Tycoon (1947) User Reviews

Romance and Dynamite

[cutter-12 · 7/10 · 2 April 2006]

A few negative comments here must be countered. This film is a little more drama than action, but it strikes a good balance between the two, pleasing surely both wives and their blue collar husbands who saw it back in 1947. Far from terrible, this story offers up some decent conflict, a couple funny moments (get outta the way, pigeons!), romance, suspense, two fisted action, explosions, and the exotic setting of the Peruvian Andes.

Not one of John Wayne's very best films, but solid and entertaining fare, a cut above many of his more regarded 40's outings such as The Spoilers and Angel and the Badman. Good performances and a bit of everything for everybody. Duke doesn't disappoint here. Deserves a higher rating.

An entertaining film

[Tequila-18 · 7/10 · 14 December 1999]

Tycoon is a nice John Wayne film which looks splendid in color. Wayne plays a different character than usual. For the first part of the film he plays his standard All-American man, but during the second half he turns to a heel. Day looks fabulous. A negative point of this film is the dreary character of Hardwicke. The story and the exotic locale makes this an entertaining film.

Whole less than the sum of its parts.

[smatysia · 6/10 · 25 April 2002]

"Tycoon" has a lot going for it. Unfortunately it doesn't really deliver. John Wayne plays a familiar persona, and does so very well, as always. Laraine Day, with whom I was not familiar, turned in a very good performance. The most notable of the cast, I thought, was Anthony Quinn in a supporting role. Having said all this, the film really fails to engage. I don't know why. The plot had a lot going for it, the photography was nice, the direction OK. I just can't put my finger on why this isn't a better movie. Grade: C-

Tunnels and bridges and romance in Tenango

[dbdumonteil · 29 December 2010]

A disaster movie long before they became popular in the seventies and thus a movie ahead of its time for that matter. The characters are not too much cardboard ,and thanks to John Wayne and to sir Cedric Hardwicke ,when the movie ends ,you do not know exactly who the "villain" was .Laraine Day is beautiful ,she resembles Linda Darnell and she is cast as the tycoon's daughter who falls in love with ... (well,I won't write a spoiler!).The movie is quite enjoyable and even features very good scenes : Wayne and Day,attending the office,and admiring each other ,under the girl's governess watchful incensed eye (Judith Anderson:who else?);in a more tragical mood,the death of the thirty-year-old man afraid of graveyards since he was a child and who wants to be buried in the tunnel is really moving. Aventures and melodrama.

"You aren't building, you're destroying!"

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 23 May 2010]

So I'm thinking to myself as the story approaches it's dramatic conclusion - here's John Wayne engineering a locomotive to the middle of a hundred yard high trestle, presumably to provide more stability in the face of a raging flood heading it's way. Do I have that right? Turns out it was a bad decision, with the whole train toppling over in the storm, and the bridge's center span lost as well. So does Johnny Munroe (Wayne) get fired and run out of town? Instead, he makes up with the boss (Cedric Hardwicke), his band of construction jocks become the new board of directors, and Munroe goes on his honeymoon with the boss's daughter (Laraine Day). This just doesn't make sense on so many levels.

One can also question some of the events leading up to the finale as well. There was the initial decision to go through the mountain with a railroad instead of a bridge. Johnny Munroe was proved right on that score, but at what cost? It seems to me that Frederic Alexander wasted more money following bad advice from his board than by listening to the crew doing the job. Anthony Quinn had a rather dubious role in all of this as basically Alexander's yes man with little regard for his own instincts in fulfilling the project.

Another thing that struck me was that as Wayne got older, the romantic lead in his films remained a girl in her twenties. As another example, you have Gail Russell opposite Wayne in 1947's "Angel and the Badman". Here, Laraine Day's character is mentioned as being twenty years old. She's quite attractive in her role, with wardrobe changes that would get her pegged as a fashionista today. With that in mind, this is one of the few pictures you'll see in which John Wayne sports a suit, and a white one at that! He did it some years earlier in 1931's "His Private Secretary", perhaps the only two times in his movie career that he might have done so.

So even though this film is panned pretty much across the board, there are some worthwhile things to find if you tune in and pay attention. It's just that most of them don't have anything to do with the story itself. Loyal John Wayne fans at least should take a look, just as little Chico (Fernando Alvarado) stayed true to the big lug through thick and thin.

Wayne is very good as a very bad guy

[AlsExGal · 6/10 · 24 July 2015]

This film was actually RKO's biggest failure of the year. This movie has Wayne playing an engineer who is building a railroad bridge across a gorge. He and his financier partner in this effort dislike each other intensely with spats that range from the inadequate financing of the project to the shotgun wedding of Wayne's character to the tycoon's daughter. This is where The Duke completely breaks from the hero he normally plays and acts like a spoiled child who believes that he who dies with the most toys wins. He and the tycoon's spat escalate to the point that sabotage is occurring and lives are being lost. There's some beautiful cinematography in this one, and although the plot just didn't work for me, Wayne's acting did. Most people don't like this film at least in part because Wayne convincingly plays someone completely unlikeable - and that's the point. He's given a role completely out of step with what he usually plays and does a good job.

"Sliderules Don't Hold Up Rock!"

[richardchatten · 7/10 · 9 June 2022]

The sort of high flying melodrama that later became a staple of TV. The acting is good, particularly by Cedric Hardwicke and an elegantly suited Judith Anderson bearing the rather severe moniker 'Miss Braithwaite', the former cast as Anthony Quinn's uncle!

big, sprawling yawn of a movie

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 5 June 2010]

MGM never had any idea what to do with its contract star, Laraine Day, other than cast her as Lew Ayres' girlfriend in the "Dr. Kildare" series. Other than that, they loaned her out. I'm not sure if she was still with MGM when "Tycoon" was filmed - I have absolutely no clue why anyone would think of her as a South American, but there she was, with black hair and her skin darkened.

I digress. "Tycoon" stars John Wayne, Day, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Anthony Quinn, and Judith Anderson in a technicolor film about the travails of a) falling in love with the boss' daughter; and b) then having the boss make sure you don't have the materials to build your railroad, tunnel, or whatever else you're building. Seems a bit self-defeating and spiteful.

Filmed in technicolor, some of the shots are gorgeous, and some are hilarious - for instance, the South American town, which is a painted backdrop.

I actually like John Wayne when he's not in a western, and here, he's handsome and tough and brings some life to the proceedings. I've always been a fan of Laraine Day, and she's lovely - but a chimpanzee could have played her part. I understand Day's husband, Leo Durocher, was on the set most of the time and was jealous of John Wayne. Judith Anderson as her duena is very good and Hardwicke is dignified. Anthony Quinn, as he often was back then, was shown to great advantage in a supporting role.

It might have been a better film if it had been shorter - there's just too much down time in "Tycoon." The script is a bore. The explosions are good.

Laraine Day's Jealous Hubby

[bkoganbing · 4/10 · 14 March 2006]

Tycoon will never be listed as one of John Wayne's better post Stagecoach film. It's good in spots, has some fine action sequences in the cave in and also in the flood at the climax. But the plot leaves a lot to be desired.

What we have in Tycoon is two men who thoroughly dislike each other and that dislike prevents them from working as a team. Multimillionaire Cedric Hardwicke has hired John Wayne and James Gleason to build a railroad. But then he refuses to give them the needed funds to do the job right.

Things get really complicated when Wayne falls for Hardwicke's daughter, Laraine Day. After a night when they have to spend time alone in an Inca ruin, by convention in South America, Wayne and Day get a shotgun wedding even though nothing happened.

What should have happened is these two should have been locked in a room for 24 hours together to work out their differences one way or another. Their petty spites cause some fatalities among Wayne's crew.

But what Tycoon is most known for is another piece of pettiness. Laraine Day was married to Leo Durocher the manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers when this was being filmed. He was a constant presence on the set, insanely jealous of John Wayne who he thought might be having an affair with his wife. Nothing to it, but he made his wife's life miserable.

Not one of the Duke's better efforts.

Underrated; very good story line

[vincentlynch-moonoi · 7/10 · 1 May 2015]

What is there about John Wayne? To me, he remains a sort of an enigma. There are quite a few of his films I admire and enjoy a great deal. Yet, his acting is about as shallow as a river in Death Valley. And, his acting in this film is pretty shallow in the love scenes....and this is essentially a love story. But worse than his love scenes is the scene where he is talking in his sleep. Although, the film around John Wayne here has some depth to it.

Better than Wayne here is one actress who often doesn't get a lot of credit -- Laraine Day. This is one of her better roles, although for a B actress I was always just a bit partial to her.

Sir Cedric Hardwicke is also excellent here, if unlikable. It's actually a role that fit him well. Equally good is Judith Anderson, not quite as austere here as she could be on screen.

There are also a few fine character actors here: James Gleason and Paul Fix, for example. A very handsome Anthony Quinn is here, not yet having attained stardom. And, Quinn is very good here.

Although it's only the sub plot, the building of a railroad tunnel here is quite interesting, and done quite well.

The real plot here, however, is a controlling father, a woman who is interested in a man, and a man who is interested in that woman. Except for Wayne's shallow acting in the love scenes, this part of the story is well done, as well.

If there's one thing to complain about -- aside from Wayne's awkwardness in love scenes -- it's the very fake exterior scenes that are matte paintings. The color is so fake.

Personally, aside from a few films like "Rio Bravo" and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence", I think this is better than many of John Wayne's films, but it is seriously underrated. I give it a strong 7 for the story line.

My brief review of the film

[sol- · 3/10 · 26 November 2005]

Laraine Day and John Wayne are well cast, each with their share of strong moments, however these moments are too few, and in between the film is rather dull and lacking in excitement. The storyline and character relationships are predictable: it is all very typical and riding on clichés. The extreme length does not help either, but there is one aspect of this film that is certainly very good: the art direction, captured well in Technicolor, is simply beautiful. In a way it is a shame that this film flopped because it otherwise may have had the chance of an Oscar nomination in the art direction field. However, it is not very good overall and only arguably adequate viewing, so it is not quite worth watching the film just to admire the sets. Perhaps worth a look for Day or Wayne die-hard followers though.

Tycoon with the Duke

[surfs2 · 8/10 · 20 January 2014]

Is this John Wayne's best movie no, but I have seen it three times now and I enjoy the movie. Yes, it's more of a drama instead of an action movie, but that's not a bad thing. I think people today are just spoiled with over the top fast paced special effects driven action movies, and this makes it hard for people to have a little patience and slow down and just relax and try to enjoy the characters and the story. Also, to try and watch the movie through the lens of the time it was created and shown instead of trying to apply today's filming styles and standards to a movie over 50 years old it's a little crazy in my opinion.

Anyway, overall I think it's a good movie and I find it enjoyable to watch especially at night when I want a more quite relaxing movie while chilling out in bed. So if it brings me joy in the end and every one else that likes the movie that's all that matters anyway.

Big romance, rugged action...but none of it quite convincing

[secondtake · 7/10 · 2 May 2014]

Tycoon (1947)

An appealing role for John Wayne, rugged but not quite a western archetype. This RKO Technicolor big budget film is unusual for that studio (it was their biggest movie to date), and they snagged Wayne along with Anthony Quinn. Somehow, as good as it is in many ways, it lost a million dollars (a whole lot for the time). It's good, however, and watchable, if still a bit contrived within its wild Andes excess.

Though set in the mining roughneck edge of the mountains, this is a romance. Wayne, a savvy worker and engineer, falls in love with the mine owner's daughter. That never goes well, and it yet it goes very well at times. The love affair is sweet and innocent, due both to Wayne's scruples and to the leading woman's equally good intentions. This is Laraine Day, a good Nixon Republican who was faithfully Mormon her whole life. She's charming and truly attractive in the movie star mould of the day, and was an MGM star of some importance during these years. I think Wayne and her have an odd, believable consonance, and since they make so much of the movie, they hold it all together well.

The larger plot is about a conflict in how to manage building he railroad. This sets up the structure for the different social strata of the leading characters (Wayne and the mine owner), but it distracts somewhat from the other, deeper plot. The scenery vibrates, the music pulses, the romance is intense.

Whatever the general predictability of the plot, the story is well enough done, and warm enough (it's not a gritty tale, whatever the dirty environs), it makes you want to watch. There might be a social message in here somewhere about individualism and hard work, about true love in the face adversity, about the ruthless power of money, about the folly of building things without getting permission first (actually), and so on. But it's not convincing enough on any level to quite take it so seriously.

Why did the movie fail so miserably? For one it's a kind of grandiose movie that audiences were probably a little familiar with. For another, this was the total height of the film noir boom, which is essentially the opposite kind of film. And for another, the female star was not a particular draw, and Wayne was so completely known by this point as a cowboy, the casting might have doomed it from the start.

In the end, after fighting the elements of the hot mountain desert, the mine owner sells it all and goes, with his woman, to what he calls paradise. Where? Vermont.

John Wayne Disaster Movie is a Disaster

[jayraskin1 · 4/10 · 8 August 2010]

There are lots of good elements here. There's great cinematography. The sets are big and look cool. Most of the actors are pros giving fine performances, including the ubiquitous Anthony Quinn, Edith Anderson, Cedric Hardwicke, and James Gleason. The Special Effects are top quality for 1947 with about 8 explosive mine blasts/cave ins and a good flood.

There are however two elements which blasts this movie to smithereens: the script and John Wayne.

The script has the John Wayne character doing absurd and reckless things. For example, he falls in love with Lorraine Day, the daughter of his boss, at first sight while being drunk. Her father orders him to stay away, but he is so horny for her, that he risks his own livelihood and the livelihood of dozens of men working for him to see her again. This just makes the character seem stupid. The stupidity kicks into high gear when he secretly meets her and drives off with her without telling anyone. Her father, fearing that she has met with an accident, rightfully, organizes a posse to look for his daughter.

If Wayne's behavior is stupid in the first half of the film, his character turns destructive and obnoxious in the second half. He becomes fanatical about his building projects and alienates all his friends. In the hands of a capable actor like Gable or Bogart, this good guy turns bad role might have been interesting, but Wayne only knows how to play bad by looking constipated and scowling. He delivers his lines pretty much the same with a bitter, don't mess with me, hombre, tone throughout.

Actually, there is one scene where Wayne does act well. The father/boss says to Wayne that he might have to "break Him" if he sees his daughter again. Wayne looks genuinely angry like he's been kicked and walks out of the room. Unfortunately, this is an exception, and in most scenes he just looks tired and gives a one sour note performance.

I have watched about 50 Wayne films, only about 1/3 of his total, but I can not remember him being this bad in any of them. Therefore, I can't even recommend it for Wayne fans. This was the most expensive film RKO made until 1947 and also its biggest money loser. I can only recommend it for disaster movie fans and movie buffs who want to see major film disasters.

John Wayne as a bridge builder

[Marta · 9 July 1999]

John plays an engineer helping to build a bridge over a dangerous South American gorge, and Laraine Day plays the daughter of the wealthy man trying to get the bridge built. This is a tough film to wade your way through; it's over 2 hours long, and not especially exciting. Cedric Hardwicke and Judith Anderson are good, but they can't help this piece much.

Slow-moving melodrama of power struggles in the South American Mines.

[mark.waltz · 6/10 · 28 March 2010]

Tunnel blaster boss John Wayne defies the big money man Cedric Hardwicke by falling in love with his daughter, Laraine Day. Hardwicke is vindictive and pulls out his financing which creates all sorts of problems in getting a much needed train tunnel through the mountains. Colorful photography but slow pacing makes this film less than great, but in the hands of professionals, it's a notch above what it could have been.

Judith Anderson is memorable in a rare sympathetic role as Hardwicke's secretary who helps Wayne and Day in spite of her own love for Hardwicke who takes her for granted. Anthony Quinn plays the man Hardwicke would rather see his daughter with; James Gleason is amusing as always as Wayne's pal, and young Fernando Alvarado is fine as the young boy who hangs around Wayne and Gleason.

Under the direction of Richard Wallace (a name forgotten today, but with a list of impressive, if not spectacular credits), "Tycoon" has some long dull patches, but all of a sudden, the action explodes into excitement. This seems to be a variation of the type of film Cecil B. DeMille was making a few years before (with many people in the cast he would work with), and perhaps it needed someone of DeMille's stature to make it more than average.

Pleasantly picturesque but ploddingly banal photoplay . . .

[JohnHowardReid · 6/10 · 2 May 2018]

Copyright 13 December 1947 by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. New York opening at the Palace: 25 December 1947. U.S. release: 27 December 1947. U.K. release: 25 April 1949. Australian release: 22 July 1948. 11,844 feet. 131½ minutes.

SYNOPSIS: American engineer in the Andes falls for the boss' daughter.

NOTES: Shooting from early February to early May 1947. Negative cost: $3,209,000. Net loss after worldwide distribution: $1,035,000.

COMMENT: Hard to believe in that budget - the largest ever expended by RKO to that time! There's precious little to show for it up there on the screen. The only worthwhile bit of action occurs right at the climax - and that is obviously contrived with miniatures! A couple of earlier explosions were cheated the same way. Location expenses were not heavy, as most of the picture was very obviously lensed in the studio. We can only surmise that the actors, the writers and the director were grossly overpaid.

Wayne has the sort of tough, superficial, turnabout role he usually plays with a breezily unassuming credibility. Here his performance is so strained, so artificial his characterization is simply unbelievable. However, Duke is not alone - the same goes for the rest of the cast. Hardwicke can do nothing with the empty posturings the script hands him. Though it's always a pleasure to listen to his sonorous voice and it's a joy to find him in so large a role, what a pity the writers couldn't find him anything exciting to say or dramatic to do. All they have done is to obscure and haze his motivations so that his actions seem utterly incredible. If her part were larger, Judith Anderson would be in the same fix.

Laraine Day comes out of the film best. She is certainly the player the photographers have lavished all their attentions upon. Radiantly lit, exquisitely gowned and made up, she projects an alluring luminosity that stays in the mind's eye long after the rest of this silly film is forgotten.

It says much for the quality of the support cast to mention that Paul Fix and Harry Woods stand favorably in the forefront. Gleason is bombastically irritating (fortunately he is removed to hospital for a large part of his innings) and Quinn's role is so piffling as to seem almost non-existent.

Of course - aside from the writers - the man to blame for the whole debacle is Richard Wallace. Never has direction been so painstakingly dull, so studiously lethargic, so blatantly disinterested.

Tycoon provides a lavish feast of colorful hues for the eyes, nothing for the brain, and tintinnabulation for the ears!

OTHER VIEWS: Aside from its lustrous Technicolor photography - Laraine Day never looked lovelier - Tycoon is an astonishingly dull, undistinguished effort which wastes a large amount of talent and money on the part of all concerned in its making. As for the time and patience of those forced to view this pleasantly picturesque but ploddingly banal photoplay . . .

Tycoon

[CinemaSerf · 6/10 · 28 December 2023]

"Johnny" (John Wayne) and his long-suffering partner "Pop" (James Gleason) do contract mining work and are building a tunnel for railway owner "Alexander" (Sir Cedric Hardwicke). This latter man is a bit of a pile driver and they are already arguing about safety and cost cutting at the tunnel when "Johnny" encounters his boss's daughter "Maura" (Laraine Day). Dad disapproves profoundly, but the two embark on a romance that leaves both estranged from her father - and that makes their digging even more dangerous. Can they reconcile their differences before disaster strikes? The last half hour picks up the pace quite well - loads of heavy rain and engineering peril, but the rest of this over-long melodrama spends far too long on the smoochy stuff and nowhere near enough on any adventure elements. Anthony Quinn turns up now and again, but is largely wasted as the rich man's nephew "Ricky" and Judith Anderson is likewise underused as the well meaning assistant "Miss Braithwaite" - a woman in whom "Alexander" is clearly interested but his rigid behaviour leaves little room for this to flourish. Like so many of Wayne's leading ladies, Day is a rather underwhelming actress who has a little more to get her teeth into here, in theory, but she seems content to wander around in a different frock each time pouting and pretending she can fry an egg. This is typical fayre for this star, and though it is watchable enough it's not a movie that I reckon I shall ever recall.

Dawdling

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 6 July 2018]

TYCOON is a very typical John Wayne picture with little to distinguish it from the multitude. The western star plays the man in charge of building a railroad across a dangerous gorge in South America; the plot is complicated - and slowed down quite considerably - when he ends up falling for his boss's daughter in the meantime. Yes, it's one of those dawdling tales that gets bogged down in romance and character interplay, with Wayne playing something of an amoral figure required to redeem himself through manly action. Unfortunately the running time goes on way too long, and there are too many scenes involving Cedric Hardwicke's glum character and not enough with the more interesting characters, like a youthful Anthony Quinn.

not nearly up to the standard you'd expect from John Wayne

[planktonrules · 5/10 · 28 January 2006]

This movie provided little satisfaction when I watched it. No, it wasn't BAD, really, but it was certainly several notches below the quality you'd expect from one of his films. For example, while this is a color movie, every print I have seen looks very grainy and cheap--so it's very interesting that another reviewer comment on how good it looked. Maybe I just didn't get to see the right print. Also, the dialog is, at times, really crappy and riddled with clichés--like it was meant for just another B-movie and not a star whose career was definitely on the upswing as Wayne's was. And finally, the plot just didn't engage me--perhaps because there just wasn't that much action or suspense. Without the Japanese or Commies or Indians to fight, it just falls a little flat.

Action and scenery deliver good entertainment

[SimonJack · 8/10 · 12 February 2013]

This 1947 film by RKO is one of several in which John Wayne has an interesting role other than Western or war. The movie has a very good plot, but an unfortunately weak script. The cast includes some of the best second tier performers in Hollywood during that time, and all delivered very well. Wayne is good in his role, but Anthony Quinn's role doesn't quite develop. Laraine Day and Cedric Hardwicke turn in good performances in roles that could have been developed better with a good script.

One aspect that I don't see anyone else has commented on is the character played by Wayne. We all see quickly the hardness of Hardwicke's character, and the dislike between him and Duke's character. But the film has a good undertone about the Wayne character. Pop touches on it toward the end when he says that Johnny has changed – and not for the better. He does go through another transformation – a return to his former self at the end. But the underlying characteristic that is the cause for much of the trouble he encounters is his pride. This is a film about a decent guy who lets his pride get the best of him when he gets locked into a feud with the Hardwicke character. And it almost leads to his downfall. In the end, the loyalty and lasting friendship of his main crew members help draw Wayne's character out of his self-centeredness and he returns to the Johnny everyone knew and liked.

My rating is high for this film mainly for its subtle message and lesson, and for its overall entertainment value. "Tycoon" holds one's interest from start to finish, and has some excellent action segments, some very good scenic shots, and very good camera work.

How to make a tunnel without really trying

[petrilloi · 3/10 · 14 March 2011]

This is a perfect example of the kind of film Howard Hughes allowed to be made while destroying RKO Studios. Every studio made pictures sort of like this one (two guys fight over a girl while trying to do a dangerous job)but they didn't overspend like it was Gone With the Wind. This movie lost a million dollars (a lot in 1947). Hughes OK'd many mediocrities like this one, (See Son of Sindbad or the Conqueror) and had no concept of how to handle a studio budget. When he did hire good people (Sturges, Von Sternberg) he interfered, fired them and scuttled the projects, always losing money. We should stop praising or emulating boors like this (Donald Trump) before its too late. Why doesn't anyone emulate the Walter Wangers or Harry Joe Browns of this world instead of idiots with too much money?

John Wayne and Laraine Day in exotic technicolor drama...

[Doylenf · 30 May 2001]

Despite the fact that the technicolor location photography is great, John Wayne and Laraine Day have to deal with a script that is way too long (2 hrs. 8 min.) for the kind of romantic adventure seen here. One of the chief compensations for the overlong film, is seeing Laraine Day look lovelier than ever in technicolor. But other than that, the script is too long-winded and lacks enough action or drama to sustain itself over the long running time.

Let me quote from my "LARAINE DAY: All-American Girl" article that appears in the Spring 2001 issue of FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE:

"'Tycoon' is a spectacular action-romance co-starring her with John Wayne in which he carried most of the film. Once again, she was easy on the eyes in technicolor as a woman in love with a railroad constructor (Wayne) in conflict with his employer over construction of tracks through the Andes mountains. She handled the role capably enough but it was one that any young actress could have played and offered no new challenges."

The nice supporting cast included Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Judith Anderson, James Gleason and Anthony Quinn. It passes the time, but don't expect anything much.

Boooo

[BossManoftheSerengeti · 2/10 · 22 May 2007]

This movie was terrible. John Wayne is a brutal actor at times. The lead female playing the role of "Maura" did a good job and tried her best to make scenes believable despite Wayne's inept, one dimensional, over acting. Seriously, did you see him when he was supposed to be talking in his sleep? Ridiculous. And his character became such an awful person in the second half of the movie and then did nothing to atone for his behavior and is still forgiven by everyone including his arch nemesis without even so much as a 'sorry'. The story was completely implausible. We were supposed to believe that two grown men, both tremendous successes in their respected fields, would sabotage a job and risk the lives of innocent men simply because they disliked one another? YOu can pretty much randomly select any scene and it will probably leave you shaking your head in disbelief that someone paid money to have this film made. Its too bad because the only other Wayne films I've seen are the shootist and rio bravo, which were both great movies. Unless you're being paid don't bother watching this one.

"These balcony scenes kind of confuse me."

[utgard14 · 5/10 · 26 April 2014]

Forgettable romantic drama about engineer John Wayne trying to build a bridge while falling for millionaire Sir Cedric Hardwicke's daughter, Laraine Day. Daddy isn't too pleased. A huge flop for RKO at the time and it's easy to see why. Other than some nice location scenery and a couple of decent action scenes, it's nothing special and it goes on way too long. Duke is solid. Day looks stunning in technicolor but this is a part anybody could have played and she doesn't have the best chemistry with Duke. Hardwicke rarely offers a bad performance and this is no exception. His character has a rather long stick up his you-know-what. James Gleason is Duke's sidekick. He's great as always. Anthony Quinn and Judith Anderson offer good support, though this is hardly a part Quinn would brag about. Not the best John Wayne movie or even in the top thirty but it's watchable and there are some good moments.