Institutionalized religion has attracted its fair share of satirical assaults in its time, but Elmer Gantry must surely rank as the most savage in American literature. Elmer Gantry is not, however, a movie about making good choices. On a rainy, cool day Ha Tien is a warm and welcoming site. The college president declares that he is a born preacher, and everyone urges him to become a minister. We are all bored by tired old men explaining the Bible through their noses! Singer Patti Page in her first film role, with Burt Lancaster, in "Elmer Gantry", Opening title of "Elmer Gantry" (1960), directed by Richard Brooks, Richard Brooks directs Burt Lancaster and Shirley Jones in "Elmer Gantry", Jean Simmons & Lancaster: Italian movie poster for "Elmer Gantry", Shirely Jones (2nd from left) & Lancaster (far right), with Oscars, 1961, Lancaster as Elmer Gantry: "When I was a child, I understood as a child", Rosy Simas of Rosy Simas Danse is Haudenosaunee, Seneca, Heron Clan. Definitely a film to see on the big screen. Opposition to the movement was vicious; Fosdick was ousted from his New York pulpit, and in the Bible Belt and the deep south, fundamentalism cranked itself up into a powerful machine that found expression through anti-evolution measures volumes of blue laws, and the Ku Klux Klan. Is he successful? After this catastrophe, he briefly acts as a "New Thought" evangelist, and eventually becomes a Methodist minister. One thing he is aware of is that professing belief serves his purposes very well, and for all he knows, every word of Baptist or Methodist dogma might be true. In a very Elmer Gantry moment, starting at 2:54, after singing the Lord gave us two good hands, brothers and sisters, one for the givin and one for the takin, The novel's protagonist, the Reverend Dr. Elmer Gantry, is initially attracted by booze and easy money (though he eventually renounces tobacco and alcohol) and chasing women. Elmers next position is at a church in Monarch. Elmer attends Mizpah Theological Seminary, a Baptist institution in Babylon, in the Midwest. Be the first to contribute. Elmer is so infatuated with Sharon that he gives up smoking and drinking for her. But throughout his career he wonders whether there is any value in his work. Elmer seems a demonic figure. These help her to put on a dramatic show that wins many converts. He feels little desire to practice what he preaches. . Another minor character who serves as one small brick in the vast anti-clerical edifice that is Elmer Gantry is Dr. Howard Bancock Binch, a renowned defender of the literal truth of the Bible. Happiness is the key to success. The portrayal of revivals as a necessary service with a precarious balance between helping and hurting both the revivals leaders and attendants is masterful. ." Reverend Dr. Willoughby Quarles is president of Terwillinger College. After two years as a salesman, Elmer meets Eddie Fislinger at his church in Kansas, and he decides he wants to be a preacher again. His decision to enter the ministry is dishonest and contrary to his own nature, and it costs him the respect and friendship of his agnostic college roommate, Jim Lefferts. When Deacon Bains discovers Gantrys affair with Lulu and forces him to propose, Gantry tricks another man into an entanglement with Lulu and is released from the engagement. Lewis preferred the liberal Birkhead to the conservative Stidger, and on his second visit to Kansas City, Lewis chose Birkhead as his guide. For example, the division between Northern and Southern Baptists is explained in this way: [B]efore the Civil War the Northern Baptists proved by the Bible, unanswerably, that slavery was wrong; and the Southern Baptists proved by the Bible, irrefutably, that slavery was the will of God. Later in the novel, Frank Shallard realizes how threatened conservative clergymen are by scientific knowledge and how inadequate they are to preside over educational institutions. This site -- maintained by the faculty but also involving our students, our alumni, and the graduate teaching assistants who help us in our classes -- discusses the relevance of the study of religion, in particular, and the liberal arts, in general, for understanding both the past and present, by seeing religion as but one element of wider cultural practices. Lulu becomes devoted to Elmer but he gets bored with her. After Sharon dismisses him in favor of Elmer, Cecil tries to conduct a rescue mission in Buffalo. Elmer is the great man steadily making his way upward in the worldthe man of immoderate personal ambitionand the great man hasnt time for scruples. These blossoming words, these organ-like phrases, these profound notions, had been rammed home till they stuck in his brain, ready for use. As a boy, the Baptist church was all he knew. WebElmer Gantry (Burt Lancaster) is a slick traveling salesman who is a boozer and a dog hound. Aubrey holds a Ph.D. in English and has published many articles on twentieth century literature. Those who believe in the doctrines of the church are presented as fools or morons, and are easy targets for malicious fun. WebHow does the novel Elmer Gantry end? William Donninger Styles is a rich businessman in Zenith. It's easy to miss the Katar River restaurant, hidden away in a little industrial strip behind the Lake & Hiawatha shopping center in south Minneapolis. Jim is the college freethinker and the only person who has any influence on Elmer. The pious but stupid Eddie complains that [E]verything we Baptists stand for is threatened by those darn so-called liberals . He is referring to the practice of open communion, which is favored by liberals, as opposed to the closed communion of the fundamentalists, according to which only Baptists are allowed to participate in the rite. In creating the evangelist Sharon Falconer, the author presents himself with a bigger, although more complex, target. Elmer forces him to resign by questioning his religious beliefs, after which Shallard gets a job with the Charity Organization Society. WebDaily newspaper from Chickasha, Oklahoma that includes local, state and national news along with advertising. Many reviewers have already remarked on this terrific movie far better than I can, so this message is really for younger people interested in serious film. She had bought the plantation just two years before. Here she kneels. Equity is one part of a broader vision for the Hiawatha network of schools. At the church, Elmer tries to seduce Lulu Bains, the daughter of one of the deacons, while Shallard warns him against even the appearance of evil. After exposing the professors secret, He retains his theological navet, however, and it is clear that his modernism is not sufficient. Nothing reveals Lewiss isolation from an overview of life more clearly than the way he dismisses religion. If there are two dates, the date of publication and appearance Source: Bryan Aubrey, Critical Essay on Elmer Gantry, in Novels for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006. Gantry becomes her lover, but loses both her and his position when she is killed in a fire at her new tabernacle. But while Elmers career ascends, that of the honest Frank Shallard, who goes to the seminary with Elmer, descends to the point where Frank is beaten up by members of the Ku Klux Klan for preaching what he believes to be the truth. Id sell anything.. Jean Simmons is lovely and convincing as as Sister Sharon Falconer, the charismatic female evangelist who wins Gantry's heart (and lust)as they team up to jump-start America's dwindling religious beliefs. In another scene, Falconer exhibits pride and materialism when she admits that she always wanted her own church with a giant glowing cross. Meanwhile, Babe Ruth was closing in on the home run record. After Elmer dumps her for Hettie, Lulu loses interest in life. Lulu Bains is the daughter of Barney Bains. This is indeed what happened to Dr. Bruno Zechlin, one of the faculty at Mizpah, who lost his fundamentalist faith even before he received his theological doctorate. In his preparation for the ministry, it is ironic that Elmer plagiarizes his first (and most frequently useful) sermon from the social reformer Robert G. Ingersoll: Love is the only bow on lifes dark cloud. It is the call! He follows her to her bedroom where he sees a couch high on carven ivory posts, covered with a mandarin coat; unlighted brass lamps in the likeness of mosques and pagodas; gilt papier-mch armor on the walls; a wide dressing-table with a score of cosmetics in odd Parisian bottles; tall candlesticks, the twisted and flowered candles lighted; and over everything a hint of incense. She gives him a robe for the service of the altar. Required fields are marked *. She was reported missing after swimming off Venice Beach, California, turning up five weeks later in Mexico, claiming she had been kidnapped. "Elmer Gantry" United Artists Simon received an Oscar nomination for Best Actress for her performance as a runaway housewife in "The Happy Ending" (1969), Elmer is soon preaching to crowds larger than almost all the churches in Zenith. Gantry considers Shallards company an obstacle to his plans with Lulu, so he engineers Shallards resignation with accusations of apostasy. Salesman Elmer Gantry, salesman teams up with evangelist Sister Sharon Falconer to sell religion to 1920s America. Web1. The last date is today's For several sessions of congress he had backed a bill for a federal censorship of all fiction, plays, and moving pictures, with a penitentiary sentence for any author mentioning adultery even by implication, ridiculing prohibition, or making light of any Christian sect or minister. Robert J. Higgs. For two years, he helps her lead revival meetings in large cities, mastering the art of press advertising and fundraising. It applied the methods of historical and literary analysis in order to determine the authorship, date and place of composition of the books of the Bible. The movie is based on the 1927 novel of the same name by Minnesotas own Nobel Prizewinning author, Sinclair Lewis. Lewiss attack upon the villagesnowhere so embittered as in Elmer Gantry occurs through exposure of the cultural opportunities which the village provides, and these are thin indeed, Most literary materials found in the village are reflections of American popular culture before the turn of the century. A hundred and eleven people died that night, including all the gospel-crew save Elmer.. WebOn publication, Elmer Gantry had a sensational reception. What of Jesuss teachings? The attack on the hypocrisy of Protestant ministers continues throughout the novel. ", Jesus was a simple virtuous teacher, . She and Elmer have an affair, which later turns out to be a trick on the part of Hettie and her husband Oscar to blackmail Elmer. The couple abandons their campaign against Elmer and leave The following was written for REL 360: Popular Culture/Public Humanities. After various forays into evangelism, he becomes a successful Methodist minister despite his hypocrisy and serial sexual indiscretions.[1]. If all of them are there, he says. But we sure view it differently 80 years after the book and 55 years after the movie debuted. Liking the idea of having power over an audience, Elmer convinces himself he has been called to the ministry. That night he has doubts, but he is persuaded to speak the following night at the Y.M.C.A. Was a member of the of the bogus Fleetwood Mac band, that the then manager Clifford Davis send on a US tour in 1974 when the real Fleetwood Mac rejected the tour. Good drama that had the potential to be one of the greats. After the fire and Sharons death, Elmer is conscience-stricken. Besides being an effective satire targeted against religious hypocrisy, Elmer Gantry provides insight into the clash of cultural forces in America in the 1920s. Gantrys beliefs are left ambiguous, as are his motives for evangelizing. The film isn't just about rural religion in the 1920s, or how media is exploited, or how sometimes clever hucksters can outwit themselves. In the Shadow of No Future: Justice Claims and the Israel-Palestine Conflict? Satire ridicules its subject, with the intention of arousing contempt or scorn in the reader. Why does Lewis include him in the book? A novel set from 1920 to 1922 in Zenith, an imaginary midwestern American city; published in 1922. Before Falconer and Gantry set up their revival in Zenith, a large city which is described as a place where Falconer and Gantry can become famous, Falconers revivals were held in the country and in small towns. He joins the staff of a metaphysical cult but is fired when he is caught stealing from the collection plate. Gantry maintains friendships with most pastors in Zenith but loathes Philip McGarry, a pastor in a poor neighborhood who has been a friend and mentor to Shallard. In Zenith, when a group of local clergymen meet as the Committee on Public Morals, they reveal a distinct lack of brotherly love amongst themselves: They all detested one another. She engages in worthy activities at the church in Banjo Crossing, and falls in love with Elmer. According to Mark Schorer, in his introduction to Sinclair Lewis: A Collection of Critical Essays, No novel in the history of American literature outraged its audience so completely, and very few novels in American literature had a larger immediate audience. The book was banned in Boston and other cities and denounced from hundreds of pulpits. Once Gantry accuses the city government of protecting the brothels and drug dealers, he becomes one of the most powerful men in Zenith. Finally, in the summer of 2005 I took a look after seeing several Burt Lancaster films and being reminded how good an actor he was. The result would be the fascist state against which Babbitt, in anticipation of 1984, warns. William's business plan has been for the show to set up in small towns, so it's against his wishes that Sister Sharon, falling for Elmer, agrees to Elmer's plan to set up in the larger city of Zenith, where William feels the that the scrutiny of the cynical urban populace will hurt their brand. Elmer Gantry is a satirical novel written by Sinclair Lewis in 1926 that presents aspects of the religious activity of America in fundamentalist and evangelistic circles and the attitudes of the 1920s public toward it. WebThis count will explain the meaning of Macrons declaration that peace, security, and stability in Europe, and in the Ukraine, are for Europeans to agree with Russia. She even tells Elmer (who falls for her the instant he sees her) that she is the reincarnation of Joan of Arc, although she later admits that she does not really believe this. Elmer reads Browning, Tennyson, Dickens. Harry Sinclair Lewis, best known as Sinclair Lewis, was born on February 7, 1885, in Sauk Centre, Minnesota. Movie Forums . Though the bulldog of the football team in college, Elmer shows his cowardice during the fire in Sharon Falconers tabernacle (which is built out over the water): In howling panic, Elmer sprang among them, knocked them aside, struck down a girl who stood in his way, yanked open the door, and got through it the last, the only one, to get through it. He then ran out a little into the surf and dragged in a woman who had already safely touched bottom, and then at least thirty more who had already rescued themselves. I give this movie a 10 only because there is nothing above that. Dr. Otto Hickenlooper is a prominent Methodist minister in Zenith, and one of Elmers rivals. He first worked with William L. "Big Bill" Stidger, pastor of the Linwood Boulevard Methodist Episcopal Church in Kansas City, Missouri. Only the novels It Cant Happen Here (1935) and Kingsblood Royal (1947) have stood the test of time. At the start of the novel Elmer is a college football player so little given to piety that he is known as Hell-cat. At the end of the book he is Dr. Gantry, minister of the large Wellspring Methodist Church in Zenith, with hopes of becoming the head of a national moral-rearmament organization, the National Association for the Purification of the Arts and the Press (Napap). He also forms a Committee on Public Morals, persuades the police to make him a temporary lieutenant, and personally leads raids on the red-light districts. Come! He preaches at the service that gets Elmer converted. Sharons real name is Katie Jonas; she picked out the name Sharon Falconer when she was working as a stenographer. If I could only believe it! Elmer escapes by knocking other people out of the way, but Sharon is burned to death. Simulation Theory: How is Religion Part of It? But Frank rages on at the inconsistencies in doctrine, the contradictions in the Bible, the evil men who are ministers, and the fools and dullards who work about him in Zenith: Gantry, Bishop Toomis, Chester Brown, Hickenlooper, and PottsPotts especially, who gets his idea of human motives out of George Eliot and Margaret Deland, and his ideas of economics out of editorials in the Advocate, and his idea as to what he really is accomplishing out of the flattery of his Ladies Aid! Frank adds that he doesnt find Jesus an especially admirable characterJesus was more vain and furious than a leader should be. Lewis seems determined to avoid religious discrimination: all sects appear in equally bad light. Shirley Jones won an Oscar for best supporting actress in her role as the woman who can bring Gantry down. The novel is absorbing, and I should like to say a few words about it. The footballer wins by flattering Elmer, insulting Elmers courage, and challenging Elmer to a fight over The Lord. Connected to this it must be said that I did think the plot was a little thin at times and the strength of film does lie in the general portrayal of the world rather than the nitty-gritty of any one character or thread (although even the thin bits are pretty good). Yet at the fire, it is Sharon who is heroic. Schorer also says that, while researching the book, Lewis attended two or three church services every Sunday while in Kansas City, and that: "He took advantage of every possible tangential experience in the religious community." While managing to cover up certain sexual indiscretions, he is thrown out of the seminary before completing his BD because he is too drunk to turn up at a church where he is supposed to preach. Lancaster is absolutely mesmerizing as "Elmer Gantry." The attendants give her their money, she leaves after a short period of time, and then the attendants are no better off and short on money. Elmer Gantry is a film that exposes hypocrisy and greed among religious leaders who seek to exploit gullible citizens looking for something in which to believe. His specialty is in denouncing vice, and in Zenith he even leads a police raid on the local dens of iniquity. Later Frank is thrown from the church and he ventures forth as a worker in a charity organization. He is immediately The story of a womanizing con man and an evangelist selling religion all across America was an Then his past comes back to haunt him in the form of Lulu Bains (Shirley Jones) who is now a prostitute. From the exceptionally talented pen of noted author Sinclair Lewis comes this entertaining story of a fast-talking, yarn-spinning vacuum salesman with the natural gift of persuasion. She ignores the warning and they become a great success in the big city. In his ever lustful sights is a voluptuous female preacher. Introduction of Gantry Girder. 23 Feb. 2023
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