Great Moments From Cinema - 9

The Sad Song
Movie: To Kill A Mockingbird (Brentwood, Pakula-Mulligan and United International Pictures; 1962)
Director: Robert Mulligan
Screenplay: Harper Lee (book) and Robert Foote
Major Cast: Gregory Peck, Mary Badham, Phillip Alford, Brock Peters and Robert Duvall

Film Synopsis: Set in the South of 1932, a black man is falsely accused of raping a white woman. One man stands next to him and fights for justice.

My Favorite Moment: The black people in the court standing up as a mark of respect for Peck’s ‘Atticus Finch’

Why I Like It: Has there ever been a more heroic movie character than ‘Atticus Finch’? Well apparently not if AFI is to be believed. They named him the No. 1 hero of all time from over 200 characters. When you consider that he was competing with everyone from ‘Moses’ to ‘Indiana Jones’; that is saying something. This is an unforgettable movie experience based on the Pullitzer prize winning book. Told entirely through the point of view of the six year old daughter of ‘Finch’, ‘Scout’, played brilliantly by Badham, it is one of those movies which teaches to sustain the human spirit despite the injustice around us.

‘Finch’ is a small town lawyer who is the only person to believe in the black man’s innocence. With the South wrought with racial prejudice, he fights for that cause which, he deems morally correct. He gives it his all in the court, but it doesn’t convince the white jury who convict the black man who is obviously innocent. As ‘Finch’ leaves the courtroom despondently, all the black people sitting in the balcony stand up in reverence to this one white individual who upholds the dictum of all men being born equal. No words are said, no cheering, no applause. Just a silent and united stand by a community to show their gratitude.

Peck won an Academy award for this performance which is now immortal. He is ‘Atticus Finch’ period. The turbulence of those times is seen innocently by the young girl, who just does not understand why the color of someone’s skin should make them different. Seeing the film from her point of view makes it strikingly heartrending. The reference to the title comes when ‘Atticus’ tells his children that it is a crime to kill a mockingbird since all they do is sing for us. There is also a parallel story line about the town bogeyman played by Duvall. It is a great role in which he is on the screen for just 5 minutes and doesn’t have a single dialogue. But his part says more about humanity than anything else. So who is the mockingbird? Is it the black man who was ‘killed’ by prejudice? Is it Duvall who was unfairly suspected of being a psychopath? Or is it ‘Atticus’, whose spirit is attacked again and again, sometimes by his own son who thinks of him as a coward? It may well be all of them and it is not just the white people, but everyone, who ‘kills’ them with bias against some of their actions. ‘Finch’ says to his daughter once, “If you just learn a single trick, Scout, you'll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” It is a learning she will never forget. So is ‘Atticus Finch’ the greatest of all screen heroes’? Damn right he is!