The Intruder by Roger Corman
Roger Corman is known for his many low budget films, and one of his nicknames was The King of Cult.
Never shy about 'pushing the envelope,' in 1961, he decided to make a film about racism, bigotry, mob mentality, and a major social event of the time: desegregation of the public schools. He filmed The Intruder, based upon a story by Charles Beaumont (who wrote a number of Twilight Zone episodes), starring a youthful William Shatner (pre-Captain Kirk...and also in several TZ episodes).
Typical of Corman, he pulls no punches here.
Racism and bigotry are ugly. The N word is spoken a number of times. It is raw.
The Intruder is a story which examines the ease with which a charismatic leader with a pernicious all-consuming hunger for power can exploit fear to rally otherwise normal people into irrationality, violence and hatred.
Corman:
"I wanted to shoot in the Midsouth, which was where most of the integration problems were taking place. But I didn’t want to be in a Southern state. I wanted to have, in my own mind, the protection of a Midwestern state and the laws there. Looking at a map of the US, I found what’s called the boot heel of Missouri, which runs along the Mississippi River in a little kind of wedge south of Missouri proper, between Arkansas and Tennessee or Kentucky, something like that. There I was able to get a southern look and southern accents for the townspeople. All of that worked right."
An outsider from the north, well dressed, and articulate hate monger, arrives in a small town in the south, with the intent of stoking racial violence. He is able to manipulate the white members of the town against the recent court decision ending school segregation. He stokes fear. He unearths their worst qualities. He turns neighbor against neighbor. Sound familiar?
Remember, this was 1961. Corman had courage to even consider making a film like this, much less actually doing it. The film was shot in Missouri, and Corman used many of the locals in the film.
Oh...did I say it as made in 1961?
During a key sequence in the film, in which Shatner as Cramer delivers an impassioned pro-segregation speech, it’s clear to the viewer that the large audience supports him all the way. Corman stated that many of the people who were at that rally were really pro-segregation, and thought Shatner was the hero of the film.
As Corman remembered:
Oh, they loved him! They believed him! I recruited these guys out of the public park. They had great faces, and I said, “This is the man who is coming to town, and I want you to be part of this group”. When Shatner said, “This country shall be free and white”, they cheered, and they believed him all the way. Some of them were heartbroken at the end of the film when they realized that Cramer was the bad guy. It was a great shock to them.
[When the local citizenry realized the film’s true intent] I was thrown out of two towns with flat-out threats from the sheriff of one county and the chief of police in another. Being in Missouri really didn’t make any difference. The sheriff actually told me, “If you’re in town when the sun sets, you’re in jail. And don’t ever come back.” The final sequence of the film took place in a schoolyard, and we had shot in East Prairie, Missouri. The first day or two days of this final sequence went OK, and then the sheriff told me to get out of town.
We couldn’t go back, so I shot some swings in a part in Charleston for half of the next day, and the chief of police kicked me out of Charleston, and we ended up shooting at a country schoolyard. It was summer, and we were out in the country, where there were no police or anybody to see that we were there, and we finished the sequence. Nobody has ever noticed, but the size of the swings varies slightly from shot to shot because they were in three different areas. Luckily people were more interested in the scene itself."
(source: Wheeler Winston Dixon May 2013, Senses of Cinema)
The Intruder is worth a viewing, if only to remind us of what has gone before us,
in our country, and what still exists today....if we stand by and allow it.
Never shy about 'pushing the envelope,' in 1961, he decided to make a film about racism, bigotry, mob mentality, and a major social event of the time: desegregation of the public schools. He filmed The Intruder, based upon a story by Charles Beaumont (who wrote a number of Twilight Zone episodes), starring a youthful William Shatner (pre-Captain Kirk...and also in several TZ episodes).
Typical of Corman, he pulls no punches here.
Racism and bigotry are ugly. The N word is spoken a number of times. It is raw.
The Intruder is a story which examines the ease with which a charismatic leader with a pernicious all-consuming hunger for power can exploit fear to rally otherwise normal people into irrationality, violence and hatred.
Corman:
"I wanted to shoot in the Midsouth, which was where most of the integration problems were taking place. But I didn’t want to be in a Southern state. I wanted to have, in my own mind, the protection of a Midwestern state and the laws there. Looking at a map of the US, I found what’s called the boot heel of Missouri, which runs along the Mississippi River in a little kind of wedge south of Missouri proper, between Arkansas and Tennessee or Kentucky, something like that. There I was able to get a southern look and southern accents for the townspeople. All of that worked right."
An outsider from the north, well dressed, and articulate hate monger, arrives in a small town in the south, with the intent of stoking racial violence. He is able to manipulate the white members of the town against the recent court decision ending school segregation. He stokes fear. He unearths their worst qualities. He turns neighbor against neighbor. Sound familiar?
Remember, this was 1961. Corman had courage to even consider making a film like this, much less actually doing it. The film was shot in Missouri, and Corman used many of the locals in the film.
Oh...did I say it as made in 1961?
During a key sequence in the film, in which Shatner as Cramer delivers an impassioned pro-segregation speech, it’s clear to the viewer that the large audience supports him all the way. Corman stated that many of the people who were at that rally were really pro-segregation, and thought Shatner was the hero of the film.
As Corman remembered:
Oh, they loved him! They believed him! I recruited these guys out of the public park. They had great faces, and I said, “This is the man who is coming to town, and I want you to be part of this group”. When Shatner said, “This country shall be free and white”, they cheered, and they believed him all the way. Some of them were heartbroken at the end of the film when they realized that Cramer was the bad guy. It was a great shock to them.
[When the local citizenry realized the film’s true intent] I was thrown out of two towns with flat-out threats from the sheriff of one county and the chief of police in another. Being in Missouri really didn’t make any difference. The sheriff actually told me, “If you’re in town when the sun sets, you’re in jail. And don’t ever come back.” The final sequence of the film took place in a schoolyard, and we had shot in East Prairie, Missouri. The first day or two days of this final sequence went OK, and then the sheriff told me to get out of town.
We couldn’t go back, so I shot some swings in a part in Charleston for half of the next day, and the chief of police kicked me out of Charleston, and we ended up shooting at a country schoolyard. It was summer, and we were out in the country, where there were no police or anybody to see that we were there, and we finished the sequence. Nobody has ever noticed, but the size of the swings varies slightly from shot to shot because they were in three different areas. Luckily people were more interested in the scene itself."
(source: Wheeler Winston Dixon May 2013, Senses of Cinema)
The Intruder is worth a viewing, if only to remind us of what has gone before us,
in our country, and what still exists today....if we stand by and allow it.
