Red River - 1948
Cats: Set Your Recorders, Western|| May 30, 2008 | ||
| 5:30 pm | to | 7:30 pm |
Mutiny On The Bounty on a cattle drive. That is how this picture,
The picture starts with Tom and his faithful sidekick ‘Groot’ Nadine (Walter Brennan always great in the role of sidekick / comic relief) leaving a wagon train that is headed west. Against the better judgment of the head of the wagon train Tom and Groot head towards
Years pass, as does the Civil War, and Matt comes home as the now full grown Montgomery Clift in his film debut. There is an enormous herd of cattle but no where in
The drive begins with one of the most memorable scenes ever filmed. It is dawn, every cow, horse and cowboy is completely silent and still. Tom rides up, surveys the vista, sees what will make or break him (a whole lot is riding on the success of this drive) and quietly says “Take them to Missouri Matt”.
And so begins this drive. Things start out fine. Then the going gets tougher, there is a stampede and the food starts to run short. In addition, Dunson’s tyrannical ways cause Matt some concern, especially when he starts shooting people. Could this massive drive be too much for Tom? Matt mutinies and takes the herd away from Dunson and with new information heads to a new railhead in
The cast is full of stand out performances. I already mentioned Walter Brennan, who was great at what he did. John Wayne and Montgomery Clift balance each other so beautifully. They are exciting to watch. This was Montgomery Clift’s film debut and he could not have had a better one. John Wayne gives one of his most natural and confident performances ever. There is a great moment just before the start of the cattle drive in which a scene takes place with a group of characters on horses. During the scene someone’s horse kept fidgeting (or whatever horses do when bored) and Mr. Wayne stops, turns to the other actor and says “can’t you steady that horse?”. It was obviously a distraction. Every time we watched this picture in the store I would always wonder (out loud) did he improvise that moment. John Ireland is great as Cherry Valance. The role was originally offered to Cary Grant but he turned it down and the part was minimized. Too bad.
As you know, I love casting accidents, where someone almost plays the role for which some one else became famous for playing. The kind of role that we cannot imagine some one else playing (Ronald Regan as Rick in Casablanca would have changed the future as we know it). Tom Dunson is one of those roles. I can only hear John Wayne reply to some one with “as sure as you’re standing there”. The role was originally offered to Gary Cooper. He turned it down. This was the first project Mr. Wayne and director Howard Hawks worked on together.
Originally filmed in 1946 but not released until 1948 due to legal problems with Howard Hughes, who claimed it was similar to his picture The Outlaw (1943). Not true and the picture was worth the wait.
May 30th
