Ten years after the Joad family of "The Grapes of Wrath" left the dust bowls of their home to head to California to find even more despair, the Ashby family heads out west to try and find their own meaning of home. What they find is far more spiritual and trying, that so called Christians have no desire to help people like them already living in a shanty town that the locals desperately want to wipe off the map. Fairview, a "nice, friendly town" is where their broken down car and trailer treads through to the disgust of the locals, and a respected local businessman (Tom Powers) must look into his own heart to figure out the right thing to do. He has been made a part of the committee to organize the end of this eye-sore, but when he encounters the Ashby family outside his home, he learns the truth about the soul beneath the beaten down automobile and the tired, dirty faces of the clan who long to settle down somewhere. The wonderful Sarah Padden is the heart and soul of the clan as Ma Ashby, a wise and devoted Christian who only wants to get her family back to church and find peace and good will in a changing world. When the parishioners of the local church basically snub the family, it is truly heartbreaking, after which the family stands outside the closed doors of the church where they are sure they are not welcome.
It falls into the hands of young Colleen Townsend (Powers' daughter) to try and convince her father and the local bigots that they really need to do something to help these people. Powers' young son befriends Ms. Padden's own son, standing up for him against his own friends and his very uncaring older brother. Finally, Powers breaks down and heads to the shanty town where he sees the desolate locals, including crying children, weather-beaten mothers and frustrated fathers. This wakes him up to his Christian duty, and with the help of a visiting do-gooder (Regis Toomey), his eyes suddenly open to the hypocrisy of what his own church has turned him into. The Protestant Film Commission takes a truly honest view of what needed to be done to wake certain Christians up and get off their snobby high horses, and with Hollywood veteran William Beaudine behind the director's chair, they got a very professional looking film.
The very same year, they also turned out "Second Chance", another view of how the hardships of life made good Christians hard, casting Mrs. Citizen Kane (Ruth Warrick) as a disillusioned society lady who must find herself again after turning into one of the snooty church ladies seen here raising their noses against Padden and her clan. The films are not at all preachy, reminding the viewer that true Christianity comes from the heart, not from the pocket book, and that God offers mercy to everybody no matter what side of the tracks to everybody. There's no finger wagging, no hand slapping, no judgmental deriding of the upscale congregation, just a plea for understanding and a call for action. In today's sometimes over-zealous religious intolerance of anything different outside that particular denomination's agenda, this reminds the viewer that there is only one God, and he only has one agenda, told through his son to "Judge, lest ye be judged" and simply, "Love thy neighbor as thyself".
It falls into the hands of young Colleen Townsend (Powers' daughter) to try and convince her father and the local bigots that they really need to do something to help these people. Powers' young son befriends Ms. Padden's own son, standing up for him against his own friends and his very uncaring older brother. Finally, Powers breaks down and heads to the shanty town where he sees the desolate locals, including crying children, weather-beaten mothers and frustrated fathers. This wakes him up to his Christian duty, and with the help of a visiting do-gooder (Regis Toomey), his eyes suddenly open to the hypocrisy of what his own church has turned him into. The Protestant Film Commission takes a truly honest view of what needed to be done to wake certain Christians up and get off their snobby high horses, and with Hollywood veteran William Beaudine behind the director's chair, they got a very professional looking film.
The very same year, they also turned out "Second Chance", another view of how the hardships of life made good Christians hard, casting Mrs. Citizen Kane (Ruth Warrick) as a disillusioned society lady who must find herself again after turning into one of the snooty church ladies seen here raising their noses against Padden and her clan. The films are not at all preachy, reminding the viewer that true Christianity comes from the heart, not from the pocket book, and that God offers mercy to everybody no matter what side of the tracks to everybody. There's no finger wagging, no hand slapping, no judgmental deriding of the upscale congregation, just a plea for understanding and a call for action. In today's sometimes over-zealous religious intolerance of anything different outside that particular denomination's agenda, this reminds the viewer that there is only one God, and he only has one agenda, told through his son to "Judge, lest ye be judged" and simply, "Love thy neighbor as thyself".
