Elmer Gantry – 1960
Now, here we have a drama that hit the mark on a number of levels. The lead character was dynamic and larger than life, the supporting characters were interesting and complex, the cast was fantastic, the plot was engaging, and the directing was excellent. I have to give the director, Richard Brooks, props for putting together a good film.
The movie starred Burt Lancaster as Elmer Gantry, a traveling salesman with ambitions of becoming a Revivalist preacher. But his motives are entirely suspect. He isn’t in it for the religion, but for the money. Basically, he is a con man. He smooth talks his way into the company of Sister Sharon Falconer, played by Jean Simmons. She is a Revivalist tent-preacher who is in it for the religion. She has a true desire to bring people closer to God. In fact, she has an inner belief that she has actually been touched by God.
When the two of them team up, it is a match made in heaven. Gantry brings the fire, the brimstone, and the financial ambitions, while Sister Sharon brings the love, the forgiveness, and the honesty. Together, they set their followers on fire with religious zeal. But the film was actually a controversial one because it showed a bit of a seedier side of organized religion, something at which conservative Christians probably cringed. It portrayed Christianity as a circus side-show.
Now, I have to mention that I have never been a huge fan of Lancaster’s acting. Everything he does seems to be either forced or overdone. When he laughs, he laughs maniacally. When he cries, he sobs and bellows. There is such a lack of subtlety that I often have a hard time taking him very seriously. But here, I think that his overbearing eagerness as an actor worked in his favor. The character was one who had a personality like a sledge hammer. He was supposed to have been both bold and fast-talking, and he played those qualities well. Still, I think he could have toned it down a bit. But the Academy did not agree with my assessment and he won the Oscar for Best Actor for his performance.
That being said, I thought there were some pretty terrific performances by Lancaster’s supporting cast. The woman who Gantry wronged in the past, and who turned to prostitution in the present, was Lulu Bains, masterfully played by Shirley Jones, earning her the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. I also loved the performance of Dean Jagger, playing the part of the Revival show’s manager, William Morgan.
Once Gantry joins Sister Sharon’s tent show, his flamboyant sermonizing draws in the crowds. He gets Sharon and Morgan to take the show to a larger town where the local church leaders are divided on whether or not to let them stay. The plot goes over some difficulties that the tent-revival show has to overcome, like Jim Lefferts, an atheist newspaper reporter, played by Arthur Kennedy, who tries to ruin the reputations of the revivalists, or Lulu going out of her way to get revenge on Gantry for the way she feels he ruined her life. She invites him to her hotel room, only to make sure photos are taken of him that make him appear like a client. Then she give the photos to the press.
But in the end, these obstacles are overcome, and it was the ending that really caught my attention. Sister Sharon has been saving money for years in an effort to build a church of her own, believing that she is being moved by the hand of God, himself. When the church is finally complete, a large crowd of parishioners attend her first gathering. But before the service can really begin, a man who has lost his hearing approaches the altar and begs for healing. Sister Sharon was so sure that she had personally been touched by the divine, she put her hands on the man’s ears and prayed over him. And it worked! The man regained his hearing, which would lead me to believe that she had been right all along, that her belief in her own special relationship with the Almighty was not simply arrogance. God truly was working through her!
But as soon as that was revealed, the ending took a turn for the tragic. A fire broke out and burned the divine Sister Sharon and her new temple to the ground, as if to say “I’ll give you that one miracle, but after that, you’re finished.” Once the fire has been put out, Gantry simply strolls away with a smile on his face, his con having successfully ended.