Director Ford had a habit of naming this as his favorite film, along with "The Sun Shines Bright," both lesser examples of his work. I suspect he was just being contrarian. He usually assumed the role of the success who denigrates his art by calling it "just a job." It's entertaining enough but it ought to be more than that. Ford was in good shape and was working with some familiar performers. He had "introduced" Harry Carey, Jr., earlier, after having worked with Carey's father in the 1920s. He had "discovered" Ben Johnson, a handsome young, unpretentious horse wrangler years earlier. He had Joanne Dru from "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and both Ma and Pa Joad from "Grapes of Wrath," and finally Ward Bond ("liver lips", Ford called) him, who made his first film with Ford in something like 1928.
He had the Red Rock country of Utah, first cousin of Monument Valley, as a location. There are two or three scenes of the community dancing and singing, a drunk scene, a fist fight, and a climactic shoot out that is practically a reprise of "My Darling Clementine." But although it IS entertaining and unmistakably Fordian, something went a little askew somewhere along the line. It has little depth of character and no poetry to speak of. The result is a kind of cartoon in which everyone overacts. It's as if it were made for a kids' matinée.
The weak story wanders all over the place, leaving little oxbow lakes behind. Stranded in the desert, the four members of a hootchie-kootchie show have had no water and been forced to drink whiskey. If you were very thirsty, would it follow that you'd drink booze? There are multiple serial close ups of the faces of the Clegg gang, each sneering or smiling, incandescent with villainy. None has the character of one of the Clantons. They're indistinguishable except for Hank Warden, who is recognizable if only because he was in every Western movie ever made since "The Great Train Robbery" of 1903. Nobody is likely to recognize Jim Thorpe, All American, who clumps along next to Jane Darwell during a clanking Indian dance.
It does have its moments though and a few are memorable. You have never seen a man willing to be whipped while tied to a wagon wheel for raping a Navaho woman who speaks Spanish. He yanks at his bonds, curses, kicks out with his feet at his tormentor. And whenever Ben Johnson is riding a horse, it commands the viewer's attention. Johnson was never much other than his good-natured self but it was a reassuring persona and he was quite good in "Shane" as the bully who reforms.
Ford had his materials at hand, but it's as if his attention were elsewhere.
He had the Red Rock country of Utah, first cousin of Monument Valley, as a location. There are two or three scenes of the community dancing and singing, a drunk scene, a fist fight, and a climactic shoot out that is practically a reprise of "My Darling Clementine." But although it IS entertaining and unmistakably Fordian, something went a little askew somewhere along the line. It has little depth of character and no poetry to speak of. The result is a kind of cartoon in which everyone overacts. It's as if it were made for a kids' matinée.
The weak story wanders all over the place, leaving little oxbow lakes behind. Stranded in the desert, the four members of a hootchie-kootchie show have had no water and been forced to drink whiskey. If you were very thirsty, would it follow that you'd drink booze? There are multiple serial close ups of the faces of the Clegg gang, each sneering or smiling, incandescent with villainy. None has the character of one of the Clantons. They're indistinguishable except for Hank Warden, who is recognizable if only because he was in every Western movie ever made since "The Great Train Robbery" of 1903. Nobody is likely to recognize Jim Thorpe, All American, who clumps along next to Jane Darwell during a clanking Indian dance.
It does have its moments though and a few are memorable. You have never seen a man willing to be whipped while tied to a wagon wheel for raping a Navaho woman who speaks Spanish. He yanks at his bonds, curses, kicks out with his feet at his tormentor. And whenever Ben Johnson is riding a horse, it commands the viewer's attention. Johnson was never much other than his good-natured self but it was a reassuring persona and he was quite good in "Shane" as the bully who reforms.
Ford had his materials at hand, but it's as if his attention were elsewhere.