UNBRIDLED
PASSION by Howard Hughes
Following the release in March of ‘A Man
Called Gannon’ (1968), Simply Media in the UK continue to release more
Universal-International westerns, this time of 1940s and ‘50s vintage. The new
releases, out on 18 April, are ‘Calamity Jane & Sam Bass’ (1949), ‘Cattle
Drive’ (1951) and ‘Black Horse Canyon’ (1954). This trio of films are literally
‘Horse Operas’, with the accent on thoroughbred steeds and their importance and
role in the working west. Be they cattle drovers, stock breeders or outlaws,
where would any of them be without the horse? The answer, of course, is
walking.
I’ll review the DVDs in the order I watched
them. First up is ‘Cattle Drive’, a 1951 western directed by Kurt Neumann.
Chester Graham Jnr (Dean Stockwell), the spoilt, arrogant son of railroad
magnet Chester Graham Snr (Leon Ames), is accidentally left behind when the
train he is travelling on makes a water stop. Lost in the arid desert, he is
rescued by Dan Mathews (Joel McCrea), the ramrod on a cattle drive to Santa Fe.
The boy joins the trek, reluctantly at first, and eventually learns to respect
his elders, whilst also learning how to become a proficient cowhand and bronc
buster. When they arrive at the trail’s end, the boy – who has been christened
Chet by the drovers – has become so enamoured of Dan and life on the range that
he’s reluctant to re-join his father and civilisation.
As you’d expect from the material, there are similarities
here with such films as ‘Red River’ (starring John Wayne and Montgomery Clift)
and ‘Cattle Empire’ (also starring Joel McCrea) and the television series that
grew out of the latter, ‘Rawhide’, which made a TV star of Clint Eastwood. On the cattle drive, there’s a chuck wagon
stocked with vittles driven by an irascible cook (was there any other type on
cattle drives?) as played by Chill Wills, as ‘old pot walloper’ Dallas. There’s
a sense of the workaday west, with the drovers routine depicted romantically,
but also to a degree realistically. The trail drivers diet of beans and more
beans will make you think of the famous campfire scene in ‘Blazing Saddles’
(1974). In a rather fanciful moment, a rogue black stallion runs off the
remuda, the herd of horses the drovers use as their steeds. But there’s nothing
fanciful about the scene where the destructive power of a cattle stampede is
depicted, after one drover accidently spooks the steers with a rifle shot.
Unusually for a 1950s western, there’s no
female lead – in fact there are no women in ‘Cattle Drive’ at all. McCrea,
always a reliable screen cowboy, and young Stockwell (perhaps known to most
from the sci-fi TV series ‘Quantum Leap’) make an appealing team. Though Dan is
the ramrod, Cap (Howard Petrie) is trail boss. Among the drovers are
troublemaker Jim Currie (Henry Brandon – Chief Scar in ‘The Searchers’) and
Charlie Morgan aka Careless (B-western star Bob Steele). Other drovers were
played by reliable stuntmen Emile Avery, Carol Henry, James Van Horn and Chuck
Roberson, who handle the ridin’ and ropin’ with aplomb. The film was shot in
spectacular Technicolor on location in Death Valley National Park, California,
and also in the distinctive hilly backdrop and red dust of Paria, Utah, which
has been used as the memorable setting for such westerns as ‘The Outlaw Josey
Wales’, ‘Ride in the Whirlwind’, ‘Sergeants 3’ and ‘Duel at Diablo’. Listen out
for the traditional cowboy ballad ‘Ten Thousand Cattle Gone’ at various points
in the film, either in orchestrations, or whistled, sung or hummed by the
cowhands. This was reputedly one of McCrae’s favourites of his own films and
his easy-going, hard-riding Dan is the epitome of a 1950s Hollywood western
hero. At one point, Dan races his horse Blaze against Currie’s steed Lightning,
but it’s Dan’s pursuit and taming of jet-black wild mustang Outlaw that
provides the film with its best moments. Outlaw himself was played by Highland
Dale, who as we shall see had a busy schedule in the 1950s.
George Sherman’s ‘Calamity Jane & Sam
Bass’ (1949) also features horse racing as a key plot component. Sam Bass
(Howard Duff), a farm boy from Indiana, arrives in the Texan town of Denton and
wins a stake by betting on Calamity Jane’s horse Thunderbolt, against the
seemingly invincible Denton Mare in a big horse race. This supposed biopic is
as romanticised and inaccurate as they come, as it depicts Bass’s descent in
outlawry. After the race, Sam manages to buy the Denton Mare and joins a cattle
drive to Abilene. En route Sam races the Mare against various cowboys’ steeds
and wins money, but in Abilene town tyrant Harry Dean (Marc Lawrence) wins a
high-stakes horse race by poisoning the Mare. The drovers have put their entire
savings, plus all the proceeds they had from the cattle sale, on the Denton Mare
to win. When they realise they have been tricked, Sam and his friends hold up
the stage that Dean is travelling on, to take back their money and an outlaw gang
is born.
Throughout the story, Sam is torn between two
women – lovely storekeeper Kathy Egan (Dorothy Hart), the sister of Denton
sheriff Will Egan (Willard Parker) and altogether livelier Calamity Jane, as
colourfully played by Yvonne De Carlo. De Carlo looks tremendous when she
arrives on screen here, in a fringed buckskin outfit and wearing bright red
lippy. She reappears at various points in Sam’s life, even saving him from jail
and lending him her horse to make his escape, as he becomes a fugitive – albeit
as an innocent victim of injustice. It’s a shame she’s not onscreen more, as Calam
is the film’s best ingredient, predating Doris Day’s more famous portrayal of
the frontierswoman by four years. Despite occasional flashes of realism, this
is an idealised Hollywood western, with colourful costumes and perfect
landscapes highlighted in magnificent photography. The big race in Abilene was
filmed at Kanab Rodeo Grounds (aka Kanab Racetrack) in Utah, with many
sequences filmed in the Kanab landscape, including Kanab Canyon and the sets at
Kanab Movie Ranch. Other scenes were filmed at the Iverson Ranch in Chatsworth,
California (the bank robbery scene) and Red Rock Canyon State Park, at Cantil,
California. In supporting roles, Lloyd Bridges played cattle trail boss Joel
Collins, Houseley Stevenson was irascible cook Dakota and Norman Lloyd was
Sam’s eventual betrayer Jim Murphy (that morsel at least was based on fact). Some
of the cattle drive sequences are very familiar, as it’s stock footage lifted from
‘Cattle Drive’.
Third up is ‘Black Horse Canyon’ (1954) by Jesse Hibbs, who directed several Audie Murphy vehicles (including his WWII autobiography ‘To Hell and Back’) and the excellent B-western ‘Rails into Laramie’ (1954). ‘Black Horse Canyon’ is a tale of a pair of would-be horse ranchers – Del ‘Rock’ Rockwell (Joel McCrea) and youngster Ti Taylor (Race Gentry) – and their attempts to corral and tame a jet-black stallion named Outlaw. But they’re not the only ones after Outlaw. The horse’s original owner, Aldis Spain (Mari Blanchard) is also trying to recover the steed for her ranch, while villainous Harry Jennings (Murvyn Vye) wants the horse for breeding purposes. ‘Black Horse Canyon’ was shot on the Bloomquist Ranch, Douglas and in Guadalupe Canyon, both in Arizona. Interestingly, the fencing-in of the open range is often depicted in westerns as a negative thing – for example in ‘Man Without a Star’ or its remake ‘A Man Called Gannon’ (which is also available on DVD from Simply Media). Here the barb wire fences are seen as a positive aspect of range life, providing a new start for Rock and Ti.
As the story progresses, both Rock and Ti become romantically involved with Aldis. Exuberant Ti shows off for Aldis, attempting to impress her, while Rock’s quiet resolve wins her over. McCrae is good as Rock, a blue-denim-shirted cowboy in the Hollywood tradition. Mari Blanchard, as Aldis, is sexy but out-of-place in full make-up on a working horse ranch. She appeared in several 1950s and ‘60s B-movies – from westerns and horror, to action and sci-fi – including ‘Rails into Laramie’, ‘Abbot and Costello Go to Mars’, ‘Ten Tall Men’, ‘Son of Sinbad’ and ‘Twice-told Tales’. Most interesting in the cast is the presence of Race Gentry, an up-and-coming young star from the period who reminded me a little of Italian western star Giuliano Gemma. Why his filmography is brief and he didn’t become a bigger star is a mystery, as he was one of Henry Willson’s protégés, from the same beefy stable as Rock Hudson, Troy Donahue, Guy Madison and Tab Hunter. Gentry does however break the cardinal sin of western heroes, as cowboys should never cry – at least onscreen. Fortunately in ‘Black Horse Canyon’ romantic horseplay plays second fiddle to the business of tracking down Outlaw. There are several good ridin’ and ropin’ scenes and the film’s best sequences are when Rock, Ti and Aldis (they sound like a pop group) trail Outlaw in the desert. But there’s little gunplay or fisticuffs, and the fact that when McCrea plays cards, he plays cribbage rather than poker gives you a fair indication of where this homely western’s heart is.
In ‘Black Horse Canyon’, Outlaw was again played by Highland Dale, a horse so famous that he starred in his own TV series, the title role in western show ‘Fury’ from 1955 to 1960 (Peter Graves and Bobby Diamond handled the dialogue). Highland Dale also starred in the title role of ‘Black Beauty’ (1946), the pinnacle role for any horse, played ‘Gypsy’ in the family western ‘Gypsy Colt’ (1954) and the title role in Fred F Sears’ ‘The Outlaw Stallion’ (1954), among many others. Highland Dale was a magnificent animal with a glossy coat and real star presence – and what a bargain, they only had to pay him in oats.
While watching these three films, you’ll notice that they share stock footage. In addition to the cattle drive footage mentioned in ‘Cattle Drive’ and ‘Calamity & Sam’, much of the footage of Highland Dale in ‘Black Horse Canyon’ and ‘Cattle Drive’ is reused from the little-known family western ‘Red Canyon’ (1949) directed by George Sherman. Based on the Zane Grey novel ‘Wildfire’, it stars Ann Blyth as horse rancher’s daughter Lucy Bostel and Howard Duff as drifter Lin Sloan. Sloan and old-timer Jonah Johnson (Edgar Buchanan) team up to track down deadly wild mustang Black Velvet (played by guess who?) and once it’s captured, Lucy helps them break the bronc before a big horserace. ‘Red Canyon’ was shot in Utah, including Kanab Racetrack, Kanab Movie Ranch, Kanab Canyon, Paria, Duck Creek and Aspen Mirror Lake, near Cedar Mountain. A lot of footage from ‘Red Canyon’ was reused in subsequent westerns, especially ‘Black Horse Canyon’ (which is fashioned almost entirely around the existing footage) and Dan’s trailing and capture of the black stallion in ‘Cattle Drive’ is also lifted wholesale from this movie (even McCrea’s costuming is designed to match Howard Duff’s in the earlier footage). ‘Red Canyon’ is currently only available on Spanish DVD under the title ‘Huracán’ and makes an interesting companion piece to ‘Black Horse Canyon’ and ‘Cattle Drive’.
Simply Media’s trio of releases will be of interest to western film fans. All three have similar themes, stars and locations, and the Technicolor cinematography really sparkles in these Region 2 DVD editions. ‘Black Horse Canyon’ is probably in the worst shape, but is still largely great quality image. ‘Black Horse Canyon’ runs 78 minutes, ‘Calamity Jane & Sam Bass’ runs 82 and ‘Cattle Drive’ 74 minutes. The screen ratio for all three is 4:3. There are no extras and none include subtitles or descriptive SDH close captions. ‘Black Horse’ and ‘Cattle Drive’ are rated U by the BBFC, while ‘Calamity’ is rated PG for ‘mild western violence’ (which is the least you can expect from a good western!), while in June 1949 it was originally rated U. These are three good ‘Horse Operas’, in the truest sense, from Simply Media, a company which continues to deliver rare, undiscovered and interesting westerns to DVD.
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All text © Howard Hughes 2016
Howard Hughes is the author of a range of film books including ‘Stagecoach to Tombstone: The Filmgoers’ Guide to the Great Westerns’ and ‘Outer Limits: The Filmgoers’ Guide to the Great Science-Fiction Films’. For further information on western movie locations, read location guides by Carlo Gaberscek, particularly his two-volume ‘Sentieri del western – Dove il cinema ha creato il West’.