THE RAINMAKER
US, 1956, 121 minutes, Colour.
Burt Lancaster, Katharine Hepburn, Wendell Corey, Lloyd Bridges, Earl Holliman, Cameron Prud’ Homme, Wallace Ford.
Directed by Joseph Anthony.
The Rainmaker is based on a play by N. Richard Nash. It has the very striking acting combination of Burt Lancaster and Katharine Hepburn (remade by John Frankenheimer in 1982 as a television movie with Tommy Lee Jones in the Burt Lancaster role, Tuesday Weld in the Katharine Hepburn role and James Cromwell in the Lloyd Bridges role).
The film is set in a remote town, experiencing a drought. Into the town comes romantic Bill Starbuck, a rainmaker. He encounters Lizzie Curry (Katharine Hepburn) who has decided that she can never get married, she is far too plain. She is to be an old maid. However, she is bright and intelligent. Yet the sheriff (Wendell Corey) has not proposed to her even though she dotes on him. Her father is played by Lloyd Bridges and her brother by Earl Holliman.
The film derives from a stage play and has some echoes of theatre and artificial dialogue. However, the performances are very strong, very engaging – and there is an optimism at the end of the film with the change in people’s lives as well as the coming of the rain. The cast were nominated for Golden Globes, with Earl Holliman winning one as best supporting actor. Katharine Hepburn also had an Oscar nomination as did Alex North for the musical score. Director Joseph Anthony was an actor and began a short directing career with The Rainmaker. His other films include The Matchmaker, Career, All in a Night’s Work.
1. How enjoyable was this film? Its folksy atmosphere, its portrayals of dreams and reality, its humour and wit, its portrayal of good and evil?
2. The film was based on a play. Was this evident? In the staging of sequences, the dialogue sequences, the use of outdoor sequences?
3. How well did the film portray its setting? the Kansas of 1913, the naive and folksy people, the atmosphere of drought, the farms and work, the life in a farm home, the town itself and the people there, families of the time, clashes etc.? The need for something to happen, the need for rain?
4. The family tensions as the setting for the films the father and his use of authority, his attitude towards his children? Noah and his harshness? Jimmy as the younger brother and his diffidence, persecuted by Noah, relationship with Lizzie, his girlfriend? The nature of the clashes and the fights? Why? Lizzie and her relationship with her father? Her plainness, ambition to marry? The hard times and the nature of dreams?
5. The portrayal of life in the town? the ordinary people, the shops and the bars, the tensions, the drought, the role of File as sheriff in the town and some sort of control and order?
6. How attractive was Starbuck? Burt Lancaster's boisterous style - as appropriate to a conman, his fast talk, the enjoyment of his demonstrations, his charm? How well was this illustrated? His response to the Currie family? His promise of rain? His effect on all the family and the people in the town? The fact that Mr Currie believed in him? That File did not arrest him? That he gave some strength of faith in himself to Jimmy? That he promised fulfilment of dreams to Lizzie? How important were dreams to him? Living in his own dreams
and fantasies? Fulfilment for all except himself? And then the
coming of the storm and rain? fulfilment for himself?
7. How central was the role of Lizzie in the film? Katharine Hepburn's style? The reality of Lizzie and her place in the home, her plainness, her longing for marriage, the way that she ran the house? Her bossing around of the brothers and their response to her? Her response to File and his devotion to her? Why did Starbuck fascinate her? The sadness and happiness in her life? Her final decisions?
8. The effect of the experience on Mr Currie?
9. The portrayal of the brothers and their clashes? The future for them?
10. File as a law-abiding citizen, a gentleman? The effect of the Rainmaker on him? His future?
11. How important was the optimistic message of this film? Its optimistic philosophy of life? Its sentiment in its message? Too sentimental and too optimistic?
12. What did the film have to say about truth and falsehood, good and bad, human values?
