Hallelujah
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Movie Reviews of Hallelujah
Movie Review: more than just an artifact
Summary: 4 Stars
king vidors "hallelujah" was the only hollywood mainstream film with a black cast until the 1940s. as such, it has historical signicance, but it merits viewing on its own terms as well. while it seems patronizing to todays culture, it is rather progressive about racial stereotyping for its day. strong performances by a now mostly forgotten cast, and a great musical score. definitely worth a view.Movie Review: Hallelujah New DVD
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a very good story, but the quality of the reproduction was very noticeable at times. I enjoyed watching it and will share it with me visiting friends.Movie Review: Hallelujah-a movie better in intentions than execution.
Summary: 3 Stars
"Hallelujah",released in August of 1929,is a movie that was much better in intention and idea by famed director King Vidor,than in its' final execution on film.The film is ultimately weighed down by its'theme and the music which enhances it;interwoven throughout.One of the first all-black cast movies/musicals it may have been,but it is more a testament to and furthering of movie making in general than a furtherance of the black condition that existed at that time.
The story is about peace,sin,death,redemption and finally peace again;life in full circle,as experienced through a totally black perspective.No whites appear at any time in the film;a plus or minus depending on your perspective.It opens with the strains of "Swanee River" and concerns the story of Zeke(Dan Haynes)who lives on a cotton plantation with his family,Mammy(Fanny DeKnight),Father/Parson(Harry Gray),Spunk,his brother(Everitt McGarrity)and Missy Rose(Victoria Spivey).After a particularly successful crop of cotton is picked Zeke is off to the cotton mill to sell it,with Spunk.With $50 in hand a dancer,Chick(Nina Mckinney) catches his eye.Before he knows it he is playing a crooked game of craps with her compatriot and boyfriend Hot Shot(Bill Founatine).A scuffle ensues and Spunk who has been searching for Zeke arrives on the scene just as shots are fired,and he dies enroute home.
Zeke is beside himself and is too ashamed to attend his brothers' funeral.His pastor father comforts him with words of Grace and Zeke becomes reborn.Zeke now "Ezekial the Prophet" travels the countryside on a train,preaching the good Word to all who will listen and performing baptismals in nearby rivers.At one such stop Chick resurfaces with Hot Shot in tow,who set into beratting him as he passes(riding ala' Jesus on a donkey!).Later Chick attends his outside sermon and she becomes a convert to his preachings.During her baptismal she is overcome and he takes her into a tent where his amooruous feelings start to get the better of him until Mammy walks in and interupts him.It is just a reprieve as during an evening revival meeting at a church Chick again attends but this time the two slip away,leaving his stunned parents,congregation and Miss Rosy to whom he had expressed intentions of marrying a short while before,in disbelief.
We next find Zeke now working in a sawmill.Upon his return home one day there is a suspicious buggy parked outside his house.Unbeknownst to him Chick has re-connected with Hot Shot and she plans to leave Zeke.When Zeke falls asleep she sneaks out of the house.As the two make their get away Zeke unrelentingly follows them on foot.At one point a wheel breaks off sending Chick flying onto the ground.Her wounds are fatal and she dies in Zeke's arms.Inconsolable Zeke pursues Hot Shot along the road,through the woods and into a swamp where he finally catches him and kills him.
Zeke is caught and sentenced to hard time and finally gets released.Riding the rails back home(singing "Coming Home")he arrives and walks back down the dirt roads he knows so well.His mother is the first to greet him after which the entire family joins in.His father tells him he is just in time to help with the cotton picking and he and Missy Rose are reconciled once more.
Vidor,a Texan by birth,wanted to do something along the lines of the successful 1927 stage play "Porgy",but on film.He met with vehement opposition by many and finally offered to put up his share of his salary in order to do it.When he arrived in Memphis,Tennesse to do film it,none of the sound equipment had arrived.So he went ahead and filmed it as a "silent" picture and added additional scenes in the studio in Hollywood.However all sound filmed on location were recorded and edited in LATER! An astounding and unimaginable undertaking at that time,which caused one of the editors to go beserk and smash a reel of film against a wall.Being shot silent however allowed for a better flow of camera movement.Most of these early takies were necessarily static creatures,filmed in scenes where the actors gathered around a central mike overhead or ones hidden strategically in plants or elsewhere on the set;and all cameras were sealed in large boxes to minimize noise.Location shooting was a rarity.
Many of the scene's re the black experience,DID ring true for the day such as Hot Shot's crap shooting,the revival meetings in the south and the resultant fervour of its' congregations,Zekes' train-like preaching technique used countless times,the unloading,baling and loading of the cotton onto steamboats and even Chick singing "The St Louis Blues" when she was going to leave Zeke(common practice when giving the air to a hubby or sweetheart!).Many scenes also are quite gripping such as his brother's death scene in the bar when he is first shot,Chicks death scene and Zekes' chasing of Hot Shot through the swamp.
Where the film falters is in Vidor's stretching of every major scene throughout most of the film.From the opening scenes at Zeke's home to his later sermons,all are stretched well beyond what they should be.It is understandable that Vidor wanted to enhance the "flavour" of each scene but it gets a bit tedious.This goes on for most of the movie until the last five to ten minutes after we see Zeke kill Hot Shot.From here the movie zooms to its' conclusion from Zeke on the rock pile,travelling home on the rails and then reuniting with his family.It is disturbingly fast and noticable.Also Vidor wants us to believe that blacks are oft times sexually obssessed and almost childlike in their fears and no matter what they do,in the end it matters not what crime they have committed or what they have done,all will be instantly forgiven.This does not ring true at all,no matter what culture we view;now or in the past.
Vidor was one of the great directors of his time("The Big Parade","The Crowd","The Champ",etc.),but I believe his intention and his furtherance of movie making triumphed here far more than did his actual execution of the film he ultimately created.Unfortunately I am not reviewing his intentions,no matter how well founded they were.I am reviewing his product(its' structure,story and presentation) and as such I can only give it at BEST three stars.
Technically this film does show its' age but generally speaking it is a good print and has been transferred quite well.Two two-reelers are here from the Warner's vaults that are,to me,more exciting than the main attraction.First is the Vitaphone "Pie,Pie Blackbird" and it gives us the debut of one of the greatest dance teams ever to have graced a stage;the Nicholaus Brothers.Looking much younger than the 18 years Fayard was and the 11 Harold was,both do a smooth and great job for the camera.Fayard can be seen more than a few times smiling off camera as Harold does his part,as if to say "Is that all right,guys?".Nina McKinney sings "Everything I have is Yours" with Eubie Blake and band who also perform "Smoke Rings" and "You Rascal You".The second Vitaphone short is from 1936,"Black Network".It stars legendary and multi-talented black singer,composer and poet Babe Wallace,Nina McKinney,Amanda Randolph(best known for her later role as Louise on TV as Danny Thomas' maid-she sings "Something's Wrong with Me"...hilarious) and again the Nicholaus Brothers appear.The boys tackle a song and dance number called"Lucky Numbers",and what a difference four years made.Here they are quite slick looking in suits and their dancing has gotten even better.
In conclusion "Hallelujah", while having the best of intentions just does not come through in the finished product.It is historically important,being one of the earliest sound films and all black musicals,but does little to further the black experience.The film rings true in its'depictions of certain aspects of day to day life(cotton picking,revival meetings,et al),but falls apart in the morality department and in most major scenes,which Vidor must have felt were important to give the audience a better appreciation of black life,were in fact much too long and should have been more judiciously edited.What are the best kicks to me,are the two Vitaphone shorts with the Nicholaus Brothers,particlularly their debut short "Pie,Pie Blackbird".
Movie Review: Good One!!
Summary: 3 Stars
What a gem of a movie! I purchased it only because I wanted to see more of Nina Mae McKinney and it was certainly worth it. The extra footage of the Nicholas brothers makes this one a keeper!Movie Review: A Little Archaic, Hard to Watch
Summary: 2 Stars
I have watched several movies, all from Amazon, that could be in this same category: "Green Pastures" - one of our family's all time favorites; "Purlie Victorious" - not a great movie, but a lot of fun and causing us to buy these other movies; "Cabin in the Sky" - looked to be a lot of fun, with a famous cast, but the apparently defective DVD would run about fifteen minutes and then just lock up and finally fail. Next time it would play through the failure point and fail somewhere else, enough that we finally had to give up.
This brings me to Hallelujah, which is the earliest of all these movies. This also failed similar to "Cabin", but less often, so we were able to watch it through. It appears to be of historical interest and reminds me of movies, perhaps themselves old at that time, that I saw on TV over fifty years ago when a child.
Does this movie depict early black culture more accurately than do today's movies about the same period? I suppose in some ways it might, since it was made closer to the times it depicts. In other ways it probably does not, probably because the people of that time, whether blak or white, did not have the time or wherewithal to really understand what was strong or weak about the black culture in America.
There are certainly depictions that our modern American culture would see as demeaning or disrespectful, more so in this movie than the others mentioned above. Maybe there were enough of these that it was just kind of tiring and wearing to watch for me. I don't know that I learned a lot of historical interest, either. The movie is pretty primitive, and the plot utterly predictable. I suppose it would be of interest to students of film history.
I can't really recommend Hallelujah, but don't let that stop you from seeing "Purlie" or "Cabin", assuming the latter DVD will play for you. There is a disclaimer about possible material prejudicial of black cuture at the start of "Green Pastures", but I see nothing of the sort. It makes me feel good about being human every time I watch it.