Richard Brooks's 1960 screen adaptation of the 1927 Sinclair Lewis novel, although well received in its time (and awarded with three Oscars), squeezes most of the intellectual juice from the source, a saga of the bumpy rise of a hypocritical Protestant evangelist who constantly seesaws between belief and doubt until he evolves from an awkward, doubting seminary student to a smooth talking and celebrated Bible thumper.
The novel spans the first quarter of the 20th century, largely in the mythical midwestern state of "Winnemac." Brooks distills the contents into a few years of the Coolidge era culminating in 1927 (in one scene we glimpse the newspaper headline "Isadora Duncan Dies" which occurred in September of that year).
Burt Lancaster in the title role hams it up, making liberal use of his trademark toothy grin and acrobatics; his vigor is true to the character, but his native New Yawk accent is out of place for a character born and raised in Kansas. Jean Simmons is physically correct as the revivalist zealot with whom he falls in love, but too proper-English-lady to register as a Virginia shanty town girl barnstorming the prairie. The complexities of her character - a not-so-sincere true believer - are undeveloped. Shirley Jones's Lulu Baines, a composite of at least two characters from the novel, has some good moments. All three main characters (especially Lancaster) laugh out loud a lot; Jones's laughter is the least natural.
The most consistently believable performances come from Arthur Kennedy as yet another composite character, a rather cynical but fair-minded newspaper reporter who follows Gantry around and serves as a sort of stand-in for the secular or uncommitted general public, and Edward Andrews, that beefy staple of 1950s and '60's TV and film, as the embodiment of George F. Babbitt, spewer of platitudes, the eponymous fictional character of an earlier Lewis novel.
Intimate dramatic scenes work well enough but quick cuts, odd angles and jarring instrumentals are employed to distract from clumsily staged street demonstrations and other riotous gatherings (which include protest signs that look like assembly line studio art department props); a climactic temple fire is entirely lacking in suspense. Besides traditional religious hymns sung by various groups in various locales, the musical scoring by Andre Previn is mostly loud, garish and dissonant, perhaps to reflect the inner turmoil of the major figures in the narrative.
On the screen Sinclair's broad-ranging theological and philosophical discourses become a series of aphorisms or one-liners, bordering on arty didacticism. When good acting and strong writing merge, as with Kennedy, Andrews and at times Jones and Lancaster, we are lifted out of our disbelief, but such moments are few and far between.
The novel spans the first quarter of the 20th century, largely in the mythical midwestern state of "Winnemac." Brooks distills the contents into a few years of the Coolidge era culminating in 1927 (in one scene we glimpse the newspaper headline "Isadora Duncan Dies" which occurred in September of that year).
Burt Lancaster in the title role hams it up, making liberal use of his trademark toothy grin and acrobatics; his vigor is true to the character, but his native New Yawk accent is out of place for a character born and raised in Kansas. Jean Simmons is physically correct as the revivalist zealot with whom he falls in love, but too proper-English-lady to register as a Virginia shanty town girl barnstorming the prairie. The complexities of her character - a not-so-sincere true believer - are undeveloped. Shirley Jones's Lulu Baines, a composite of at least two characters from the novel, has some good moments. All three main characters (especially Lancaster) laugh out loud a lot; Jones's laughter is the least natural.
The most consistently believable performances come from Arthur Kennedy as yet another composite character, a rather cynical but fair-minded newspaper reporter who follows Gantry around and serves as a sort of stand-in for the secular or uncommitted general public, and Edward Andrews, that beefy staple of 1950s and '60's TV and film, as the embodiment of George F. Babbitt, spewer of platitudes, the eponymous fictional character of an earlier Lewis novel.
Intimate dramatic scenes work well enough but quick cuts, odd angles and jarring instrumentals are employed to distract from clumsily staged street demonstrations and other riotous gatherings (which include protest signs that look like assembly line studio art department props); a climactic temple fire is entirely lacking in suspense. Besides traditional religious hymns sung by various groups in various locales, the musical scoring by Andre Previn is mostly loud, garish and dissonant, perhaps to reflect the inner turmoil of the major figures in the narrative.
On the screen Sinclair's broad-ranging theological and philosophical discourses become a series of aphorisms or one-liners, bordering on arty didacticism. When good acting and strong writing merge, as with Kennedy, Andrews and at times Jones and Lancaster, we are lifted out of our disbelief, but such moments are few and far between.