Film
Seitz, Michael H.
FILM Michael H. Seitz Hard Traveling Hard Traveling, written and directed by Dan Bessie, his first feature work, is a good-looking independent production that questions, in a heart-felt manner,...
...Dan Bessie justifies the resurrection of this forty-five-year-old story by pointing out that "there are millions out of work today...
...Good vanquishes Evil in the milieu of karate culture, as the ever-so-endearing "kid" (Ralph Macchio) and his lovable Japanese mentor (Noriyuki "Pat" Morita) right wrongs in California and Okinawa...
...A final flashback depicts the actual circumstances of the crime...
...When he's asked if he feels remorse, he breaks down and cries...
...Quite so, but I imagine Hard Traveling will find its natural audience not among devotees of penetrating social drama, but in those nostalgic for the "culture" of the popular front...
...Norah, who knows the good in him, asserts that he's a "victim of society," and finds a lawyer to defend him...
...Hard Traveling is based on a 1941 novel, Bread and a Stone, by Alvah Bessie, who was subsequently blacklisted as a member of the Hollywood Ten...
...Unemployed, and unable to provide for his family's food and rent, he took a gun, without any intention of shooting anyone, and ended up in this tragic mess...
...Ed Sloan (J...
...The shooting, it seems, was accidental, and occurred in a scuffle as the victim assailed a terrified and defensive Ed and attempted to wrest the gun from him...
...In this far from subtle bit of manipulative filming, the courtroom audience acts as a surrogate for the movie audience, informing us that unless we are callous brutes we should react with similar feeling...
...The film is carried by a talented veteran cast including Philippe Noiret, Claudia Cardinale, Jean-Louise Trintignant, and Fanny Ardant (who nearly steals the show from her seniors...
...Ed recalls his life of unremitting brutali-zation which began with terrible beatings by his stepfather and led to reform school and other horrors...
...Hits and Misses The Karate Kid: Part II For juveniles only, and the pre-pubescent of mind and heart...
...In the film's favor are a sympathetic (albeit simplistic) depiction of Japanese customs and a subplot that denigrates rapacious robber-baron capitalism...
...the film isn't very clear about this...
...Is he really the "victim of society," or of the incompetence of his lawyer—or is he simply done in by Alvah Bessie, who needed to make him a social martyr...
...FILM Michael H. Seitz Hard Traveling Hard Traveling, written and directed by Dan Bessie, his first feature work, is a good-looking independent production that questions, in a heart-felt manner, the nature of social justice in American society...
...The tale ("based on a true story") takes place in a rural area of Santa Cruz County around 1940...
...Production notes indicate that Bessie tried for years to bring the story to the screen, and that the project was finally taken up and realized by his son...
...The judge, nonetheless, strictly interprets the law, and sentences Ed to death so as to provide a "deterring example...
...Script and direction are by Jean-Louis's wife, Na-dine Trintignant, and their daughter, Marie, plays one of the lead roles...
...Next Summer Rather charming, multi-generational romance-melodrama, played out within the framework of a large, exuberant, and tightly knit French family...
...and many, many people are in our jails because they could find no other way to feed their families...
...Ed is interrogated, then beaten (or at least it seems that he's beaten...
...We are meant to feel outraged, yet a moment's thought leads one to wonder why, if the flashback of the crime is accurate, Ed was charged with a capital crime at all...
...Reaction shots of those in the courtroom-ordinary citizens, the sheriff, even the judge—indicate that the narration is profoundly touching...
...E. Freeman), an uneducated, itinerant farm hand, finds love and security in marriage to Norah (Ellen Geer), a warm-hearted, widowed schoolteacher...
...He later makes a confession and confides to Norah that he's acted in desperation...
...But the film's politics are vague, the content is sentimental and emotionally manipulative, the characterizations lack depth, at least one aspect of the plot doesn't wash, and it comes across as oddly anachronistic...
...The defense at the sentencing consists of a plea for leniency and understanding...
...A work that is unmistakably French in tone, and in some ways reminiscent of the recent films of Eric Rohmer—but Rohmer does more with less...
...The victim, moreover, is a loud-mouthed reactionary, who damns the New Deal and Franklin Delano Roosevelt and asserts that any man who really wants to can get a job...
...Geer is the daughter of Will Geer, who also suffered the effects of the Hollywood blacklist...
...Much of the early portion of the film portrays in flashback the coming together of this unlikely couple: Ed's devotion to Norah's two young children, his initial hesitancy and self-consciousness, Norah's acceptance, and the blossoming of love...
...One night, however, a pair of boorish cops come to arrest Ed for the robbery and murder of a respected businessman...
Vol. 50 • August 1986 • No. 8
