Wind Across the Everglades (1958)

Such a frustrating disappointment

brilliant actors, brilliant editing

Boring

Absolutely brilliant

The screenplay is basically a contest between the traditional exploitation of nature's bounty to near exhaustion, and the new conservation movement to conserve natural resources so that they may be with us in the future. Cottonmouth(Burl Ives) and his crew of waterbird poachers represent the epitome of exterminate and move on practice, that reached its peak in the late 19th century, with the advent of superior repeater weapons, and population pressure. Walt Murdock(Christopher Plummer)(also called 'bird boy') represents the wave of the future, as a student of nature, and game warden with the dangerous job of enforcing recent no kill laws. Ives' character very much reminds me of his character in "The Big Country", also released in 1958. There too, he is the patriarch of a motley crew of men, again ruling with an iron fist. His character also much reminds me of Eddie Robinson's Wolf Larsen, in "The Sea Wolf", who preferred to go down with his ship rather than have to start over as a nobody. Cottonmouth 'knew' he wouldn't survive that snake bite, thus ordered Murdock to leave him there in his beloved glades rather than try heroics to save him. But, Murdock and Cottonmouth are, in some ways, more alike than different. They both relish wild places, far from the prying eyes of conventional civilization. Murdock acknowledges this connection in his participation in the drinking spree and rough games of the poachers.Incidentally, the dramatized death by tying a Seminole to a Manchineel tree is a bit overplayed. There is indeed such a tree in the glades that contains many types of poisons, whose sap mostly causes bad skin and eye ulcers, which may become septic. The tempting fruit is quite toxic when eaten.

Strange pseudo-Western set in turn-of-the-century Florida, with Christopher Plummer as a seemingly half-crazed ornithologist going up against Burl Ives as a fully-crazed cottonmouth-snake-fondling swamp-god of the Everglades. Gypsy Rose Lee turns up as a whorehouse madame and Peter Falk stalks the sidelines in his first film appearance.I stumbled onto Wind Across the Everglades playing on TCM; as a native Floridian, I just had to check it out. The film is undeniably entertaining but it is consistently undercut by strange dialog, uneven editing, and a plot where characters seem to meander aimlessly into and out of trouble. Plummer seems lost in his role, veering from composed and thoughtful to wild and unkempt again and again. Burl Ives fares better in his role as the grizzled poacher, though he isn't really given a lot to do.The cinematography, too, is as uneven as the old "African safari" travelogues that intermix shots of the actor/s with assorted wildlife. I swear to God, when we got shots of egrets, alligators, ibis, a wood duck, and a freakin' sawfish all in the same montage, I just lost it. I mean, this is great stuff.The strangest thing about all this hooey is that it is, in the end, really entertaining. While I wouldn't call it a "good" film, it holds up well against classics of "bad" cinema like Spider-Baby, Robot Monster, or any of Ed Wood's gems. This is a worthy cult film for any cinephile.

The Final Battle...No, not Ecologists vs. Poachers...But the real battle!Auteurists vs. Writer-Driven Cinema!The showing in NY was a trip, with a Schulberg relative coming to the showing - at a Nicholas Ray retrospective, no less! - to announce that this was not only NOT a Nicholas Ray film, but CLEARLY a Schulberg film (this was simply bad manners, given the occasion). And she went on to talk about how drug-addled Ray was during the shooting (that was worse than bad manners, given the occasion).Anyway...if you care...Lots of Ray stuff: the created "family unit" of outlaws, with their twisted bonhomie and their rituals; the sense that living in a particular "natural" environment creates an alternative sense of right and wrong, and that someone who enters into that environment has to confront this other reality, even if it goes against his or her belief system. Christopher Plummer finds himself in a position akin to that of Peter O'Toole in The Savage Innocents, Robert Ryan in On Dangerous Ground,Susan Hayward in The Lusty Men.On the other hand...lots of stagy soliloquies, lots of scenes which don't get to really inflect; they just make their plot points and move on. One can imagine a lot of footage which was discarded because it didn't "advance the story".Some beautiful swamps and animals.It's a real mess - but a beautiful mess.Film-making...it can be a real heartbreak for the directors who believe in their personal vision.

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