Three Joel McCrea Westerns came out in
1950, four if you count Stars in My Crown.
They weren’t the big epic Westerns of his pre-war career like Wells Fargo and Union Pacific. They were smaller, even B-Westerns. But they were
still good. McCrea was an excellent Western actor.
The
Outriders was written by Irving Ravetch, of Hud and The Cowboys fame, and directed by Roy Rowland, who married the niece
of Louis Mayer and, quite coincidentally of course, was promoted from script
clerk to directing. This was only his second Western, after the stunning
success (not) of the Van Johnson epic The
Romance of Rosy Ridge, about which I shudder to talk. Still, he seems to
have done a competent job with Joel. The action scenes are well staged.
It’s a Civil War story, like South of St Louis the year before, with three Reb soldiers
(McCrea, Barry Sullivan, James Whitmore) escaped from smallpox-ridden Fort
Benton, Missouri prison camp in 1865. After being rumbled by farmer Russell
Simpson (Joel says he was a Union soldier at Pittsburg Landing, unaware that
the Yankees call it Shiloh), they stumble upon evil Jeff Corey, a
Quantrillesque guerrilla leader out for his own ends, basically a bandit. Corey
makes them an offer they can’t refuse: they are to go out West and expropriate
$1 million in silver (or was it gold, I forget) being transported from Mexico.
Good man Joel
One of the three is a sergeant, a decent
man with scruples - no prize for guessing who took that part. Another is a
bloodthirsty type, Jesse (not James but) Wallace – clearly meant to be a Jesse Jamesish figure, and he is played by Barry Sullivan. And the third is the slightly
Walter Brennanish old-timer role, James Whitmore, on Joel’s side when the going
gets tough. This was only Sullivan’s third Western (after The Woman of the Town and Bad
Men of Tombstone) and was a full decade before The Tall Man on TV. I was never a great Barry fan but he’s OK, I
guess, as the homicidal and basically bad-egg compadre of Joel. Whitmore is entertaining,
as he usually was.
Bad man Barry
There’s a Route 66 moment as a voiceover recounts all the places they travel
through to get out West, and then they get to Santa Fe and join up with the
wagon train carrying the bullion (hidden under hides). The boss of the train is
Don Antonio (good old Ramon Novarro) and he has, naturally, a beautiful woman
among his charges (all wagon trains did in Westerns; I think it was compulsory), Mrs. Gort (Arlene Dahl,
who was indeed very beautiful and who earlier the same year did another
Western, also for MGM, the rather good Ambush
with Robert Taylor). Obviously – and we see it coming a mile off - Joel and
Arlene will get it together.
Very beautiful
Mrs. Gort has a young son, Roy, played
by Claude Jarman. Jarman was a talented actor and would be absolutely superb as
John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara’s son in Rio Grande later that year but sadly he has too little to say or do in this one
and cannot shine at all. He is soon sacrificed, drowned in a dangerous river
crossing.
Jarman sacrificed
There are also Apaches and Pawnees to be
fought off and much derring-do. Some nice Kanab, Utah locations are well photographed
by DP Charles Schoenbaum, to the tune of stirring music by André Previn. However,
the majority is shot on very obvious sound stages in the studio and this does
detract from the epic sweep. MGM was always especially guilty of this.
Fine photography
There’s a slightly Fordian dance scene
with Joel sensuously putting green slippers on Arlene’s feet before waltzing
her to a secluded corner of the studio. Daring stuff.
Quantrillesque Corey
It all comes to an action climax (I mean
fighting with Corey’s guerrillas, not Joel and Arlene – please). The bad guys
are vanquished and Joel gets the girl – no spoiler here.
It’s all a rather unoriginal but
enjoyable Technicolor excursion out West, with plenty of gallopin’ and shootin’.
Not Joel's finest Western, by any means but you’ll enjoy. The best scenes are those between McCrea and Sullivan.