East of Eden (1955)

Elia Kazan's adaptation of the great Steinbeck novel "East of Eden" is stellar for its time, 1955. And it still holds its water. But leaks are showing. The book is a biblical epic of two intertwining families in the late 1800s and early 1900s in America. It's epic. And near impossible to film. So Kazan and screenwriter Pail Osborn rip out a section and run with it. They do good by it, too. Mostly. Here two brothers (one played by James Dean in a knockout star debut) fight for their father's love, and then that of a girl. Whereas the book caused great fever and cried for censorship, the movie goes family values. Whole scenes are set in a whorehouse, but there's hardly a woman around and no mention of sex. The film hits on subjects hinted at in the book, such as discrimination against German Americans during WWI, while ignoring a fascinating in-the-book father figure of Chinese descent. Racism? Dean rules, though. Crumbled, muttering and utterly lost, he seems to have created teen angst. The score smacks the audience over the head, but Kazan is firing as best he can. B+