Wild Geese on Film (Part 3): After the Harvest

The third of three addendums to the recent post about Martha Ostenso's 1925 bestselling novel.

The only film adaptation of Wild Geese released during my lifetime, yet I missed its airing on 4 March 2001.

I was the father of a toddler at time.

After the Harvest was a made-for-TV movie. A part of Baton Broadcasting's Canadian Literature Initiative, a very slim, very small bone thrown so as to get the okay for its takeover of CTV. The corporation promised all of one million dollars spread over two years to encourage independent productions. What followed were adaptations of Anna Porter's The Bookfair Murders, the Gail Bowen mysteries Deadly Appearances and Murder at the Mendel, and Murder Most Likely, which was based on the Michael Harris book The Judas Kiss.

The Porter and Bowen books were murder mysteries, Harris's was an investigation into a corrupt RCMP officer who in 1983 tossed his wife off the 17th-storey balcony of their Toronto condo. All four were published in the 'nineties.

Wild Geese, which features no murder, was a seven-decade-old novel. When first published it sat on store shelves alongside Bliss Carman and E. Barrington, not John Grisham and Daniel Steele. 

Detail of a Henry Morgan & Co ad, Montreal Gazette, 19 November 1925.

After the Harvest was by far the best received of the Canadian Literature Initiative films. Watching it today, it is easy to see why.

The first thing that strikes is the look, which captures the beauty of the Canadian West, using natural lighting to full effect. There are shots that look  like paintings come to life. Cinematographer Gregory Middleton would go on to Passchendaele, The Watchmen, and Game of Thrones.

Care was taken in costuming, sets, and pretty much everything else, farm machinery included. 

Added to these are extraordinary performances. One expects as much from Sam Shepard, who is perfectly cast as tyrannical, yet dispassionate Caleb Gare.  That stare! He commands nearly every scene, as the story demands. Liane Balaband, who plays Lind Archer, is another standout. Her role as "the Teacher" is somewhat greater than in the novel, though I do think CTV's promo reel exaggerates the character's influence:

Finally, there's the script. I've left this for the end because, by necessity, spoilers will follow. Anyone coming fresh to Wild Geese may wish to skip to the After the Harvest YouTube link below.

Read the book, see the movie, and remember they do not tell the exact same story.

According to a Sandra Martin piece in the 3 March 2001 edition of the Globe & Mail, screenwriter Suzette Couture first read Ostenso's novel after having been given a copy by Maggie Siggins when working on the film adaptation of A Canadian Tragedy: JoAnne and Colin Thatcher. Like me, she was hooked.

Couture makes changes in bringing Wild Geese to the screen, but in ways that will, with few exceptions, pass unnoticed by all but the most recent or most familiar reader.

The first words are uttered by Judith Gare, played by Nadia Litz, as she lies seemingly naked in a wheat field:

"I've heard it said that there is one moment in life when we're happy and the rest is spent remembering."

In the second scene, Lind Archer stands alone by the side of a dirt road trying to hail a ride. John Tobacco, who is passing on a horse-drawn wagon, stops:

LIND: I was just dropped here, they wouldn't take me any further. I'm expected...

John says nothing.

LIND: ... at Caleb Gare's?

JOHN: No one goes up that road.

LIND: Then why do you?

JOHN: I go everywhere. I deliver the mail.

So much of the novel is contained in this exchange, so much of the mood is set, and yet like Judith Gare's opening monologue it doesn't feature in the novel.

There's the cinematography, the attention to detail, and the acting, but what impresses most is Couture's script. Her dialogue does much to rein in the novel's length, as in this exchange between Lind and Judith:

JUDITH: Caleb's father farmed this land. We're born to it, to live here and die here. It's just the way it is.

LIND: And your mother? She never takes your side with him?

JUDITH: She doesn't care. Not for any of us.

LIND: You really believe that?

JUDITH: What's it to you anyway?

LIND: You don't know me. You don't know anything about me.

JUDITH: Tell me then.

LIND: The man who was supposed to marry me left.

JUDITH: I've heard worse.

LIND: My father's dead.

JUDITH: I call that lucky.

This is another scene that does not appear in the novel, but it is easy to be fooled in that it fits so perfectly.

Couture provides Lind with a backstory. That she's Catholic explains why she does not join Caleb in services at Yellow Post's church.

Very clever.

I don't mean to suggest that I'm all in on After the Harvest. 

As in Ruf der Wildgänse, the 1961 Austrian-German adaptation, Amelia tells Mark Jordan (inexplicably renamed Jordan Sinclair), that she is his mother. This never happens in the novel. I see no reason to do so aside from the resulting drama. It is indeed tear inducing.

The much criticized ending of Wild Geese is just as contentious in this adaptation. Here Caleb survives the fire to be met with his wife in the final scene. I don't know that it is the perfect ending, but it is superior. Because I think the scene worth watching, I won't quote the dialogue. It begins at the ninety minute mark, pretty much right down to the second, and is just about the best thing I've ever seen from a Canadian television production. 

The film can be seen in it's entirety on on Youtube (for now, at least):

Watch it while you can.

I recommend it highly.

Related post:

Wild Wild Geese

Wild Geese on Film (Part I): Wild Geese
Wild Geese on Film (Part 2): Ruf der Wildgänse

Véhicule Press: Ten for Fifty

Véhicule Press celebrated its fiftieth anniversary this past weekend. One of eight people invited to speak at the celebration, I kept kept my comments short, but only because Mark Abley, who co-hosted the evening with Nyla Matuk, threatened hook and hammer if I went over my allotted time. I left the stage unscathed by channelling Big Star... as opposed to, say, Emerson, Lake and Palmer.

Fifty years is a remarkable achievement, particularly in this country. The press has survived while others, large and small have ceased or been absorbed by foreign multinationals. I'm proud to have played a small role in its history.

For you bibliophiles, I've have put together a list of ten old favourite Véhicule Press books from my collection:

Yellow-Wolf and Other Tales of the Saint Lawrence [Divers]

Philippe-Joseph Aubert de Gaspé [trans Jane Brierly]

1990

Jane Briery translated the complete published oeuvres of Philippe-Joseph Aubert de Gaspé, beginning with Les Anciens Canadiens (Canadians of Old), one of this country's most translated works. The last, Yellow-Wolf and Other Tales of the Saint Lawrence, received a Governor General's Award for Translation. 

Veiled Countries/Lives

Marie-Claire Blais [trans Michael Harris]

1984

Marie-Claire Blais is my favourite Québécoise writer. To think that we've both been published by the same press!

Comprising Pays voilés (1963) and Existences (1967), this volume is the only translation of her poems. 

The Crow's Vow

Susan Briscoe

2010

The poet's only book. How I looked forward to her next.

It was not to be.

A wonderful friend and a beautiful soul.

Neons in the Night

Lucien Francoeur [trans Susanne de Lotbinière-Harwood]

1980

The oldest Véhicule Press book in my collection. Francoeur inscribed it to "Joe," describing a 1981 John Abbott College class as "wild and crazy." I was a John Abbott student at the time, but do not remember his visit. If memory serves, I purchased my copy at Aeroplane, a basement-level book and record store on Sherbrooke Street in NDG. 

The Heat Accepts It All: Selected Letters of John Glassco

John Glassco

2013

A Gentleman of Pleasure, my biography of Glassco, was the culmination of seven years' work. The Heart Accepts It All was edited in its wake. Credit goes to Carmine Starnino for proposing this book. For a time, I thought of it as my farewell to things Glassco, but I now realize I was just taking a breather.

Dr. Delicious: Memoirs of a Life in CanLit

Robert Lecker

2006

Best to leave the description of this book to the author:

The idea of being Dr. Delicious instead of plain old Professor Lecker made me think about the kind of writing I would have done if I was really the tasty version of myself. Professor Lecker would be reluctant to tell stories about his own life. He would resist the temptation to make his life in Canadian literature personal. He would not gossip. He would write scholarly articles and books that no one would read. But Dr. Delicious would lead a completely different life. He would delight in his classroom experiences. He would take liberties with his life story. He would talk about the ups and downs of being a Canadian publisher. He could bring in music, painting, hypochondria, malt whisky, deranged students, government grants, questionable authors, bank debt, termite infestations, a teaching stint in Brazil, lawsuits, the pleasures of hot-sauce. He would write about his passions, his failures, how the whole business of CanLit drove him crazy, lost him sleep, drove him on.

Stepping Out: The Golden Age of Montreal Night Clubs

Nancy Marrelli

2004

Hello Montreal! Stepping Out covers thirty years – 1925 to 1955 – during which Montreal's night clubs presented the finest jazz musicians, crooners, and burlesque acts in North America. Oh, the photos!

Remember the scene in The Great Gatsby when Nick suggests Gatsby lie low in Montreal? This is the city he had in mind.

The Crime on Cote des Neiges

David Montrose [Charles Ross Graham]

2010

A second sentimental favourite, The Crime on Cote des Neiges was the first title in the Ricochet series. Sixteen have followed. I'm most proud of the John Buell reissues – The Pyx and Four Days – but this stands as one of this country's three best private dick novels

Remarkably, after all these years, Montrose/Graham remains a mystery. For all my efforts, I've yet to find a single person who so much as remembers meeting the man.

Wardlife:

The Apprenticeship of a Young Writer as a Hospital Clerk

Andrew Steinmetz

1999

Another book by a friend. I first met Andrew in the summer of '85 at Station Ten, which I maintain was the smokiest of all Montreal night clubs. My eyes still sting. Andrew was then a member of Weather Permitting. We two were young pups, each imagining that we might one day produce a book. Andrew was the first to realize the dream. As much a fan of his writing as I was of Weather Permitting. 

Lasting Impressions:

A Short History of English Publishing in Quebec

Bruce Whiteman

1998

Short and bitter sweet, Bruce Whiteman's history of English publishing is an invaluable resource. Véhicule Press figures. How could it not?

It's only in writing this that I realize Lasting Impressions was published a quarter-century before last weekend's half-century celebration.

Here's to the next fifty!

Related posts:

Gothique Canadien

A Penthouse Killing in Montreal

Four Days in Darkest Quebec
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