Swamp Water [DVD]

Walter Brennan (Tom Keefer) has been on the run and made a life for himself in the Georgia swamplands after being wrongly accused of murder. Dana Andrews (Ben) comes across him when he goes looking for his dog and an alliance is formed. However, the townsfolk soon discover that Brennan is still alive as Andrews lets a few things slip to his girlfriend Virginia Gilmore (Mabel). It's up to Andrews to prove that Brennan is innocent and re-introduce him into society.

The film starts well as we find ourselves in the swamplands being directed by Jean Renoir with layers of depth to every shot. It's a great beginning, it's just a shame that the beginning section of the film couldn't have been maintained all the way through. We needed to spend more time in the swamp. The story in the town takes up the majority of time of the film.....and it shouldn't...

Almost everyone has an accent in this film which is a hindrance at times. Talk properly! Walter Huston as Andrews' father (Thursday) and Virginia Gilmore were the best of the cast and I think we needed more from these characters. Gilmore was gloriously spiteful and bitchy and Huston was broody and just ready to erupt, but sadly never got the chance to really let go at someone. The cast all do well but the story seemed to come to an end rather quickly. It would have been more effective to build more tension and see a confrontation between Brennan and the townsfolk.

There's a good scene where Brennan gets bitten in the face by a snake and we have a touching moment as Andrews prepares to bury him. The film needed more swamp action.

"Swamp Water" aka "The Man who Came Back" was Jean Renoir's first film during his Hollywood sojurn and is certainly an interesting one. The film is a far cry from his pre Hollywood work like "La Grande Illusion" and does show a degree of artistic surrender on his part to the American studio system. To be fair this would have been almost impossible to avoid! Twentieth Century Fox were so dazzled by the great mans reputation that he was given a strong cast to work with, that may well have made other more established Hollywood directors a little envious. So far as debut films go in tinsel town, this was a pretty good one. The films eerie black and white cinematography reeks of atmosphere, and it is hard to believe it was made as far back as 1941.

The film is set in the vast swamplands of Georgia where much of it was filmed. Dana Andrews is the hunter who stumbles upon a fugitive murderer, played by Walter Brennan, deep in the swamps. The two strike up an unlikely friendship and agree a business partnership involving the selling of furs. It is not long before Andrews inadvertently lets the cat out of the bag, and the hunt is on again for Brennan who was thought to be long dead. Brennan protests his innocence as the net closes in on him.

I can quite understand how people watching this film in the early forties would have good cause to remember it. Peverell Marley's cinematography is hard to forget, despite the liberal use of back projection. What with alligators and cottonmouth snakes infesting the murky waters it is enough to give anyone, especially younger viewers of the time the eebyjeebies. The film has a strong John Ford flavour to it with the inclusion of his favourites Guinn 'big boy' Williams, John Carradine, Walter Brennan and especially his close drinking crony Ward Bond. The competent screenplay was by Dudley Nichols who also famously provided the script for Ford's seminal western "Stagecoach". Dana Andrews who was a fine actor, uses a rather strange backwoods accent. His father is played by a belligerant Walter Huston. There is an interesting sub plot involving Huston and his much younger wife. Brennan is strong as the fugitive Tom Keefer, and unusually for him took star billing in the film. Anne Baxter is radiant in rags as Brennan's pauper daughter in one of her earliest roles. Renoir was to go on to make better films, but whilst this is not exactly a classic, it is well worth watching if you have never seen it before. The transfer is excellent with no picture quality issues.

When the Germans invaded France at the beginning of WWII, Jean Renoir had just directed three masterpieces...Grand Illusion (1937), La Bete Humaine (1938) and The Rules of the Game (1939). He escaped to Hollywood with little but an immense reputation and a poor command of English. So what did Hollywood do? Darryl F. Zanuck assigned him to a piece of swamp noir called Swamp Water. Renoir emerged with his reputation more or less intact, but as Zanuck said later, "Renoir has plenty of talent, but he's not one of us."

Swamp Water tells the story of young Ben Ragan (Dana Andrews), who lives in a small community on the edge of Georgia's Okefenokee swamp. The swamp is a fearsome place filled with gators, quicksand, cottonmouth water moccasins, tangled undergrowth and mosquitoes. The menfolk all hunt, trap and fish around the edges of the swamp, and so does Ben with his dog, Trouble. One day Trouble goes missing and Ben, over the objections of his stern father, Thursday Ragan (Walter Huston), goes into the swamp to find his dog. Ben finds the hound, but an escaped convict, Tom Keefer (Walter Brennan), finds Ben. Keefer years ago had been judged guilty of hog stealing and killing a man, but he escaped before he could be hanged. He's been living deep in the swamp ever since. When Keefer is bitten by a cottonmouth, Ben tries to save him. Keefer survives and instead of killing Ben or abandoning him in the swamp, decides he'll trust Ben. He explains to Ben what really happened and that no one will believe him. The two of them agree to become partners. Keefer and Ben will hunt and trap to collect skins. Ben will keep Keefer's secret and sell the skins back in town. Ben can become independent of his father; he'll also save half the money for Keefer's daughter, Julie (Anne Baxter). Julie thinks her father is dead and has been raised by others. She is ragged with dirty feet, and works hard.

Things are never simple, of course. Ben has a girlfriend to whom he by mistake shares his secret. She turns out to be a jealous flirt. There are two brothers who are tough, mean and who may be the real killers. There is Thursday Ragan's younger wife, who loves Thursday but longs for more companionship than Thursday is providing. There's Julie, who looks much better after a bath and wearing a pretty dress. And there's Ben himself, well-meaning, honest and a little naive, whose attempts to do the right thing often lead to more trouble.

What did Renoir manage to make of all this, his first American movie? I wish I could say "a masterpiece," but that would be gilding the corn pone. Renoir does a fine job of showing us the life of this small community; we get a real sense of a tiny place where everyone knows everyone else and, sooner or later, everyone else's business. He insisted that he go to the Okefenokee and finally Zanuck gave him permission. He took Dana Andrews and a camera crew and came back with enough footage that we get a real feeling for what the swamp is like, especially if you're by yourself in the place. He also created some first-rate set pieces...the opening gator hunt, Ben's search for his dog, Keefer going to drink in the swamp at night and being struck in the face by a cottonmouth, the loneliness of Thursday's wife, the community dance, and Keefer's return with Ben that leads to an ambush in the swamp and an unsettling conclusion for the bad guys that involves quicksand and abandonment. On the other hand, we have to listen to Andrews try on a Georgia cracker accent. "My dog" becomes "mah doag." Andrews is never just sure of something, he's "plumb sure." And I can't count the number of times he refers to Baxter as a "young 'un" or he is referred to as a "young 'un" by others. The three canny old hands in the movie, Walter Brennan, Walter Huston and John Carradine (in a smaller role) never let themselves be trapped by corny accents; they speak their lines straight and it's much more effective. Good performances are also given by such recognizable faces as Eugene Pallette, Ward Bond and Guin Williams. To add insult to injury, Zanuck himself rewrote the ending and gave this sentimental scene to a hack contract director to finish.

All in all, Swamp Water is a movie Jean Renoir completists will eventually want to own, although I'm not sure how often you'll watch it after the first time. The Region Two DVD looks very good. There are no extras. The cover art looks exactly like the style of the Fox Studio Classics being released in Region One editions. There's even a spine number, 96. Perhaps Swamp Water will be showing up as a Region One some day. In the meantime, treat yourself to an all-region DVD player.

I suspect that when Zanuck said "Renoir has plenty of talent, but he's not one of us," Renoir was delighted and enthusiastically agreed.