EAST OF EDEN: 4K UHD Blu-ray (Warner Bros., 1955) Warner Home Video

It has been said the greatest love there is belongs to a parent for a child, the affirmation of unconditionally affection to last a lifetime. But what happens when this essential is denied – or, at the very least, grossly ineffectual? In preparing East of Eden (1955), a slightly autobiographical memoir, director, Elia Kazan confided in author, John Steinbeck that only the last eighty-pages of his generational saga actually appealed to him – chapters dealing with willful and self-destructive isolationism and paradigmatic generational conflict between stoic patriarch, Adam Trask (Raymond Massey) and his younger son, Cal (James Dean). Digging a little deeper we find Cal and Adam’s inability to understand each other is at the heart of Kazan’s own childhood angst. Steinbeck’s too, the author most certainly probing his own inability to connect with his father through literary catharsis.  Essentially, East of Eden is a retelling of the time-honored Biblical morality tale of Cain and Abel. After a fallow start in Hollywood, the picture would mark the big-screen debut of James Dean whose meteoric rise to fame would barely last two years. Kazan, who initially had his misgivings about Dean, quickly became enamored of the actor’s style and commitment to the role, allowing him to react instinctually in the part and utterly fascinated by the results. During the epic confrontation between Adam and Cal, the script called for Dean to turn away from his father. Instead, Dean – catching Raymond Massey off guard – chose to embrace him in a desperate plea for male affection. Massey, it should be noted, did not share in Dean’s proclivity for such improvisation. He was deeply displeased throughout the shoot, but gracious in the end, and impressed with the way the picture turned out.

Among its many other attributes, East of Eden remains a cautionary tale about the dissolution of a strong-willed family and its destructive fallout wrought in the many lives it touches, and, for generations yet to come. Steinbeck wholeheartedly believed in the concept of ‘functional literature’ – allegoric stories to provide a blueprint for better human understanding. Setting his story in Salinas California, Steinbeck’s homage to his own childhood arguably exorcised a lot of highly personal demons, the region’s traditional agrarian backdrop used as a metaphor for life itself, curiously void of any nostalgia for the place Steinbeck had once called home. For Steinbeck, small towns bred a nihilistic sense of narrow-mindedness and a stifling lack of opportunity for those aspiring to something better. Steinbeck’s affection was with the recluses, the reprobates, the dreamers and the scamps. These appealed above the mighty and prosperous, because they symbolized the tragic loss of innocence into which blind promise was occasionally sacrificed, though nevertheless remained a beacon on the horizon.

There is some speculation amongst scholars today that the character of Kate (Jo Van Fleet) was based on Steinbeck’s second wife, Gwen. The couple was divorced in 1948. If so, it must have been a very unhappy marriage, for Kate is an unscrupulous harpy. Yet Steinbeck is affectionate and forgiving toward Kate. In the novel, she kills her own parents by setting fire to the family home, seduces a much older school teacher and has two young men run out of town on a false allegation of rape, by all accounts, a very venomous woman. Yet, Steinbeck’s genius manages to create a queer sort of empathy for this rather heartless wretch. Kate is hardly sympathetic, but at some level she retains a sort of wounded humanity. Her inner torment is a conflict between good and evil from within, neither resolved nor dismissed outright as ‘all bad’.

The central themes in East of Eden are forgiveness and compassion – the latter perceived as a necessary salvation for even the most cold-blooded and conspiring among us. Kazan had long admired Steinbeck’s ability to maintain this sense of moral balance in his bleak reflections on warring humanity. In fact, Kazan was very good friends with the author by the time he began to pen East of Eden. Steinbeck even allowed Kazan to see the galleys as they were being written and would remain unobtrusive and respectful after Kazan offered to take the project over to Warner Bros. for possible development. East of Eden – the movie – remains a remarkable achievement in that it bears no earthly resemblance to the structure of the novel but nevertheless manages to convey Steinbeck’s central themes while delving deeply into its characters. The essence of the novel gets reworked though never distilled, the tangible flavor of the book retained in spite of an almost complete rewrite done for the movie by screenwriter, Paul Osborn.

In this regard alone, East of Eden is perfection itself, its verdant Californian landscape juxtaposed against the earthy strain of extremely conflicted people who call this part of the world their home. The sun-soaked visuals are enhanced by the irony and anguish set before them, perceptively stylized, the character’s inner torments border the bittersweet on the fantastic.  East of Eden is not only one of Kazan’s unlikeliest tapestries about the grotesqueness of life, it arguably remains the finest of the three performances James Dean committed to celluloid as the veneer between Cal and Dean’s own brutalized youth, impenetrable and in constant flux, is exceptionally thin.  As already stated, Raymond Massey and James Dean did not get on during the shoot, an antagonism Kazan subtly encouraged despite Massey’s strenuous objections. Massey felt Dean’s impromptu approach to their scenes was ‘unprofessional’. In fact, Dean was testing Massey in much the same way Cal constantly goads his father with distressed hopes of gaining his parental acceptance. Massey believed in fidelity to the written word – unchanged and unedited. Dean’s métier, however, was improvisation and he frequently tried Massey’s patients by never playing their scenes together the same way twice.

For the moment where Cal is denied his father’s love after he has managed to scrape together the money Adam lost on a bad crop of lettuce (the reimbursement as a birthday present refused outright) Dean’s Cal was supposed to leave the money on the table and exit the room heartbroken. Instead, Dean approached Massey with a look of absolute persecuted shame unreciprocated by Massey – who quite simply did not know how to react. The moment, fraught with Massey’s contempt for Dean’s experimentation, plays to Adam’s understated inability to comprehend or even appreciate the love of his son. Dean punctuates this moment with a final shriek, so primal that it levels the audience into shock and empathy for this boy who has been destroyed too often by the man whose unconditional love he so desperately craves.  It’s a riveting moment for sure, and one to illustrate what an epic wellspring of talent Dean had to offer the movies had he lived to see the day.   

East of Eden is set between 1917 and 1918 in the central Californian coastal towns of Monterey and Salinas. Cal (James Dean) and Aron (Richard Davalos) are sons of a modestly successful farmer and wartime draft board chairman named Adam Trask (Raymond Massey). Cal is moody and embittered in the knowledge their father favors Aron. Although the boys have long been led to believe their mother died in childbirth, Cal quietly unearths the truth, that she is alive and operating a small brothel in nearby Monterey.  Adam’s failed venture into long-haul vegetable shipping puts a considerable strain on the family’s prosperity and Cal quietly reasons, if he can recoup the money by entering the bean-growing business he may earn his father’s love and respect. To this end, Cal journeys to Monterey, confronts Kate and begs for a loan of $5,000. After considerable haggling and an all-out rejection (Kate, tries to have Cal forcibly evicted from her room) she inevitably breaks down and lends him the money. Cal puts it to good use. The U.S.’s participation in WWI causes bean prices to skyrocket, earning Cal back considerable profit on his investment.

Adam’s pride however remains invested in Aron, the heir apparent to the family business. Aron does not know about Kate. At least, not yet. And despite his knowing Adam favors Aron, Cal harbors no ill-will or jealousy toward his brother. He does, however, take something of an interest in Abra (Julie Harris), Aron’s demure girlfriend, arguably the only person to genuinely appreciate Cal’s merits and mettle. As time wears on, Abra begins to realize her loyalties to both have begun to divide the brothers. This becomes particularly apparent at a local fair. Having been stood up by Aron – who has been delayed – Abra allows Cal to squire her around the fairgrounds. The two partake of the gaiety and a ride atop the Ferris Wheel, sharing an awkwardly pleasant kiss. Abra confesses to Cal, she still loves Aron. A dispute arises between the town’s folk and Aron after he takes an unflattering view of America’s involvement in the war and sides with the Germans. Cal stands beside his brother. But Aron has grown jealous of Cal’s friendship with Abra. The brothers quarrel and Cal strikes at Aron in a fit of rage before being subdued by Abra.

Much later Cal decides to make Adam a present of the money he has earned from the bean harvest, a surprise gift for his birthday. But almost immediately the mood sours. Still jealous of Cal’s relationship with Abra, Aron announces he and Abra have become engaged. Abra cannot deny her feelings for Cal, despite her best intentions. To defuse the moment, Cal gives Adam his present. But when Adam learns about the initial investment, he outwardly refuses the gift, bringing Cal to wounded emotional tears. Abra comforts Cal with tenderness and a few kisses, the scene observed by an enraged Aron who orders Cal to stay away from his future wife. Cal confesses to Aron that their mother is alive and managing a brothel in Monterey. Unable to believe his own ears, Aron is taken by Cal to the whorehouse and shown the awful truth.  Aron goes on a wild bender that culminates with his enlisting in the army. Adam rushes to the train station to prevent his son from going off to war, but is too late. Aron manically laughs from an open window as his father looks on in horror. Not long afterward, Adam suffers a near fatal stroke that leaves him paralyzed. Abra encourages reconciliation between Cal and Adam, but only after one failed attempt, and Abra’s tearful pleas, does Adam stir up the gumption to speak in a frail voice, asking Cal to get rid of the nurse and remain behind to look after him. Grateful for her intervention, and moreover realizing how much he loves her, Cal passionately kisses Abra who has decided, once and for all, she loves him best. After their embrace, Abra leaves the room and Cal takes his place by his father’s bedside.

East of Eden is an emotionally uprooting experience. The volatile backstage antics and Raymond Massey’s general disdain for James Dean have translated into an exceptionally complex father/son relationship on the screen – arguably, to cut much closer to the truth of Steinbeck’s characters as well as the author’s own conflicted emotions regarding his father. In his first starring role, James Dean reveals a deeply troubled side to Cal, in retrospect more Dean than Cal - the actor allowing his anxiousness just enough latitude to be exorcised in dramatic moments played for their own catharses. Dean was, of course, cribbing from a lifetime of pent-up disillusionment, insecurity and feelings of betrayal. In short, he probably found a lot of himself in the part and used it as his platform to give one of the finest breakout performances by any actor. One is immediately struck by the verisimilitude ricocheting between fiction and fact. Dean fights like mad to breathe imperfect life into Steinbeck’s most haunted and tragic anti-hero.  While more readily hailed today for his iconic turn as Jim Stark in Rebel Without A Cause, the contemporary iconography of that cigarette-smoking teen, ultra-cool in his red windbreaker, Dean’s performance in East of Eden illustrates a subtler approach to his craft, a burnt offering of tenderness made raw and subversive until the intervention of a good woman manages to tame, coax and finally renew him in his sense of self.

Raymond Massey’s performance is an entirely different matter. The one performer who bucked, rather than took his cue from what Dean was trying to do, Massey comes across as rather wooden and ineffectual throughout the movie. Arguably, this bodes well for the flawed father/son relations of this piece. Yet, it also tends to fall just short of our expectations. Thankfully, Dean is doing so much within their interactions, the onus is diverted from Massey to Dean, while still to mark their scenes as engrossing. Julie Harris was not Kazan’s first choice for Abra. In fact, Harris was last to be cast and had the shortest period to get up in the part. Harris is tepid and timid. Again, these are traits that ought to have complimented the character. But Harris’ Abra is too bashful, too detached, too hesitant to be a love match for either Aron or Cal. There is no development in Abra’s emotional arc, rendering her love interest in Cal moot. Despite these shortcomings, East of Eden is James Dean’s movie. He runs away with the show, more than accomplished opposite the heavy-hitters cast opposite him. Dean’s star quality has never been easily definable. His looks are more curious than classic. His demeanor was best described by Kazan as that of a person riding the rim of insanity. Nevertheless, Dean remains an iconic figure at the movies – even though, regrettably, he was only to ever appear in three. Nevertheless, East of Eden is a classic today because of James Dean. He works every frame of it as few actors then or now have been able to, especially in their debut.

With Warner Home Video’s 4K debut of East of Eden we officially have all 3 of Dean’s classic performances to revel in UHD. Some years ago, the picture was meticulously restored in 4K via Warner’s MPI digital imaging facilities. Only ever released to Blu-ray, this newly minted native 4K release adds texture and depth to an image already sporting robust colors and exceptional contrast. Viewing East of Eden in 4K is like seeing it for the very first time, with renewed color and clarity. Fine grain advances to the forefront, looking indigenous to its source.  Ted McCord’s cinematography was never intended to be razor-sharp. There remains a residual softness, in keeping with that intent and also, the shortcomings of early Bausch and Lomb Cinemascope lens. Contrast is a shade darker, revealing subtler details. Transitional dissolves and/or fades between scenes still exhibit a loss of color density – again, a shortcoming of ‘scope’ not this 4K remaster. We get a 2.0 mono and 5.1 DTS remix, the latter to mimic 4-track Cinemascope stereo rather well. Dialogue remains front and center, but Leonard Rosenman’s poignant score is given its due.  Extras are all imported from previous releases and include a ‘making of’ featurette with recollections from Julie Harris and others. We also get Richard Schickel’s rather turgid audio commentary, plus a tribute piece on James Dean, original screen test footage and a few deleted scenes.  Bottom line: East of Eden is the best of Dean’s screen appearances. Though the picture’s popularity has been marginalized over time by more high-profile repeat viewings of Rebel Without a Cause and Giant, it’s in Eden that Dean illustrates his most intuitive virtues as a brilliant young talent, tragically snuffed out of the cinema firmament much too soon. The 4K is exceptionally satisfying. Highly recommended!

FILM RATING (out of 5 – 5 being the best)

3.5

VIDEO/AUDIO

4.5

EXTRAS

3