Wind Across the Everglades

source: Wind Across the Everglades

Trailer—Wind Across the Everglades

Wind Across the Everglades

It's the turn of the century. Ornithologist Walt Murdock (Christopher Plummer) arrives in the Florida Everglades to photograph local birds and to enforce the newly declared bird/animal sanctuary. Walt finds himself confronted by a family of poachers led by Cottonmouth (Burl Ives) and the local trade in feather plumage. This apparently had a troubled production. The swamp people has shades of Deliverance with shocks of bright colors. There are some great natural views but the production can get stuck in the mud. The ecological and native themes are a bit ahead of its time. On the other hand, the melodrama and old costumes feel old. Most of this is a bit of a mess until the last section. It's as if the film figured out that it has two great actors in the cast. It becomes a mano-a-mano film and it's so good. The first two thirds is an interesting fail but it becomes almost electric in the last act.

I saw this title as a young boy (7 or 8) and got seriously warped by its palpably sensual cinematography and scenes of fetishistic violence. It takes place in fin de siecle Florida with Burl Ives as the head of a bunch of exotic bird poachers and Christopher Plummer as the driven game warden trying to shut down their action. The violence I remember is a fight between Plummer and one of Ive's gang called 'Jockey' who lays about Plummer viciously with a riding crop before Plummer beats the crap out of him in a pool of ankle deep muck. Ives picks up the half-dead Jockey (who always wears riding silks) and carries his senseless, mud-drenched form as tenderly as a child, "You can sleep in my bed tonight, Jockey" he says - creepy as hell. In another scene a man is tied to a 'poison tree' and left overnight to die, screaming. The next morning we see his body, still tied to the tree, his face covered with oozing blisters. Horrible. And yep, I'd love to see this flick again!

Playing like a demented cross between Fellini & Lil' Abner, Budd Schulberg's & Nicholas Ray's film features Christopher Plummer in one of his first roles. He plays an ornithologist working in the Florida Everglades and attempting to stop swamp gangster Burl Ives & his goons from pouching the bird population. Ives is ruthless but Plummer proves a worthy adversary. Director Ray and writer Schulberg create quite a potboiler leading up to an all-night moonshine drink-off between Plummer & Ives. The actors are all perfect (among Ives's posse is a young Peter Falk and a make-up-less Emmett Kelley). Curt Conway plays the "prefesser." The art direction is by Richard Sylbert & the stunning cinematography is by Joseph C. Brun, who later shot FLIPPER (also filmed in the Sunshine state).

I love this movie and the important message to brings!

Burl Ives and his band of lowlife bird poachers are the equivalent of the "rednecks" in "Deliverance". Christopher Plummer on the other hand is their Audobon Society adversary, trying to protect the tropical birds and their valuable feathers. When the movie is in the Everglades, it moves along at a pretty good pace, while the Miami scenes feel padded. I'd imagine there has to be at least a bunch of fashionable ladies parading around in their feathered hats to make a point, but the scene on the beach and Gypsy Rose Lee's ladies of the evening are somewhat overplayed. The film is strongest when Ives and Plummer are on screen, almost everyone else is forgettable. I would rate this only slightly above average, but definitely watchable. - MERK

Taken in the context of the 'feather' craze that almost decimated the birds of the Everglades at the turn of the 20th Century, this movie -almost- presaged Rachel Carson and Marjorie Stoneman Douglas. A moving depiction of the River Of Grass, those who lived WITH it and those who tried to DESTROY it. Christopher Plummer and Burl Ives gave this movie a depth that seemed effortless It deserved a wider release and I can only hope it will be issued as a DVD. It was based upon a true story of a federal wildlife ranger. The Manchineal trees have been displaced by Malelucas, what a pity, I would rope all the inhabitants of South Florida to the formers caustic trunks and enjoy he howls of pain

For it's time, I considered it original, thought-provoking, and typical of Schulberg's quirky, off-beat style. I would rate "Wind Across the Everglades", as a movie ahead of it's time, given it's now much-debated theme. I still remember--after almost 40 years---Burl Ives speaking lines which included the phrase "A man's an eel", or did I hear it right? Finally, it was the first film in which I ever saw ChristopherPlummer. I would dearly love to see it again, but it's seldom on television, and in my home town of Sligo, in the Irish Republic, it is not available on video or DVD. Well,that's about wraps my comment. Goodbye, and thank you Paddy Coen.