HeadlinesExotic Boring

ThedevilChoose When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

JohnHowardReid If I were asked which were the best scenes Victor Fleming had directed, I would answer, "The bar-room scenes in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde." If I were asked which was the best film he directed, my reply would be "Tortilla Flat". I've never been able to understand the critical apathy to this fine film. I strongly suspect that most of them haven't seen it. I guarantee that if it was spoken in a foreign language, they would be rating it with silver stars and golden superlatives. I wish I could get hold of a dubbed Italian print. I'd pass it off as an early work by De Sica; and I bet I'd be able to land a score of rave reviews for the asking.A picaresque tale of life among squalid California paisanos, "Tortilla Flat" had rather an odd history: John Steinbeck wrote the novel in 1935 and found his first public. Dramatist Jack Kirkland (Tobacco Road) made it into a dirty, dismal, unsuccessful play in 1938, and socked friendly drama critic, Richard Watts Jr, for saying so. It went to Paramount for peanuts ($4,000) and after some customary Hollywood sleight-of-hand, wound up at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for $60,000.After Steinbeck had come by success and a bank account (then swollen by the astronomical $300,000 Fox had paid for his novel-play, "The Moon Is Down"), he brooded over his wayward "Flat", and offered Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer $10,000 to buy it back. This virtually unheard- of maneuver produced its almost inevitable result: "Tortilla Flat" became a movie.Of all the big and little books Steinbeck has written, "Tortilla Flat" still rates with me as his most satisfying job. It wrestles with no big problems like The Grapes of Wrath or The Moon Is Down or Of Mice and Men. For though Steinbeck writes like a realist, he thinks like a sentimentalist. And in the frankly sentimental "Tortilla Flat", he writes about his lazy, simple-hearted Mexicans with a warming glow and an indulgent sympathy.It is the outstanding virtue of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's movie that — due mainly to Fleming's masterful control of atmosphere and acting — it preserves Steinbeck's sympathies.For the first time in her Hollywood career, Hedy Lamarr depends on no glamorous clothes or background to enhance her charms. She wears no fake eye-lashes, no make-up except a ten-cent lipstick and grease to darken her skin. Her costume cost less than four dollars and took less than four minutes to slip into. Commenting on the joys of working with her, John Garfield confessed: "I tried to steal scenes from Hedy, Hedy tried to steal them from Spencer Tracy, Tracy tried to steal from Frank Morgan, Morgan tried to steal from me, and the dogs stole the show."Garfield's witticism, of course, is somewhat inaccurate. Tracy's performance is by far the best. Morgan's ingrained tendency to over- act is always evident — especially in his later scenes. As for the dogs: their vision strikes a somewhat jarring note, and the scene would be better deleted, if only in the interests of good taste.Fleming's great achievement in "Tortilla Flat" was that he created a leisurely atmosphere, without causing us to lose interest in the proceedings. It is true that he was helped considerably by Karl Freund's photographic expertise and the John Lee Mahin-Benjamin Glazer script itself. After all, we don't meet characters like these paisanos every night. Their story is as fascinating as it is original and off-beat. But even so, we could still get bored with them, if they were not handled with a polished touch and a sure sense of timing.

aabigbill John Steinbeck was very disheartened by how many viewed his portrayal of the residents of "Tortilla Flat". He wrote in the the foreword of a 1937 edition of the book,"..it did not occur to me that paisanos were curious or quaint, dispossessed or underdoggish. They are people whom I know and like, people who merge successfully with their habitat...good people of laughter and kindness, of honest lusts and direct eyes. If I have done them harm by telling a few of their stories I am sorry. It will never happen again." The only sad thing is that view was of the times. "Tortilla Flat" is a great movie, a movie of great saddest and wonderful joys. Well worth the time to watch.

howardmorley I have rarely encountered such a Hollywood film so loaded with dreadful stereotypes as "Tortilla Flat".Those reviewers who lauded it must have been on a different planet or love film tripe of the lowest common denominator.Firstly according to some unenlightened producers, Hollywood had, at the time, a racist attitude to casting.There were either American/English actors or "Foreigners".If the cast called for "foreigners" no matter what the nationality of the character/actor, producers would cast a motley collection of actors from different countries and were not pedantic about the accuracy of the countries of origin of the actors concerned when consistency was required to make the characters believable.To cast Spencer Tracy and Hedy Lamarr with her sophisticated Viennese accent, and the Jewish John Garfield as Mexican peasants was risible.Second stereotype - casting Mexican characters as a lazy work shy people who laze around in the sun and shun work but get drunk.Third stereotype - to insult the audience that they cannot be trusted to understand one sentence of Spanish.To just put the odd "amigo" or "adios" into the script to add a foreign sense but saying all their parts in English is rather patronising and a "cop-out".As an aside, enlightened producers like Darryl F. Zanuck who produced "The Longest Day" (1962) had German actors speaking German, French actors speaking French (with English subtitles) which made the film really come alive.Nowadays DVD technology gives dubbing into many languages for modern films but of course this technology was not available in 1942.However, with the U.S.A. catapulted into WWII from 1941, I can, to a certain extent, sympathise with the anti foreigner stance in films of this period.The only reason I bought this video was to add to my Hedy Lamarr collection and I was slightly disappointed with the length of part she was assigned.I thought with her intellect she deserved much better than John Garfield's character at the film end.The fact that it is not available on DVD seems to show that sensible distributors realise no thinking film fan would want to pay for it in this format.So in this DVD age I bought an old video from 1990 to play on my reconditioned v.c.r. player.I have given this film my lowest ever rating of 1/10.Awful just awful.

Swithin "Tortilla Flat" is a good movie. In some ways, it reminds me of "Juarez," another film in which John Garfield plays a Latino. The similarity is that both are good films that have contained within them really terrific scenes. I guess you could say that in these films, the parts are in some ways greater than the whole.For me, the best scenes in "Tortilla Flat" revolve around Frank Morgan, who plays a sort of tramp (homeless man) who goes around with a bunch of dogs. Like Mr. Morgan, one of the dogs seems to have appeared in "The Wizard of Oz" -- yes, I think Toto is in "Tortilla Flat." Not surprising, since both films were directed by Victor Fleming.But the most extraordinary scene is that in which Frank Morgan has gathered his five dogs, in the midst of the majestic Redwood Forest, and relates to the dogs the story of St. Francis. As he is telling the story, the dogs actually have a vision! As the vision hovers, and the dogs react, Morgan averts his eyes. When the vision passes, Morgan shouts to the dogs: "Did you see him? Did you see him? It was St. Francis! What good boys you must be to see St. Francis!"I know of few other films that depict pure religious experience so effectively. It raises this good film onto another level.