Hazel Moates (Brad Dourif), an eccentric young man returns home from war, discharged after being wounded. His home in what is assumed to be Georgia has been abandoned and stands as a neglected, looming farmhouse without any signs of life. Hazel’s outlook on life is one of considerable gloom, most likely a result of what he saw in the war. Returning back to the South, Hazel finds himself surrounded by religious people, where Christianity is not seen as mere beliefs, but rather the governing element of the lives of these ordinary people. Hazel, having grown disillusioned to the presence of any higher power, takes it upon himself to start a rebellion against the roadside preachers who spew the gospel and lament about redemption and eternal paradise. He begins his own anti-religion, The Church of Truth Without Christ, as a way of counteracting the often disingenuous nature of the preachers he is constantly encountering – but as time progresses, Hazel finds himself becoming just as corrupt and soulless as those he has waged a spiritual war against, and sees himself transforming into a preacher, the very person he was vehemently against becoming at the outset.

John Huston (or credited here as “Jhon Huston”, a result of the opening titles being written by a young girl, or so legend says) made a great deal of powerful, iconic works that helped define him as one of cinema’s finest stalwarts, someone whose career lasted from the end of the Second World War, right until the final days of the Cold War. Wise Blood is amongst his most unconventional films – a dark comedy that takes a bleak turn when it starts to focus on criticizing religion. Flannery O’Connor’s contributions to the southern gothic genre has been unprecedented, and Wise Blood is one of her more fascinating novellas, mainly because it was so ahead of its time – written in 1952, at the very apex of the “southern values” movement, where intense religious belief blended with political ideology in creating a certain atmospheric intensity that was widespread throughout the region. Wise Blood questions religion tears it apart and rebuilds it in a way that is neither polite nor coherent, but rather sardonic, twisted and utterly brutal in its honesty. Huston, in interpreting O’Connor’s story, crafts one of the more intricate films of his career, one that was also quite progressive for its time, and still remains quite unique to this very day.

Brad Dourif has always been a deeply underrated actor – and whether it be in his breakthrough role in One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, his work in small roles in tentpole blockbusters like The Lord of the Rings, or in iconic work in films along the lines of Child’s Play and its subsequent sequels, with the character of Chucky being amongst the most terrifying horror villains of all time. Wise Blood sees Dourif squarely in the leading role, playing the character of Hazel Moates, who is beyond eccentric, a strange and extremely unlikeable young man who wages a war against folks with decent morals, trying to bolster himself as the very antithesis of penny-snatching prophets and exuberant evangelists that play off the blind faith (some may call it naivete) of the religious folk scattered throughout the Deep South. Hazel Moates is an odd character, and perhaps one of the most compelling cinematic figures I have encountered in recent years – there is nothing redeeming about him at all, and even the most cynical of viewers will struggle to relate to his crusade against religion. He is bitter, unsociable and unable to form any decent relationship with another person, shifting all potential friendships to the side, and rejecting all proposed partnerships – while his morals are intact (he never once descends to the point of using the general public as a way of making money through supposed charitable donations), his persona is one that is just inherently unlikeable. In essence, Hazel personification is a perfect character study of a complex individual, one that is hardly ever the focus of a story like this, but rather an auxiliary, almost villainous side character. The fact that O’Connor repurposed this archetype into a central anti-hero of a work like Wise Blood was genius.

Yet, despite all of his shortcomings as an individual and the fact that he is so effortlessly despicable, Hazel Moates is still such a captivating character, precisely because everything about him seems authentic – he acknowledges his own flaws, and understands that he is far from being as charismatic or persuasive as traditional preachers – yet he does not strive to be. Perhaps a case can be made for him as someone struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder, but I’d prefer to look at Hazel as more of an oddity, an extraordinary man in an ordinary world, navigating a simple society when he is far from being able to understand it. Dourif’s portrayal is astonishing – a more traditional leading man would not have been able to give as masterful a performance as Dourif, whose lanky physique and offbeat demeanour make him the perfect representative for Hazel Moates’ idiosyncratic world view. Wise Blood also features terrific performances from other established character actors – Harry Dean Stanton, perhaps the finest character actor to ever live, has a memorable supporting role as a beloved preacher who pretends to be blind to symbolize his dedication to his church, but really using it as a ploy to put a few extra dollars in his pocket. Ned Beatty plays the first (and as far as I know, only) cinematic representation of a preacher scout, someone who treats men and women of God as if they were celebrities, acting as their agent and helping them gain audiences. Dan Shor gives the most sympathetic performance in the film as the child-like Enoch, who only wants to make friends, but is constantly rebuffed by everyone in the sterile, bitter town – the same people who speak of wanting salvation and acceptance from a higher being end up rejecting someone right before them. A case could be made for the character of Enoch as a Christ-like figure, but that’s a discussion for another day.

Wise Blood is not a film made to please people of faith, and it could come across as offending quite a number of individuals. Despite the original novella being written by a devout Catholic, in Wise Blood, God simply does not exist (or at least there is no evidence to his or her existence), and while some may interpret the ending as karmic retribution, where Hazel reaps the fruits of what he had put into the world, it is clear that this film is not focused on answering the eternal question of whether or not there is a god, but rather intent on exploring something far more puzzling: the hypocrisy of religion. Wise Blood is a satirical jab at evangelism and the concept of fanatical preachers, who proudly boast of their promises of eternal salvation and redemption, with audiences only needing to part with a few measly dollars to show their commitment to the church. No one ever questions where this money is going – and that doesn’t only refer to the preachers in this film, but to the community at large. This film places emphasis on the vanity of humanity – what are we, both the preachers and their audience, if not self-serving, sycophantic and materialistic narcissists with nothing else driving us other than our intention to achieve satisfaction, satiation and as much affluence as possible. We hope that our good deeds outweigh our crimes of the heart and of the body, in the hopes that if there is a heavenly afterlife, we may be granted access by virtue of our apparent dedication to our faith, even if that just means giving some money and listening to a passionate, mysterious stranger as he spews what he claims to be the word of the Lord. There is something so poetic about Hazel preaching about the virtues of not believing, when just behind him, emblazoned in huge letters are the words “JESUS CARES”, which a brief glance can register as “JESU SCARES”, an unsettling composition if there ever was one.

Below the dark comedy present in Wise Blood, there is a deeper meaning to this film, and you don’t need to be religious at all to understand what Huston and O’Conner were implying in this film. Wise Blood is a film innundated with a unique form of existentialist nihilism – it doesn’t ask “is there a God”, but rather “whether or not there is a God, why should I care?”. This is the core of Hazel’s teachings, and nearly everything he preaches is inherently negative, as a result of his warped perception of the world as being deceptive and grotesque. Hazel’s Church of the Truth Without Christ is deeply unsettling, and its core principles are the complete antithesis of what preachers normally attempt to offer to their congregation. It is clear that Hazel is against organized religion and ungrounded belief – yet he himself is not immune to blind faith, such as in the case of his car. He buys a car, and nearly every character he encounters remarks as to how this car is clearly nearing the end of its life, and that it is bound to break apart at any moment. Hazel is ignorant towards their concern on the bad state of his care, believing unequivocally that it is in perfect condition and will “get [him] anywhere he needs to go”. Thus, what difference is there between Hazel’s blind belief that his car cannot ever break down and the faith of the general public that they will receive eternal salvation? We never see if Hazel’s car actually was on the verge of falling apart, because it meets a watery end at the hands of a vindictive police officer, and similarly, we never see if there is something awaiting us after death – everything is just a matter of faith. For a film about Christianity, Wise Blood features a hideous lack of morals or resolution throughout, making it both darkly comical in an anarchic way, as well as bleak and disconcerting. It is in these moments, where Huston balances sequences that are broadly comedic (along with an exuberant banjo score), and others that are far more nihilistic, that gives Wise Blood its cult sheen. Some moments are exceptionally dark, others much lighter – but they all eventually work together in creating a unique and very subversive film.

Wise Blood is a difficult film to understand, not because it is incoherent, but rather because its approach to its story is quite unique, and its underlying themes, while clear, are used in a way that makes them unrecognizable. This film is hardly as accessible as Huston’s other work, and quite understandably divisive – this is not a film along the same lines as The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Maltese Falcon ­– complex but coherent works. This is Huston at his most meditative, cerebral and experimental, and shows a progression in his style that he’d continue using into films such as Under the Volcano and The Dead, which had similar ruminations on the very fabric of our existence. Huston dismantles storytelling conventions and expectations by adapting O’Conner’s extraordinary novel into a powerful and extremely twisted dark comedy that conveys a certain message and portrays a particular atmosphere with great finesse and potent audacity. It finds Brad Dourif giving his finest performance to date, and proves that even though he is a very unconventional actor, he can still effectively lead a film like this. Wise Blood is very dark, very funny and entirely unforgettable. It has a fascinating message at the core, and while it never advocates for one side other the other, it does have a particular peculiarity that makes it quite endearing in its passion, and certainly entirely unforgettable. It is not a crowd-pleasing film, and its destiny has always been to be a cult film – but there are few films, mainstream or obscure, that are as blatant with its commitment to a certain metaphysical subject such as this one. It is powerful and deceptively funny filmmaking and something that should be widely seen, because while it isn’t very likeable, it definitely stirs thought and evokes deep contemplation – perhaps not of the presence of an afterlife, but rather to reevaluate our own carnal choices while we’re alive. There’s so much that can be said about Wise Blood, so seek it out, because it certainly is a special film.