Intruder in the Dust (1949)

Directed and produced by Clarence Brown

In a small Mississippi town, a black man, Lucas Beauchamp (Juano Hernandez), is arrested for the murder of a white man (David Clarke). Beauchamp maintains a nonchalant refusal to tell his attorney (David Brian) what happened, but urges the lawyer’s nephew, Chick (Claude Jarman Jr), to investigate the matter. This begins a rush to find the truth before Beauchamp is lynched; it also begins a journey of realisation for young Chick.

One of the most powerful films depicting racism in the United States is also one of the scariest movies on film. Adapted by Ben Maddow (who wrote the screenplay for the recently reviewed The Asphalt Jungle) from the novel by William Faulkner, Intruder in the Dust is adeptly directed by Brown, and set, for astounding realism, in Faulkner’s home-town of Oxford, Mississippi.

Not having read the book, I cannot judge what part of the writing is Faulkner’s and what is Maddow’s, but it is all good. The atmosphere created by the words and action is terrifying -  to Beauchamp, but also to the audience. Everyone in the film assumes that the suspect is guilty, even those whose characters should dictate otherwise. Furthermore, everyone assumes that Beauchamp will be murdered for his alleged crime, and no one seems prepared to do anything about it, until Chick, an old woman (Elizabeth Patterson) and a household servant (Elzie Emanuel), bestir themselves for different reasons.

This movie, more than any other I’ve seen, re-created the nightmarish world in which blacks undoubtedly lived in that part of the U.S. at the time. The surreal sequence of townspeople and visitors, many arriving by bus, gathering for the climax in a carnival-like feeling, is truly something from a bad dream. The crowd is not a mob; it’s worse than that: they are an audience, come not to commit a travesty of justice, but to watch it happen – while eating ice cream and popcorn. Equally revealing is the reaction of blacks in their homes, when they see the headlamps of an unexpected car driving through their neighbourhood, or hear the baying of hounds. A black man simply walking into a general store creates a potential for violence and death. These elements, and the use of extras, with their variety of faces and expressions, were the superb work of the director.

The acting is first-rate. Hernandez works with the script to create a character who is real. Too many black characters in films that deal, whether seriously or superficially, with race-relations are depicted as angry activists or calm sages, always with the right phrase on their lips. Beauchamp is an admirable man, but not really likeable. He says nothing wise, and, indeed, does nothing particularly smart. He is proud almost to the point of arrogance. One gathers the impression that he may, due to owning land, think himself superior to other blacks. But life’s heroes are, despite the current fashion for flawless symbols, not perfect.

Similarly, the whites who help Beauchamp are hardly free of stain, except perhaps Patterson’s character. Chick is initially appalled at a black man treating himself as a white’s equal. His journey to understanding is sometimes explained only through Jarman’s acting. And, as always in good movies, the secondary and tertiary roles are often telling: the casual hatred and racism – at best, apathy - enacted by the white performers adds greatly to the movie’s effect.

Not having experienced anything like even the setting of Intruder in the Dust, I cannot in fact vouch for its reality, though I have no doubt of it. Even so, a movie should ultimately be reviewed solely on its own integral merits, or the lack thereof. With that criteria, Intruder in the Dust is an excellent drama, a finely crafted social commentary and, perhaps not least, an interesting crime story.