Elia Kazan took on the mammoth task of adapting John Steinbeck’s celebrated opus East of Eden, and he ended up giving the world James Dean. Disaffected post-war kids were drawn to Dean’s brooding style and emotional urgency as prodigal son Cal Trask growing up in WWI-era Salinas Valley. He jockeys with chosen older brother Aron (Richard Davalos) for the attention of his idealistic, principled father (Raymond Massey), searches for a long-thought-dead mother (Jo Van Fleet), and courts affection for his brother’s girl (Julie Harris). East of Eden was the only Dean film he saw released in his lifetime, and supplied the first of his posthumous Oscar nominations. Like the novel, this family saga draws heavily from American history and the Old Testament to meditate, in rather Steinbeck-ian fashion, on the difference between progress and promise.
“East is not only one of Kazan’s richest films and Dean’s first significant role, it is also arguably the actor’s best performance.” – Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times
“A film of great performances, atmospheric photography, and a sure sense of period and place” – Geoff Andrew, Time Out
Ariel Schudson discusses East of Eden on the New Beverly blog.
