Of Mice and Men

Of Mice and Men (1939) is Lewis Milestone's film adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel — watch it online on iFILM. Burgess Meredith plays George, a sharp and weary drifter who has spent years keeping Lennie out of trouble. Lennie, played by Lon Chaney Jr. in one of his finest performances, is gentle and enormous and has no idea how much damage his hands can do.

The two men land on a California ranch during the bleakest years of the Depression. George carries a small dream: a few acres of their own, nobody to answer to, a place where Lennie can tend rabbits. The ranch has its own cruelty — a belligerent foreman's son, a lonely woman with nowhere to go, workers ground down by debt and routine. Every scene tightens the wire.

Steinbeck wrote the screenplay himself, which is unusual for Hollywood adaptations of that era. The film does not soften the ending or offer a consoling moral. It simply shows what happens to men with nothing when the wrong things go wrong. Stream Of Mice and Men (1939) online on iFILM.