Poster for ‘Grapes of Wrath.’ Courtesy/rottentomatoes.com

“The Grapes of Wrath” (1940, unrated), showing Thursday at Mesa Public Library, follows the story of one of hundreds of thousands of Depression-era “Okie” families who head for California and its promises of work.

In this Oscar-winning film based on John Steinbeck’s classic novel of the same name, the Joads and their neighbors have been forced off land their families have been living on for generations. Some of the sharecroppers try to fight, and watch as bulldozers roll over the rooms they grew up in; others leave in a hurry, clutching flyers advertising jobs picking fruit in the Golden State.

Tom Joad (Henry Fonda) and his parents, grandparents, siblings (including two school-age children), and others choose the latter, heaping themselves into a jalopy clearly not designed to hold twelve passengers and their entire estate. And yet off they go along Route 66, mattress tied over the hood and kids’ legs dangling over the tailgate, eventually reaching the heavily guarded California state line.

While peaches, apples, and grapes do indeed need picking, there are too many people willing to work, driving wages down below subsistence levels. Camps have sprung up to accommodate pickers and their families, in some cases complete with police and locked gates.

The film beautifully portrays the Joads’ family dynamics. Because they come across as ordinary, well-rounded people struggling in their roles as sons, fathers, wives, etc., the violence and dehumanization they undergo is extraordinarily poignant. The family’s life, not just Tom’s, depends on politics.

“The Grapes of Wrath” screens at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in the upstairs meeting room “theater” at Mesa Public Library. Admission is free. For those who want to more fully appreciate the story, Steinbeck’s tome is available to check out from the stacks.

The Free Film Series is supported by the Friends of Los Alamos County Libraries. For more information, call the library at 505.662.8240.