RED RIVER

If you're into cattle then this 1948 Western is just the ticket, since it's about a fictionalised cattle drive along the Chisholm Trail.  Highlights include a spectacular stampede at night, and the crossing of the Red River itself.

But there's a lot more to this film than just cows.

We start off with a series of short scenes that together form a prologue of sorts that introduces us to the three main characters: Tom Dunson (John Wayne), his friend Groot (Walter Brennan, doing what Walter Brennan does best), and Matt, a young lad they pick up along the way.

Incidentally, between 1936 and 1940 Walter Brennan managed the extraordinary and unique feat of winning no less than three Oscars for Best Supporting Actor.

Anyway, these early scenes establish that Dunson is a single-minded individual intent on establishing a large cattle ranch.  He's so focussed on this that he somehow manages to resist the impassioned plea of Fen, the love of his life, to be allowed to come along with him.  He tells her that she can join him later, but sadly she is soon killed by Indians, a death that will haunt him.

We then jump some 14 years.  The good news is that Dunson now owns a vast ranch, the bad news is that the intervening Civil War has knocked the bottom out of the beef market so that he is broke.  His only hope (a desperate one) is to drive his steers (over 9,000 of them!) to Missouri, despite marauding gangs along the way. 

His second-in-command for the drive will be Matt, now grownup and played by Montgomery Clift in one of his earliest film roles.

Once the journey starts the film takes on a distinctly 'Mutiny on the Bounty' vibe as Dunson becomes increasingly tyrannical in his determination to keep going as quickly as possible.

This culminates in Dunson wanting to hang a couple of his men who had tried to leave, at which point Matt decides enough is enough, and takes charge of the drive, leaving Dunson behind.  The latter does not take this well, vowing to kill Matt despite their father-son relationship.

Besides having to worry about that, Matt has to decide whether to continue with the original plan of going to Missouri, or instead to gamble on going to Abilene in Kansas where there is rumoured to now be a railroad.  He chooses the latter.

At the point at which the drive is getting a bit monotonous we come upon a wagon train under attack from Indians, who are soon driven off.  One of the people rescued is Tess Millay (played by Joanne Dru), a dance hall girl.  She and Matt rapidly fall in love, but of course he is soon on his way (those cattle aren't getting to market on their own).

There then follows a very interesting scene between Tess and Dunson, who comes upon her  in pursuit of his herd.  At one point he offers her half his ranch if she bears him a son, now that Matt has betrayed him as he sees it.  It's a business proposition ('a son by Dunson out of Millay' is how she drily puts it) which she agrees to, provided he abandons his pursuit of Matt.  He won't do that but he does agree to take her along with him.

All of this demonstrates to Dunson her love for Matt, which has echoes of Fen's love for him back in his past.  You might think that this would soften his resolve to kill Matt, but no, he's a pig-headed kind of guy.

The film now reaches its conclusion (at 133 minutes it's long for a Western): there is indeed a railroad at Abilene so the drive is a success, but Dunson now catches up with them.

Although at first Dunson seems determined to have a shootout with Matt, the latter refuses to play ball, so it all ends happily with them having a bit of a fist fight before making up.

John Wayne had made his breakthrough nearly ten years earlier in John Ford's 'Stagecoach' but apparently it was this performance that persuaded Ford that Wayne could act.  If so this film was a very important one for Wayne, given how prolific and successful his relationship with Ford would be over the next two decades.

It's true that Wayne's performance here is a very flinty one, although not so flinty that I ever believed he would really kill Matt.

Montgomery Clift here has the charisma of a future star albeit one with a sensitivity and vulnerability lurking just beneath the surface.  I'm always a bit sad watching him in any of his roles, given the way his life turned out.

The film is by Howard Hawks, a director who could turn his hand to pretty much any type of film, be it Western, comedy, musical or action adventure. 

Although I wouldn't go quite as far as the AFI in 2008, who made it the 5th greatest Western of all time, it's undeniably a classic of the genre.

RATING: ✓✓ Good Times