‘Our Vines Have Tender Grapes’: Celebrating Charitable Contentment

Edward G. Robinson delivers a sensitive performance as a wise and kind farmer.

(L–R) Selma Jacobson (Margaret O’Brien), Martinius Jacobson (Edward G. Robinson), and Arnold Hanson (Jackie "Butch" Jenkins), in “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes.” Telerama’vodkaster

NR | 1 h 45 min | Drama | 1945

This film is about a village, but it’s also about so much more.

Martinius Jacobson (Edward G. Robinson) runs a small farm with wife Bruna (Agnes Moorehead) and seven-year-old daughter Selma (Margaret O’Brien) in the village of Fuller Junction, Wisconsin. They and other Norwegian-immigrant families survive off the land where a man is, supposedly, nothing without his barn. Jacobson plows the land with his horses, milks his cows, and rears his calves. But what he wants is a new “ten-cow barn, with machines attached.” If only banks would lend him enough.

(L–R) Selma Jacobson (Margaret O’Brien), Bruna Jacobson (Agnes Moorhead), and Martinius Jacobson (Edward G. Robinson), in “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes.” Loew's Inc.

Nels “Editor” Halverson (James Craig) who runs the village newspaper, falls for pretty new schoolteacher Viola Johnson (Frances Gifford). Trouble is, she pines for the city life she’s used to in Milwaukee and can’t bear Fuller Junction’s dull pace; she’s only serving time in the village school to secure her doctorate.

Selma spends her time with a mischievous playmate, 5-year-old Arnold (Jackie “Butch” Jenkins). She’s as inquisitive as he is, and no less willful, whether fussing over her pet calf or trying out her roller skates. But Martinius and Bruna teach her to outgrow her childish selfishness, even while they outgrow theirs as adults.

Arnold Hanson (Jackie "Butch" Jenkins) and Selma Jacobson (Margaret O’Brien), in “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes.” Loew's Inc.

Director Roy Rowland isn’t too concerned with a coherent story. There’s very little, if any, storytelling. Instead, he dwells on perspective, capturing snippets of farm life, through the guileless, inquiring eyes of the two children.

Ms. O’Brien and Jenkins shine in every shot they’re in. One moment they’re wondering about the morality of red squirrels, the next, about how a church bell seems to toll slower at a funeral. Irritable when woken at 3:30 a.m., Ms. O’Brien’s character brightens the minute she realizes it’s to see a traveling circus. Watch her tremble with delight as she wins a surprise ride on an elephant’s trunk. Jenkins’ character has some of the funniest lines; hear his reply when Martinius applauds the thoughtful gift he’s brought Selma for Christmas.

Director Roy Rowland isn’t asking why village life is romanticized. He’s answering it—village life forces people to slow down, to appreciate better what they have instead of hankering after what they don’t, and to reach out and forge a connection with others as if it were their own. 

American writer George Victor Martin’s novel of the same name inspired this film. Its title is from the biblical Song of Solomon 2:15, which uses nature and rural imagery. To Martin, vines are people who love, grapes are children (or fruits) of that love, and foxes are anything that might spoil vines or grapes. These threats, Martin suggests, can be an everyday sense of separateness, overcome only by submitting to the connectedness of the vines.

Martinius Jacobson (Edward G. Robinson) and Selma Jacobson (Margaret O’Brien), in “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes.” Loew's Inc.

Rowland isn’t romanticizing village life, he’s romanticizing the best of human nature, in its capacity to be selfless when instinct or survival dictates self-centeredness.

Playing Against Type

City woman Viola groans with contempt at villagers who didn’t care for Ingeborg, a mentally retarded village girl, when she was alive, but come to mourn her in death. Nels gently rebukes Viola; thoughtlessness exists even in cities as he says, “It’s just easier to find it in a small town like Fuller Junction.”

Martinius and Bruna teach Selma that since the best things in life are gifts (milk, water, land, livestock, hay, sunshine, and peace), she must embrace that even what she treasures as “all mine” (roller skates, a warm coat, a pet calf) are gifts, too. Their gentle but firm insistence breeds in her an equanimity and generosity that she wouldn’t have developed had they allowed her to simply ape Arnold’s childish selfishness. Watch her ennoble the word “barn” as she narrates the Christmas story to a packed church, and, joyously, lets Arnold have his way.

Nels “Editor” Halverson (James Craig) and Viola Johnson (Frances Gilford), in “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes.” Loew's Inc.

Two actors play against type. Moorehead, who’s played more than her share of unfeeling women, plays a devoted wife and a doting mother.

Robinson breaks from his image as screen toughie by starring as a man who discovers that what he really wants is to protect and provide for his family. Martinius says, “Maybe it’s a good thing for a man to want something, something … he ain’t ever goin’ to get … to keep his interest up and help him take care of things he has.”

What irony for these lines to be uttered by one of the finest actors to never to be nominated for an Academy Award. When an Honorary Award eventually came, it arrived two months after he’d died.

Lobby card for "Our Vines Have Tender Grapes." Loew's Inc.

You can watch “Our Vines Have Tender Grapes” on Apple TV, Vudu, and Amazon Video. 

‘Our Vines Have Tender Grapes’ Director: Roy Rowland Starring: Edward G. Robinson, Agnes Moorehead, Margaret O’Brien Not Rated Running Time: 1 hour, 45 minutes Release Date: Sept. 6, 1945 Rated: 3 stars out of 5

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