Mon 29 Sep 2014
A Western Movie Review by Jonathan Lewis: CHEYENNE (1947).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , Western movies[10] Comments
CHEYENNE. Warner Brothers, 1947. Dennis Morgan, Jane Wyman, Janis Paige, Bruce Bennett, Alan Hale, Arthur Kennedy, John Ridgely, Barton MacLane, Tom Tyler, Bob Steele. Screenwriters: Alan LeMay & Thames Williamson, based on the story “The Wyoming Kid” by Paul I. Wellman. Director: Raoul Walsh.
Cheyenne is a movie with an identity crisis. It’s a Western, but also a mystery. It’s a comedy, but it feels like a would-be musical, especially given the fact that the score by Max Steiner occasionally overwhelms the dialogue and the plot. There are some gritty fight sequences, but also ridiculously light, borderline risqué, romantic moments.
And with a screenplay by Western writer Alan LeMay and direction by Warner Brothers’ go-to guy for action films, Raoul Walsh, you might think you’re in for a psychological Western. But you’d be wrong. Cheyenne is much more typical of a late 1940s Western, one that doesn’t push the envelope very far.
In that sense, the casting of Dennis Morgan and Jane Wyman, talented actors both, as the leads was a perfectly good decision. Plus what’s not to like about Alan Hale as Fred Durkin, a goofy, cowardly Wyoming lawman?
Morgan portrays James Wylie, a gentleman gambler and a cheat. After getting himself into a pickle in Laramie, he’s faced with a choice. Either work for the law or be sent back to Nevada to face justice for some past misdeed. Wylie’s a smart man and quite debonair. He chooses to work for the law, an easy choice. His mission: seek out a mysterious bandit named The Poet who is stealing from the Wells Fargo Stage Line.
Wylie heads from Laramie to Cheyenne, encountering a group of bandits led by a man named Sundance (Arthur Kennedy) along the way. He also makes the acquaintance of a lovely young woman, Ann Kincaid (Wyman) who engages him in a bit of push and pull deception and flirtation.
Theirs is a Western battle of the sexes, one that would be pulled off with much better effect by John Wayne and Angie Dickinson in Howard Hawks’ Rio Bravo (1959). There’s just not that much visible chemistry between these two leads. Morgan just isn’t gritty enough for a Western hero.
Cheyenne does have some mystery, but not all that much. There’s quite a bit of mistaken identities and assumed identities, lies big and small. It doesn’t take all that long, however, to figure out that Wells Fargo employee, Ed Landers (Bruce Bennett) is up to no good or that saloon girl, Emily Carson (Janis Paige) is going to play an important role in the film.
Altogether, it’s a pleasant enough affair. Someone should just have turned down the musical fanfare a bit.
September 30th, 2014 at 3:48 am
I’ve often wondered if Max Steiner was the unacknowledged auteur of many Warner’s 40s films.
September 30th, 2014 at 10:36 am
This review and the comments in my Raoul Walsh web book are seemingly the only reviews of this film in English! See:
http://mikegrost.com/walsh.htm
A constant approach in Raoul Walsh: mixing genres. That is the cause, one suspects, of this film being a mix of Western, comedy and mystery.
My web article suggests that the gambler hero of “Cheyenne” is an ancestor to the later TV series hero Maverick.
September 30th, 2014 at 12:01 pm
I do not agree that Cheyenne is in any way the ancestor of Maverick with this proviso — footage was culled from Cheyenne, Colorado Territory and other big budget Warner’s westerns, and if you have a fair eye, you can spot that footage.
September 30th, 2014 at 12:07 pm
Cheyenne doesn’t have much of a storyline, so they made an entertainment, and I suppose the hero who does have a light touch could have influenced, along with quite a few other ‘heroes’ the creation of Bret Maverick, but take away that catchy theme song, and James Garner, and you have very little.
September 30th, 2014 at 1:26 pm
If a template for Maverick must be identified, try Candy Johnson, Clark Gable’s character in Honky Tonk.
September 30th, 2014 at 3:33 pm
Barry
I think they actually used parts of this plot for an early episode of the MAVERICK series, whether it actually influenced the character or not. As you say, Gable played roguish gamblers in numerous films including GONE WITH THE WIND, HONKY TONK, SARATOGA (non western of course), and A KING AND FOUR QUEENS. Tyrone Power was a more serious version in MISSISSIPPI GAMBLER as was Rex Harrison in THE FOXES OF HARROW.
Though Garner brought the character to life in new and interesting ways it is hardly a new concept,although television hadn’t seen a hero like that before. Garner was one of the young actors they groomed as a Gable type (somewhere between Gable and Cary Grant) — his own style too strong to turn him into anyone but himself it turned out.
Knowing the way producers worked the CHEYENNE connection developed after they conceived MAVERICK for Garner and looking in the vaults found an old film of theirs they could use for story fodder.
However, another Warner’s western with Dennis Morgan where he played mountain man/scout Jim Bridger was the basis for the CHEYNNE television series.
Hollywood so eagerly cannibalizes itself, especially in the early days of television, that almost everything can be traced to something else whether the connection is direct or not. My suspicion is that rather than model MAVERICK on Morgan’s gambler they went back and said here’s a Maverick type in this old movie and looked it there was anything they could use. These things become very chicken and egg at times in regard to what came first.
Those writing credits for CHEYENNE are impressive though. Alan Lemay of THE SEARCHERS, THE UNFORGIVEN, and THE WALKING HILLS and Paul I. Wellman of THE COMANCHEROS, THE IRON MISTRESS, JUBAL, APACHE, and MAGNIFICENT DESTINY. Add director Walsh to that and you have impressive credits for this unimpressive little western.
September 30th, 2014 at 5:41 pm
Gentlemen,
I haven’t seen “Honky Tonk”, but sources like the TCM/AFI database describe its hero as a “conman”; others call him a criminal. The hero of “King and Four Queens” is definitely some kind of conman or thief.
By contrast, both Maverick and the hero of Cheyenne are honest gamblers. They may have the personalities of charming rogues – but actually they are legit and honest.
Both are actually honest itinerant gamblers. This doesn’t seem to be true of the heroes of Honky Tonk” or “King and Four Queens”.
Both are mainly non-violent, both are suave and sophisticated, both get in fun trouble with lots of high-powered ladies. Both solve mysteries.
September 30th, 2014 at 9:45 pm
I can’t comment on the origins of MAVERICK, but I do think I’d like to see HONKY TONK sometime
September 30th, 2014 at 9:53 pm
Mike
Many of the episodes of MAVERICK have he and or Bart or Beau running some kind of con for various reasons. Bret’s whole character is conman as in the episode with Clint Eastwood when he convinces everyone he is John Wesley Hardin. He’s honest because he doesn’t need to cheat, but they run more cons than actually gamble on the series often with friend/adversary Dandy Jim played by Efrem Zimbalist Jr. and other regulars.
Gambler and conman are often the same thing in movies. Gable is a gambler and conman in KING (the title is a poker reference) and he runs a honky tonk with gambling in HONKY TONK Gamblers and conmen were among his most common roles, and by any standard the Maverick brothers are as much conmen as gamblers in numerous entries in the series, especially those with Bret or Bret teamed with Bart.
January 17th, 2016 at 8:51 pm
Morgan may not be ‘gritty’ enough for a western hero, but in this he’s playing a smooth gambler.
The racy dialog was astounding and I had to check the production year to see if it had been made before the censorship prudes rode into town.
In many ways, this not a run-of-the-mill western. Worth a look.