This weeks film Brother's Keeper (1992) directed by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky chronicles the murderous misadventure of a small rural town in the sentinel lymph node of New York's armpit. Or more precisely, Munnsville. Before you get excited about a "murderous misadventure" let me elaborate. The film revolves around the murder trial of (A)delbert Ward. In June of 1990 Bill Ward (one of Delbert's 3 brothers) was found dead in his bed by Delbert. Previous to the "mysterious" death, Bill had bseen miserably coughing and wheezing in bed for the past week. His illness plays a large part in Delbert's trial, but not as large a role as Delbert's mental capacity.
Conversations with Delbert and his brothers quickly reveal what the defense is seeking as its main argument for Delbert; that he is mentally incapable, bordering on retardation, and sheltered from the city and its prognostication of values. As Delbert and his brothers are referred to as the Ward boys by community members younger than themselves, the view of the Wards becomes that of innocent children. Lost Boys who never truly grew up with the intellectual and moral sense of their urbanized counterparts. The court battle essentially boils down to whether or not the laws and morality of the urban populace could be applied to the virtually otherworldly realm of the rural social outcast so far removed from the populace that the subjectivity of their own judgement has become their daily law and morality.
There is a sense of dismissal involving the murderous aspect when you get past the teaser trailer. The plot becomes a commentary on rural life as seen through the eyes of urban spectators, in so much as spectacle is used as a vehicle for sympathy and stereotyping as well as questioning the rationale of both parties. The big city lawyers trying Delbert weave a tale of Bill's murder as a psycho-sexual, incest-slaughter provoked by jealousy in a fit of passion. This juxtaposed to the interviews with Delbert and his family make this seem like the crazed fantasies of James Dickey (see Deliverance). The moral ambiguity of the Wards may be prevalent, but the reasoning behind such theories is absurd.
What's not surprising about this film is that deep down I know the Wards exist and not just as the singular family, but as a less unique demographic of ill-educated farm-dwelling social outcasts. The film capitalizes on the sympathy of the audience to visualize an overworked, undereducated man torn from his farm to face the judgment of an outside world incapable of understanding him. While this may be true, the community in which Delbert and his brothers were shunned, the small town of Munnsville, rise up to fight with Delbert in his battle against the ravenous city attorneys. The townsfolk are able to look past, and maybe they don't even see, the stereotyping of the Wards and view them as people first. But even with the community's involvement, sympathy prevails. The support from the community comes more as a response to the attack of an intruder (the government) on one of their own. They feel bad for Delbert. Most of them still don't like him, but for the principle of keeping their own matters to themselves they rally to his side.
Brother's Keeper is uplifting and disheartening as the strength of a community revives a faith in the goodness of mankind while the relationships between the Wards and the outside world offers little solace for the social, political, and cultural values of the future.
7 out of 10
I believe Roscoe is on the far left, Delbert is in the middle and Lyman is to the right.
