The Trip to Bountiful

When F. Murray Abraham opened the envelope to reveal the Best Actress winner that year, he said "I consider this woman the finest actress in the world", and its hard to argue that point. She owns this movie and no one else would have done it as beautifully. Thank God this movie was done before she passed.

After many tries, Geraldine Page finally won the Oscar that had eluded her for years. As Carrie Watts, she delivered a near perfect performance and on Academy Award night walked off with the coveted prize.

Earlier, she had stunned the world with her brilliant acting in Tennessee Williams' "Sweet Bird of Youth" with Paul Newman. But 1962 was ripe with excellent female nominees including Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn and the winner that year, Anne Bancroft.

"The Trip to Bountiful" was a small, intimate film about an unhappy, elderly woman who yearns to visit her girlhood home before she dies. She has tried, unsuccessfully several times before, but was stopped by her loving son and disapproving daughter-in-law, skilfully played by Carlin Glynn as "Jessie Mae".

Once on the bus to Bountiful, Mrs. Watts meets a lovely young girl played by Rebecca De Mornay in whom she confides. Miss Page was wonderful here with every nuance, side glance and gesture. Her years of experience as a stage and film actress showed loud and clear. She was brilliant. This prompted actress, Shelley Winters to comment, "this is one of the greatest performances I've ever seen".

Scene after scene, Geraldine Page, does what few actresses can do, breathe REAL LIFE into a character. Her physical aliments and limitations are not exagerrated, but felt. Her emotional highs and lows speak volumes and you find yourself sharing her inner feelings.

Carlin Glynn deserved a nomination as Best Supporting Actress. But, I suppose the Academy members were so enthralled with Miss Page, they couldn't SEE anyone else on the screen!

The supporting cast was strong. I especially liked Richard Bradford as the Sheriff who personally takes Mrs. Watts on her "trip to Bountiful". The scene where Page peers at her old home and says "I can almost see my father walk out of this house..." was heartbreaking. Writer, Horton Foote, was obviously writing from experience and director, Peter Masterson showed compassion and respect for the script and for his actors.

Do NOT miss this one.

I came back to read my original review of "The Trip to Bountiful" after I viewed the film again the other night. I read the other accounts of the movie and I couldn't help by get very emotional reading the words of praise for Geraldine Page's memorable performance.

The night she won the Oscar was big news in New York, where she lived and taught. One news program's crew visited a cafe where Miss Page's students were watching the ceremonies on tv. When F. Murray Abraham opened the envelope and said, "...and the winner is the greatest actress.." her students began to scream and cry BEFORE her name was called. They KNEW who had won, and so did I. I wept right along with them, just as I had done when I, a former actor, realized that very few actors would ever reach her level of artistry.

I watched "Bountiful" over and over in disbelief. Her scenes on the bus with Rebecca de Mornay were wonderful and very touching. I kept wondering HOW did she prepared herself for this?!!! When she rode, with the Sheriff through what was left of Bountiful and uttered, "My God, will you look at Bountiful..." Her walk through the old house and her gaze as she looked at the land, the trees and the birds reminded me of a visit to the old country town of my childhood, reminding me that everywhere I've ever been is still there, perhaps in a different form, but it's still there.

The reason that she got that standing ovation from the Academy Awards audience, is that it was appropriate to honor greatness and that the Oscar was going to an actor that TRULY deserved to win.

In an age that Oscars are won for okay performances, when, in other years, Oscars were truly given to deserving achievements, AND, the competition was much, much stronger.

I cannot recommend this picture more. For any aspiring actor that wants to set a goal standard for greatest, he or she must see this performance.

Carrie Watts (Oscar winning Geraldine Page) has been cooped up in a 2 room Houston apartment with her meek son and her outspoken daughter-in-law for twenty years. Getting on in her years, and equipped with a bad heart, her only wish is to see her home on the southern coast of Texas (Bountiful) before she dies. She has often attempted to go there, but always seems to get caught before she can even get on the bus. But one glorious day, she does manage to escape the confines of the apartment and her critical daughter-in-law, and thus, her adventure does begin. Mrs. Watts encounters a delightful young lady (Rebecca de Mornay)and relates her life story, sings hymns to her heart's content, and finally, through sheer will and perseverance, does make it to Bountiful, where she discovers that her one time home is now a timeworn shell. Here, she rediscovers her past, and all of the emotions she experiences and shares with us are to be treasured for generations to come. Geraldine Page is so masterful and in every frame of this monumental film, that we tend to forget that she is even acting. Her character could be our grandmother, our mother, and we come to love this eccentric character as though she were family. One of the most charming movies ever made!

Note, I didn't say movie star as she certainly was not a movie star but was a veteran Broadway actor, a real actor and not a movie face with "presence". Charles Bronson once said that what big movie stars have is "presence", not acting ability. Page has both of these attributes here in spades, acting and presence.

This great film could be my grandmother's story but in reverse, as my grandma had a very caring daughter, my mother, but a resentful son-in-law in my father so I saw a very similar story first hand, which made me appreciate this film all the more.

Page did a marvelous job of showing the immense disconnect between two diverse generations, one raised early in the 20th century in an era of intense religious devotion and the other raised 40 years later in a WWII era of emerging personal independence. The resulting conflicts between the loving son's selfish and demanding wife and his self-sacrificing mother was the entire story until her eventful "trip" back home to Bountiful, Texas. Wanting and praying so hard to be able to take her last trip home consumed her entire life as she gracefully but tearfully faced her hateful daughter-in-law's cruel harshness each and every day, with her unfortunate son forced to try to act as mediator. John Heard was effective as her concerned son caught in the middle.

Page was marvelous in the special way she showed her character's intense religious devotion and principles in how she always treated all people with decency even when they were not that way to her, and in how she tried her best to get along and be friendly in the face of intense dislike and resentment. Understandably, her all-day hymn singing got on her son's wife's nerves, just as my Grandma's incessant hymn singing got on my dad's nerves and forced the same conclusion....both old ladies were practically forced to leave.

Page's son loved both women dearly but he was forced to be in the difficult middle ground, wanting to please his jerk wife and his nice mom but was increasingly unable to do so, thus the long bus "trip" back home for mom was an inevitable run-away trip that left the son in an even greater mess....now what to do?

On her bus trip home, Page's character's "live and let live" understanding of humanity, and her awareness that we are all in the same boat here on earth(even though it was God's glorious boat to her)led her to reach out to a fellow bus traveler with immense friendliness and compassion in the best manner of her religion's teachings. Rebecca DeMornay was perfect as that fellow bus traveler, a prim young military wife on her way to her husband. And, even though Thomas Wolfe was right when he wrote that "you can never go home again", Page showed the perfect combination of wonder and sad acceptance upon seeing her old, run down, country home place again after so many years away in the big city.

Though her caring son finally came to retrieve her back home to whatever improvements he had worked out with his wife, at least she got to see the "old home place" one last time. She could now rest in peace no matter what. See this great story just to fill your heart, and to see that people in this country once were just like Page's character, and it was a better place for it.

Movies don't get any better than this one. If you loved this film you will also love "Places in The Heart".