Elmer Gantry (1960)

It's the prohibition era. Elmer Gantry (Burt Lancaster) is a slick traveling salesman who is a boozer and a dog hound. He is a born salesman well versed with the bible. He is so good that it is hard to tell the difference whether he's sincere or lying. He is one haunted by his checkered past and his immorality. He is taken with Sister Sharon Falconer (Jean Simmons) who runs revival meetings. She's a true believer. He badgers her until she allows him to preach. He becomes so successful that he becomes indispensable to Sister Sharon's roadshow. Bill Morgan sees thru Elmer and tells Sharon that in 1917 he was expelled from the seminary for seducing the deacon's daughter. She ignores the warning and they become a great success in the big city. Then his past comes back to haunt him in the form of Lulu Bains (Shirley Jones) who is now a prostitute.Burt Lancaster gives such a big performance. It is so big that it always has a tinge of falsehood. His laugh is so outrageous that it plays both sides of the divide. It's this big performance that is so memorable. Jean Simmons is the perfect compliment. She is the embodiment of purity of spirit. Burt definitely deserves his Oscar win. I can see some people taking offense from the depiction of religious revival. However I see a great role model in Sister Sharon. It's also a tale of salvation for Elmer Gantry.

Charismatic 1920s con-man Burt Lancaster (as Elmer Gantry) switches from sales to sermonizing and joins forces with attractive evangelist Jean Simmons (as Sharon Falconer). They make a successful soul-saving team and become romantically involved, but Mr. Lancaster's fondness for alcohol and affairs eventually causes problems. "Elmer Gantry" adapts only a small part of the Sinclair Lewis novel, yet it seems far too long. While the story is not very exciting, the performances are – this is a film you watch for the acting. In the title role, Lancaster catches the character and is exhilarating throughout. He won "Best Actor" honors from the "Academy Awards", "New York Film Critics", "Golden Globes" and "Film Daily" groups. Minus the "Academy Awards", the aforementioned nominated Ms. Simmons as "Best Actress" for her duplicitous role. In the "Supporting Actress" category, Shirley Jones won the "Academy Award", "Film Daily" and "National Board of Review" honors for her startling portrayal of a bawdy prostitute (Lulu Bains), who explains her teenage sexual awakening as Gantry "rammed the fear of God into me!" Known mostly for wholesome musical roles, Ms. Jones appears rather late in the film, but she is worth the wait. In the "Supporting Actor" category, Arthur Kennedy won the "Film Daily" award for his cynical atheist reporter (Jim Lefferts). So many awards, but so little substance...******* Elmer Gantry (6/29/60) Richard Brooks ~ Burt Lancaster, Jean Simmons, Shirley Jones, Arthur Kennedy

... this one would have been one of the greatest ever, and would have better withstood the test of time. Story by Sinclair Lewis! Directed and adapted for the screen by Richard Brooks! Starring Burt Lancaster and Jean Simmons, both mega-stars. And -- get this -- a "supporting cast" that includes the likes of Patti Page, Shirley Jones and Dean Jagger. How can you go wrong? From my notes on a third viewing: 1. The adaption was major. Some literary experts felt the novel had been de-nuded. 2. The film has a backwards feel to it, that it, the earlier scenes where the characters are introduced feel more genuine than the contrived plot twists that come later. This is the sign of a project that ran away from the director. 3. Patti Page is seriously under-utilized (both as to voice and acting) and Dean Jagger always plays the same character, which can be both a benefit and a liability. 4. The key to this film is, was, and always will be Lancaster. Was this part written for him or did he adapt to the part? There is mystery indeed. Many if not all of the gestures and mannerisms attributed to Elmer are, coincidentally, the very same gestures and mannerisms that Burt was known for. Lancaster was one of the most physical actors of the period. He had hands the size of toasters. He was an ex-acrobat. Years before this film was made, he did a self-parody pirate film called the CRIMSON PIRATE. No one would have thought of giving him an Oscar for that film, but if you view the two side by side you will find that the gestures mannerisms and speech patterns are almost identical. 5. Lancaster was nearing 50 by the time this was made. To answer the question asked above, this reviewer does believe the part was written with him in mind; and moreover that Hollywood chose to honour him for his incredible body of work with the ultimate prize for this film. Nothing wrong with that, don't get me wrong, but, in this context you see the film is no longer one of greatest films of all times (awards notwithstanding) but rather one of the most over-acted and over-written films of all time. Big difference. 6. Later in life, Burt, actually one of my favourite performers, learned to act using the principle "less is more." Have a look at Scorpio, done over a decade later.

I came into this expecting it to be an exposé of the tent revival movement, and it is that, but I was left with many questions that I have had about the revival phenomenon since I was a young man. More out of curiosity than anything else I attended many such revivals in Oklahoma in the late 1950s. I imagine that there has not been a better time and place to experience these events in their most authentic form, and I came away from them in the same frame of mind that I came away from this movie, wondering just how much of a con job they are. And wondering what the people involved really believe. Burt Lancaster gives a remarkable performance as Gantry in this adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel. At the beginning of the movie Gantry is a salesman who is not selling much. Then he sees an opportunity to attach himself to the itinerant evangelist Sister Sharon Falconer. He rises in the ranks due to his zealous sermonizing. By the end of the movie he has changed, even declining the advances of an old flame who commented that he had once "rammed the fear of God into me." I was left to speculate about whether Gantry had truly reformed or whether he had bought into his own malarkey. Just when it seemed that he had become a man of god, he closes with the enigmatic quote from the Bible:When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.Was he saying that he recognized his past behavior as fraudulent, or was he saying that he could now see a way to a more honest ministry?I found Jean Simmons to be miss-cast. She did not project the charisma and strength that I think would be necessary in her position. In the one healing scene she seemed particularly weak. If you want to see some real industrial strength healing in action, catch Oral Roberts in his prime on YouTube.Arthur Kennedy plays news reporter Jim Lefferts. He is probably a stand-in for Sinclair Lewis, being highly skeptical of the whole business. The exchanges between Gantry and Lefferts are at the core of the story. Gantry is such a slippery character that even the cynical Lefferts can't get beyond puzzling over just what sort of man he is.The revival performances I witnesses had it down pat in terms of how to put on a show. There was some warm-up music, maybe something like "Softly and Tenderly, Jesus Is Calling." After a few of the old time hymns the evangelist would come on, starting out slowly and building to a climax, then more aggressive music presented in a rock and roll style. In fact in attending rock concerts later in life I saw a great similarity in the arc of the presentations--the idea is to whip the audience into a frenzy as things go along. Of course in the revival setting, after the audience had been primed they were asked to come forward for conversion, healing, the laying on of hands, or whatever. I have to say that, even as an atheist, it was hard not to be taken in by the spirit of the thing, and I did not get that emotional experience from this movie.