It Has Nothing To Do With Housing Or Urban Development

Turner Classic was doing a Patricia Neal day, and we'll get to A Face in the Crowd sometime, but for now, let's take a look at Hud.  Neal is Alma, housekeeper and cook on the Bannon ranch for the 3 generations of Bannons: Homer (Melvyn Douglas), the patriarch, Lonnie (Brandon De Wilde), the teenager, and Hud, played by Paul Newman. Hud is Lonnie's uncle, and Homer's son, but not the favored son (that'd be Lonnie's deceased father).

I mentioned when I watched Harper that I had difficulty buying into a film that tries to make Paul Newman an abrasive, frequently unlikeable character. Hud isn't a good person by any stretch, but the film leverages Newman's charisma well. Hud is capable of being very charming, as any number of women in the town can attest. But he's almost entirely self-centered, to the point of complete indifference to anyone else's feelings. Every so often he shows some small kindness or kinship towards Lonnie, but it doesn't last.

There's a lot of ugly history between Hud and Homer, and it's an open question how responsible the father is for the son. Homer contends Hud has nothing good in him, and that he's known it for a long time. But if he's done nothing to hide his contempt for Hud for years, how much of Hud's behavior is a response to that? He could have tried to do whatever it took to get Homer's approval, but instead decided to openly conform to Homer's worst expectations. The choice was still Hud's, but I think Homer's a little quick to wash his hands of responsibility.

Lonnie's caught in the middle, between respect for his grandfather, and a mixture of sympathy and admiration for his cool uncle. He's trying to decide which kind of man he's going to be.

As for Alma, she's a calm center in the film for much of it. She banters with Hud, and doesn't allow him to fluster her. She handles Homer's gruffness with patience, and tries to care for Lonnie in her own way. She's much older than Lonnie, and certainly more mature than Hud, if not much older in years. At the same time, she's close enough to them that she gets them, and can talk to them in the way Homer just can't. He's too reserved, to set in his way of thinking to bend. As fractured as the Bannons are, it seems likely they're the best family she's been part of. She's had a rough go of it in the past, and this place offers a little stability. She has a small home of her own, and three people to look after, each who expresses their appreciation in their own way. Of course it all falls apart badly, and while it's clear why Alma would leave, you can tell it pains her. A good thing doesn't last, another in a series.

It may have been over the top, but I like how the film adds in a howling wind noise for shots of the ranch when things go badly. The main gist of the story is Homer bought some sick cows, and his determination to do the right thing ultimately sinks the ranch, at least as he conceives of it. I think they shot things in lower light conditions during the bad times, so everything is darker, like it's overcast. Put me in the mind of a grey winter day, even though there wasn't snow on the ground in any of the shots.