BOOK/MOVIE: April Morning (1961/1988)

This post is in honor of the anniversary of "the shot heard around the world".

                I am a big fan of Howard Fast’s novel “April Morning”.  I used to assign it in my American History Honors classes.  Although not intended as a young adult novel, since the protagonist is high school age  it has become a standard assigned reading in middle and high schools.  Fast is an excellent writer and the novel has the theme of coming of age, so it is a good choice for English classes.  For my purposes, it is a great history lesson.  Fast has set his novel in Lexington at the start of the Revolutionary War.  We also get a nice dose of colonial life.  It took twenty-seven years to bring the book to the small screen.

                The book and movie cover about twenty-four hours involving the “shot heard round the world”.  The movie opens with a gun smuggler named Solomon Chandler (Rip Torn) being stopped by a British patrol and beaten up.  He arrives in Lexington to spread his tale. Moses Cooper (Tommy Lee Jones) is skeptical and wants to avoid confrontation with the British.  The issue will be brought up at the committee meeting held that evening.  Moses has a teenage son that is a thorn in his side.  Adam (Chad Lowe) seems to make a habit of chafing Moses’ posterior.  For instance, he says a pagan oath when drawing water from the well. That night at supper, Moses questions Adams maturity and makes clear his disappointment in his son.  A theme of the movie and book is that Adam feels his father does not love him and only finds faults.  Adam feels he is mature enough to be getting busy with his girlfriend Ruth (Meredith Salenger), but she is literally puritanical about it.  At the committee meeting, the adult men discuss the abuse of Chandler and the ominous signs that the British might be getting more repressive.  Moses, who loves the sound of his own voice, is against any provocative acts, but does insist on the minutes of the meeting being kept.  He is a man of principal, but basically loves playing devil’s advocate against anyone taking any position.  Later that night, the pleasant dreams of the Lexingtonians are interrupted by a rider (Paul Revere?) with word that “the regulars are out!”  The debating moves on to what to do about the imminent arrival of British soldiers.  And on a personal note, Moses must decide what to do about a teenage son who wants to use the crisis to jump into manhood.  The day will bring Adam the opportunity to come of age, but at what cost?

                The movie has a movie-of-the-week feel to it.  In other words, the production values are low budget.  They did manage to find a trio of colonial looking buildings to stand in for Lexington and the interiors of the Cooper home have 18^th Century décor.  The clothing is era appropriate.  The British uniforms are lobsterbacky, but some of the reenactors are a bit old (which is not unusual for cinematic reenactors).  The cast is fine, but the acting is spotty, Chad Lowe is wooden as Adam and the character comes off as unlikeable.  Teenage boys can possibly relate to him, but most adults will find him whiny.  He is upset that his father does not show him love and is hard on him, but you would think he would have noticed that every father in the village was that way.  Tommy Lee Jones does not do any heavy lifting as the one dimensional Moses.

                 If you don’t want to force your class to read a book (God forbid!), the movie stands in well.  As a history lesson, it does a good job covering the incident at Lexington.  You get a taste of the debate that led to the Revolution, but the committee meeting discussion is not a pros and cons debate by historians.  As far as students watching the movie in lieu of reading the book, be careful.   The movie follows the book closely and retains much of the dialogue, but it substantially changes Solomon Chandler’s arc and tampers with Adam’s experiences once the fighting begins.  These changes are not for the better.  And there is no Levi!

                *** Spoiler Alert!  The book begins with the well oath and the family dinner where Moses’ character is established with his grace that demands better weather from God.  He proceeds to ream Adam, establishing his tough love policy.  The committee meeting does not discuss the British situation.  This debate waits for the arrival of Revere.  Four positions are outlined (but not in the movie):  Parker is in favor of mustering the minutemen to be prepared, the Reverend wants to wait for more information, Moses argues for calling another committee meeting, and Sam Hodley feels that the rider was spreading fake news.  Not long after, the disputative Moses argues against the Reverend’s wait-and-see approach and convinces the men that they must stand up to the British as a matter of principle.  The movie condenses all this arguing.  It covers the British arrival and subsequent spark closely to the book, with the major addition of Solomon Chandler firing the first shot from behind a wall.  (That’s ballsy as we still don’t know who fired the first shot.)  This is a follow up of the movie starting with Chandler being abused by the British and thus having a grudge.  In the book, Chandler does not appear until he runs into a fleeing Adam after he leaves his refuge in the smokehouse.  Speaking of which, Adam is not discovered in the smokehouse by Ruth.  In the book, it is his bratty little brother Levi.  The movie completely dispenses with Levi.  The Solomon Chandler of the book shares personality with the Solomon who comforts Adam and takes him under his wing.  Except that at this point in the movie, we know he is a jerk.  Adam’s experiences during the British retreat is much tamer (and cinematically boring) in the book. He does hook up with Cousin Simmons and the Reverend and they do take some shots at the British, but he does not get flanked by three British soldiers as depicted in the movie.  Chandler does not die in the book.  Adam actually whines more in the movie.  He does not close out his day by falling asleep in some bushes. In he movie, he convinces Cousin Simmons that he has had enough and they go home.  The movie closes with Adam’s mother giving him his father’s watch and comes full circle with Adam saying that evening’s grace. The book closes more logically with Adam discussing with Ruth and the Reverend whether he will join the rebel army.

                I usually find movies based on novels to be better than the source material. The screenwriter has the luxury of having the plot laid out for him or her and then they can make improvements for the movie presentation.  Obviously, this theory does not apply to books that do not lend themselves to cinematic treatment. This usually refers to sci-fi and fantasy novels.  This caveat does not apply to novels like “April Morning”.  The movie version of the novel is an exception to most of my book/movie postings because this movie is not as good as the book.  The changes made were not improvements.  Chandler is the most intriguing character in the book and although I found his sudden transformation from wise old man to bloodthirsty killer off kilter, I could see where Fast was coming from.  It was heavy-handed and beneath Fast, but he had only a few hours to point out that war corrupts.  The movie’s decision to make Chandler a villain from the start simplified him.  Making Adam less likeable was also a bad choice.  The book is told in first person, so it is easier to empathize with the teenage boy.  On the other hand, the movie adds a ludicrous action scene where Adam shoots two British soldiers and has Chandler sacrifice his life to save Adam from a third.  And the decision to eliminate the Levi character, while understandable, sacrifices the most realistic dynamic in the book.

                in conclusion, I normally counsel my readers to watch the movie and then read the book to get more depth.  In this case, I would say that it would be better to read the book first and then see how the movie depicts it.

BOOK  =  A-

MOVIE  =  C