Disability Happens ™

by Joe Posner

From the silent era through the talkies, Hollywood portrayed the disabled primarily in one of two ways: either as figures that generated fear or pity. That began to change in 1946, with the release of “The Best Years of Our Lives.”

The film, directed by William Wyler, starred Myrna Loy, Fredric March, Dana Andrews, Teresa Wright, Virginia Mayo and movie newcomer Harold Russell. Russell, an Army instructor, had lost both hands in an explosion while filming a training film.

Director Wyler picked Russell after seeing him in the Army film “Diary of a Sergeant,” which detailed his time in rehab, including being fitted with hooks for hands. Russell, with no acting experience, was cast as Homer Parrish, a Navy man who had lost his hands during the war.

Russell, alongside Dana Andrews and Fredric March, played a veteran returning home after World War II, attempting to adjust to life after the war. Amazingly, non-pro Russell held his own with these Hollywood heavyweights!

In the course of the film, director Wyler focuses on what Russell’s character Homer CAN do, not what he can’t, a radical approach for the times. In one key scene, Homer’s uncle (Hoagy Carmichael) teaches him how to play “chopsticks,” with his hooks, on the piano. Later in the film, we see Homer/Russell easily slip the ring on his bride’s finger with his hooks.

At the Academy Awards of 1947, Russell won two Oscars: one honorary, the other for best supporting actor.

By the ’50s, the portrayal of the disabled underwent another change from ensemble actor to action hero in the leading role. The film was “Bad Day at Black Rock,” in 1955.

Directed by action king John Sturges (”The Magnificent Seven,” “The Great Escape”), it starred Spencer Tracy, Robert Ryan, Anne Francis, Dean Jagger, Walter Brennan, Lee Marvin, and Ernest Borgnine.

Set in 1945, John J. Macreedy (Tracy), a war veteran with only one arm, gets off the train in the poduck town of Black Rock, in search of a Japanese man named Komoko. Nobody in town, from its “leading” citizen Reno Smith (Robert Ryan) to the local toughs (Ernest Borgnine, Lee Marvin), are interested in helping Macreedy with his quest.

A key scene establishes that Macreedy/Tracy is not at all limited by his disability. When Smith’s thug Coley Trimble (Ernest Borgnine) tries to assault Tracy’s character at the local cafe, he quickly and efficiently fights back with judo, resulting in Trimble/Borgnine taking an involuntary nap on the cafe’s floor.

Although Tracy’s character ultimately fails in his quest to connect with Komoko, who it turns out had been killed four years before by racist Smith/Ryan, the one armed Macreedy DOES manage to survive his brief stay in the hate filled town, leaving with his life and dignity intact, more of a “whole” man than anyone else in the pitiful Black Rock.

Category : Film