash and idiotic. "Why Him"? Perfect example of not knowing when to say yes to a role and when not to. Put the books down and use your own imagination.

Adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel of the same name. Mac (James Franco) and Jim (Nat Wolff) are worker organizers seen as communists by many. They infiltrate a group of apple pickers in California to create a strike and all the turmoil that follows. While the film is basically pro-labor it does show some of labors dubious tactics as well as a brief land owners argument. The acting was decent with Vincent D'Onofrio, Robert Duvall, Ed Harris, and Sam Shepard in support roles. Selena Gomez was reluctant to have James Franco deliver her baby. Guide: No swearing or nudity. Near sex scene.

"I'll let you do anything you want for a can of sardines." Hahahaha!

Here we have a story that was told well - directing and writing was good, cinematography, editing and sound was great, but the pace was very slow and missing substance. It felt like someone monotonic was telling a story, but with no punch-line, or closing plot message. It wasn't a bad film, and the cast were all on point, but is was just missing that wow factor for me. It's a 6/10 from me.

The movie itself was very good, the acting was great, and the cast couldn't have been much better. However, I found the movie itself was a bit pointless as nothing really happened in it. A bunch of people went on strike, a couple died and we didn't even see what happened in the end, it just ended abruptly. While the acting was superb and even with the great cast that it had, the whole story line could have been better. On the other hand, very few movies have been made about the strikes in the Great Depression and it's good to finally see one, and it was cool that they even incorporated a bit of the first red scare into it.

During the Great Depression of the 1930's, two members of a political activist party start work with apple-pickers at a fruit farm and rally the workers to demand better rights. This was based on a John Steinbeck novel, which I have to admit to not having read. It seems to have been a pretty political work about the labour laws of the day which enabled employers to exploit their workforce by offering extremely low wages. The subject actually seems quite pertinent nowadays considering that we have just gone through another recession with employers being legally allowed to offer workers zero hours contracts. So, the film is a timely reminder that the workforce will unfortunately always have to fight for a fair deal. I thought the film itself was very good, if not necessarily emotionally strong. I didn't feel for the characters as much as I should, as they weren't sketched out quite enough. Having said that, I thought this worked just fine as a message movie. Its subject and time period are pretty unglamorous but it is brought to the screen with authenticity. The film not only looks at the unfairness of the system but also the doubts of those fighting against it. It shows their predicament and illustrated their dilemmas quite well I thought.