Woven into the main theme of racial prejudice are threads of social, or class, and gender prejudice. We are introduced to the Ewells and Cunnighams, considered to be poor white trash, one step up from the blacks; Boo Radley, a social outcast, and Scout, who is regularly put down and insulted by her own brother for behaving like a girl. These themes become part of the story as it unfolds, as they were in real life at that time. They are used both in the book and the film, subtly and noticeably to strengthen our opinions on the various issues that are raised.
In the film the theme of prejudice is symbolically illustrated even before the story begins. During the opening sequence the soft voice of a child, who we know now to be Scout, hums to herself as she colours over paper with a black pencil, revealing the title of the film in white letters. The camera frames the shots very tightly and the controlled picture gives a new angle on ordinary objects. It is followed by an overshot of the tobacco case, perhaps showing us that we have an overview of the story and that close up, things look different. The girl is then shown sketching a simple bird, which she then scribbles out, and tears through melodramatically, depicting the trouble to come with racial tensions. The divisions are also shown metaphorically with the black and white marbles and significant items in the story to come are also shown - the watch, the harmonica and the whistle.
At the beginning of the novel the story is focused on Scout and Jem growing up, and opens with reference to Jem’s broken arm. Structurally the arm is a significant ‘hook’ as the reader doesn’t know the full story of the arm until the end. This is important because disability is an issue referred to on several occasions. Part one also enables that reader to meet key characters, and learn about the social context and attitudes within it, essential to understanding part two. In a small incident we see the beginnings of racial hatred: Jem and Scout build a snowman but the snow is muddied and dark. Scout says: “Jem I ain’t ever seen a nigger snowman before.” This is an example of imagery used to put across the point of the children already prejudiced at such a young age.
The film similarly refers to the Wall Street Crash and introduces us to the Cunninghams. During the film this social awareness and the prejudice surrounding the Cunninghams and the Ewells, who are regarded as ‘white trash’, are included more than they are in the novel. Also throughout the film the Ewells and the Cunnighams are both very closely followed, more so than in the book. This extract is from the beginning of the film:
Scout: Is he poor?
Attics: Yes.
Scout: Are we poor?
Attics: We are indeed.
Scout: Are we as poor as the Cunninghams?
Atticus: No, not exactly. The Cunninghams are country folks, farmers. The crash hit them the hardest.
Throughout the novel the gender prejudice of this era is shown through the relationship between Scout and her older brother Jem.
“Scout, I’m telling you for the last time, shut your trap or go home – I declare to the Lord you’re getting more like a girl everyday.”
Jem uses Scout’s gender as an insult, almost like blackmail. Prejudice is about irrational contempt and hatred for what someone is and also about the power of one person over another. This is a good example of contempt for the female sex showing itself in children. This language is reflected also in the film but it is doubtful that many viewers in the 1950s, or readers in the 1930s, would even notice such prejudice since it was accepted that that was the way things were.
Another important thread in the film concerns Boo Radley, a social outcast along with his family, who inspires fear and around whom the children weave fantasies.
Jem: There goes the meanest man that ever took a breath of life.
Dill: Why is he the meanest man?
Jem: Well, for one thing, he has a boy named Boo that he keeps chained to a bed in the house over yonder...See, he lives over there. Boo only comes out at night when you're asleep and it's pitch-dark. When you wake up at night, you can hear him. Once I heard him scratchin' on our screen door, but he was gone by the time Atticus got there.
Dill: (intrigued) I wonder what he does in there? I wonder what he looks like?
Jem: Well, judgin' from his tracks, he's about six and a half feet tall. He eats raw squirrels and all the cats he can catch. There's a long, jagged scar that runs all the way across his face. His teeth are yella and rotten. His eyes are popped. And he drools most of the time.”
This language is a good illustration of how prejudice feeds on exaggeration and distortion of the truth – where anything bad, however ridiculous, is accepted as truth. In the film, when Jem has to return to Radley Place for his trousers, which came off whilst escaping from the house in an earlier incident, the house is portrayed in the same way that the children perceive the character of Boo Radley: the house is dark and forbidding and reinforces the mysterious and possibly dangerous character that Boo Radley may be.
One of the most important elements in the plot is the story of the alleged rape of Mayella, by Tom, a black man. Atticus, Jem and Scout’s father, is the defence lawyer for Tom, and he sets up a light outside the jailhouse so that the people of Maycomb can see that he isn’t afraid to sit alone and protect Tom. Atticus doesn’t feel vulnerable at this point. The lynch mob had sent the sheriff and his men off on a snipe hunt. When they tell Atticus this he become more fearful and more vulnerable. The mob assume that Tom is guilty because he is black and they are prepared to believe an unrespected white trash family instead of him. Scout and Jem are interested to see their father prepared to defend a black man and Scout manages, innocently, to defuse the situation by talking to Mr Cunningham, one of the leaders of the lynch mob, about his son and therefore making him feel guilty – so he retreats with the mob and they leave Tom Robinson alone.
During Tom’s trial the prosecution counsel constantly uses humiliating and demeaning language, calling him “boy”, to attack Tom on a racial basis. This was the usual language of the time, although even then it must have been clear that it was offensive and degrading.
Atticus’ questioning of Mayella is another point in the story where many of the moral issues to do with race and status are involved with, and affect, the situation. We see clearly in this strand of the story the lack of power and status that poor white women have and the fact that a black man has even less. Mayella is a poor white woman and downtrodden both in society and by her father, who has very little standing in the community. She is manipulated by her violent father and feels unsupported and alone in the town. Forced to fabricate a cover up story for her genuine affection for Tom Robinson, she creates a story of rape to protect herself. Mayella is prepared to let Tom hang rather than face her father. If the truth came out she knew the community and her family would punish her and she therefore lies because of her situation. Atticus, realising most of this, recognises that he must find out the truth to clear Tom Robinson’s name and keep a fair trial, but he doesn’t want to degrade Mayella in public. Atticus speaks the language of a lawyer, which is more noticeable in the courtroom: he speaks in measured, deliberate tones and weighs his words cautiously. The clash of prejudices is highly sensitive in court and Atticus understands he must talk around these issues carefully.
When Mayella is giving her statement and being questioned the camera uses many strong facial close-ups to show us how she uses girly crying to manipulate the court. It is the only weapon she has. Silences are employed to create a dead space where other issues are stressed. Nuances present in the book, requiring comment to bring them out, in the film are as simple as a look or expression: these are especially evident whilst Atticus is questioning Mayella.
During the film court scene the camera is used from Scout’s viewpoint, with shots from up in the balcony, perhaps to draw the attention to the blacks and stress the issue in the trial. Mr Ewell, Mayella’s father, is a very aggressive and angry character but also casual in manner and form. The character thinks he has the upper hand on his daughter and a mere black man and laughs to involve the people watching, and encourages them to laugh with him. This is particularly inappropriate when a man’s life is at stake. We can see how the audience in the courtroom reacts to the sensitive issues in the case and in these moments the film can influence us subconsciously so that we understand the important points and see where the moral issues lie. The book leaves it more to the readers to draw their own insights.
When Harper Lee was writing the book, during the 1950’s after the war, the fortunes of black Americans were changing quite drastically. Over one million blacks had been drafted for selective services. WW II not only brought war to America, but also prosperity. Many blacks were eventually involved in the war effort, either internally or externally. But even in the North black assimilation into military ranks was difficult throughout the war. Ironically, they were segregated in order to fight racism in Europe. Although their presence was in segregated units, blacks proved that they were worthy soldiers in battle. When they returned from WWII, they enjoyed a new found respect from their fellow neighbours.
The book caught the mood of the moment and it seemed to help whites to understand the situation they had created with blacks in the community. However, in some places the novel was banned and censored because many people felt strongly that blacks had to be kept in their place and that place was subject to whites. However, it made accessible the black experience to many whites – much more than ever before. Black people probably saw more of the moral significance in the story and it might well have influenced many young people to take part in the civil rights movement led by Martin Luther King in the early 1960s. In comparing the film and book and the portrayal of the social prejudices we can see that the film puts greater emphasis on the Civil Rights issues whereas the book is more a personal story against the background of the time, where prejudice and oppression were routine. The film concentrates on the characters that will illustrate to greater effect the prejudices it wants to raise. Despite the difference in emphasis both book and film have become classics.
