I have rarely encountered such a Hollywood film so loaded with dreadful stereotypes as "Tortilla Flat".Those reviewers who lauded it must have been on a different planet or love film tripe of the lowest common denominator.Firstly according to some unenlightened producers, Hollywood had, at the time, a racist attitude to casting.There were either American/English actors or "Foreigners".If the cast called for "foreigners" no matter what the nationality of the character/actor, producers would cast a motley collection of actors from different countries and were not pedantic about the accuracy of the countries of origin of the actors concerned when consistency was required to make the characters believable.To cast Spencer Tracy and Hedy Lamarr with her sophisticated Viennese accent, and the Jewish John Garfield as Mexican peasants was risible.Second stereotype - casting Mexican characters as a lazy work shy people who laze around in the sun and shun work but get drunk.Third stereotype - to insult the audience that they cannot be trusted to understand one sentence of Spanish.To just put the odd "amigo" or "adios" into the script to add a foreign sense but saying all their parts in English is rather patronising and a "cop-out".As an aside, enlightened producers like Darryl F. Zanuck who produced "The Longest Day" (1962) had German actors speaking German, French actors speaking French (with English subtitles) which made the film really come alive.Nowadays DVD technology gives dubbing into many languages for modern films but of course this technology was not available in 1942.However, with the U.S.A. catapulted into WWII from 1941, I can, to a certain extent, sympathise with the anti foreigner stance in films of this period.The only reason I bought this video was to add to my Hedy Lamarr collection and I was slightly disappointed with the length of part she was assigned.I thought with her intellect she deserved much better than John Garfield's character at the film end.The fact that it is not available on DVD seems to show that sensible distributors realise no thinking film fan would want to pay for it in this format.So in this DVD age I bought an old video from 1990 to play on my reconditioned v.c.r. player.I have given this film my lowest ever rating of 1/10.Awful just awful.

There is no denying that the man who gave us THE GRAPES OF WRATH, OF MICE AND MEN, and EAST OF EDEN is a major literary figure - one of the handful of American literary figures to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. But John Steinbeck was also a man of his time and some of his time is hard to swallow. This is particularly when dealing with his novels and stories dealing with Latin-Americans in California. A man raised in the early 20th Century, his views of Latinos is rather heavily into stereotypes. That he could develop character despite the stereotypes was a sign of his abilities as a fine writer...but those stereotypes remain as a stigma today.In TORTILLA FLAT Steinbeck looks at life among a set of Latinos in Salinas, California. The central figure is Pilon (Spencer Tracy) who is a happy - go - lucky type, without any interest in life but what pleasure (food, partying, girls, booze) he can get out of it. But he does not like to work. Nor do his pals Pablo (Akim Tamiroff), Tito (Sheldon Leonard), Jose (John Qualen), and Daniel (John Garfield). But then Daniel learns his uncle died and left him two houses. He suddenly changes a little (he is a property owner) but that is soon dented when Pilon reminds him they are pals and he owes them a share of his good fortune. Somewhat unsettled by this, he does agree to letting the four freeloaders use the other house. The wisdom of this action is shown when they gradually let the nice little house go to ruin, ending with them accidentally burning it down (Pilon just smiles and shrugs his shoulders at this).Meanwhile Daniel meets Dolores Ramirez (Hedy Lamarr), a young woman who works in the local fish cannery. Daniel starts changing his whole views on life by his desire to woo Dolores - she feels her husband has to be a hard working man to win her respect. But Pilon and the others resent this hold Dolores has on Daniel. Pilon in particular tries to break up the love affair, but only manages to make his friendship with Daniel get strained. Daniel now has a job too at the cannery, but the others are still gainfully unemployed. Pilon decides that he and the others can rob "the Pirate" (Frank Morgan) a lonely eccentric. The best scenes in the film deal with Morgan, who turns out to be a touching old man who loves his pets and is saving his money for a religious offering for them. I won't go into the rest of the plot (which shows that Pilon can be a real friend too when he wants to be). Again it is well acted, although Tracy is reusing his "Spanish" accent that he used as Manuel in CAPTAIN'S COURAGEOUS, and would use again in THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA. Lamarr and Garfield actually display some chemistry together to heat up their scenes. Garfield too is slightly reusing a previous accent - his "Porfirio Diaz" voice in JUAREZ toned down a little. Actually if it wasn't for the performances (particularly Morgan's) the film would only have the character development shown by Tracy and Garfield. But the weakness of the stereotypes makes this film a difficult one to swallow. So I can only give it a "7" out of "10".

Even if MGM plays fast and loose with the Steinbeck novel there is additional blame beyond that to cast and crew in this all star catastrophe.In the less exclusive area of Monterrey, Tortilla Flat, lives Danny and his lay about com padres. Averse to work they pass the time drinking and self righteously philosophizing about there life style. Enter Delores, a becoming senorita who entrances Danny. Pilon the self appointed leader of the loafers does what he can to make sure it doesn't interfere with the set up. Tragedy threatens but fear not, MGM is not about to let that happen to this lighthearted look at alcoholism and vagrancy in the Latino community.Oz and Wind director Victor Fleming is certainly off form with his cast of miscast performers sounding and looking ridiculously out of place. Spencer Tracy in Coppertone face as Pilon gives an insulting and embarrassing performance as does Lower East Side John Garfield's Danny. Hedy Lamarr is passionate and impressive but unconvincing as a Portuguese immigrant. Akim Tamiroff does his usual generic immigrant and Frank Morgan is outstanding as dog lover Pirate. Unlike the blustery characters he played in so many films Morgan is both genuine and moving in look and feeling. He is the films only redeeming quality especially the scene with his scruffy band of mutts that takes place in an almost mystical forrest. The rest is all Hollywood arrogance and insensitivity.

This movie is full of surprises, not the least is the casting. (Was that "Toto" as "one of the boys"?) So many of the cast are in our movie memory banks. It's a well-acted, well-scripted film that can be enjoyed by the whole family.