Fri 31 Aug 2018
Archived Western Movie Review:THE DESPERADOES (1943).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , Western movies[15] Comments
THE DESPERADOES. Columbia Pictures, 1943. Randolph Scott, Claire Trevor, Glenn Ford, Evelyn Keyes, Edgar Buchanan, Guinn ‘Big Boy’ Williams. Screenplay: Robert Carson, based on an original story by Max Brand. Director: Charles Vidor. Assistant director: Oscar ‘Budd’ Boetticher Jr.
Let’s go with a list of the characters for this one: A sheriff and his former partner, a wanted outlaw trying to go straight; a girl and her father, the slightly shifty Uncle Willie; plus a crooked banker and the “Countess” who runs Red River’s only hotel of note.
Once all the players have been sorted out, the story begins. Randolph Scott is his usual straight as an arrow self, but a very young Glenn Ford seems too awkward and wet behind the ears to be playing a notorious gunman. As for Edgar Buchanan, his overplayed role (guess who?) might be the worst of his career.
August 31st, 2018 at 8:14 pm
Given the list of cast, author and directing company, my first thought upon reading this old review is that Uncle Willie or no, this is another one that deserves a second shot.
August 31st, 2018 at 8:45 pm
Absolutely. But, you weren’t far off about Ford.
August 31st, 2018 at 10:11 pm
Liked it better than you, but Ford is miscast and Buchanan needs pulling in, but despite its failings I have a fond spot for it.
August 31st, 2018 at 10:57 pm
I liked this film mainly because of Randolph Scott. It’s hard not to like any film he is in.
Based on Max Brand’s favorite plot cliche which he used too many times: Bad man turns good. But Glenn Ford is not bad enough to matter.
September 1st, 2018 at 7:07 am
Columbia’s first color picture,and a reminder of how many dull parts he used to do.
September 1st, 2018 at 7:07 am
Randolph Scott I mean.
September 1st, 2018 at 4:44 pm
Some of Scott’s westerns in the 1940s are better than others, it goes without saying, but none seem to me to be as memorable as many he made in the 50s. If he’d stopped making westerns in 1950, say, I wonder how well he’d be remembered today?
Other than by people who read this blog, of course.
September 1st, 2018 at 5:35 pm
By 1950 Scott had made the top ten at the box office. The fifties films we like best, the Ranown cycle, made him a lot of money, but were considered indifferent at the time of released, at least in the United States. About twenty years ago, when vhs was still going strong, we had in Toronto a fine store called Sam The Record Man. Carried all this kind of product on different floors. John Wayne had his own section, and I asked a clerk where the Randolph Scott section as. The answer: ‘We don’t have a….” Today they would. he has risen across the board, as did Bogart after his death. Successful in life, yes, but never the icon he is now. Considered the equal of Grant, Gable, Crosby…maybe the superior. I think I’d rather be alive.
September 1st, 2018 at 8:55 pm
One contemporaneous Western actor I can think of with the same general popular acclaim at the same rime as Randolph Scott might be Joel McCrea, but whose westerns, for whatever reason, have faded badly in how western fans regard them today, and is all but forgotten by the general public. If I’m wrong about this, let me know.
September 1st, 2018 at 9:07 pm
Nope, not wrong. McCrea earlier in his career was way ahead, especially with Foreign Correspondent, The Palm beach Story, Sullivan’s Travels. After he switched to westerns, many of which were well received critically, Ramrod, Four Faces West, a personal favorite, and Stars In My Crown, the money didn’t follow. I think his films at Universal were charming, and a little less costly, but a few years later he was working for Mirisch at Allied. Not a good move, whether or not one like the films. Tie that in with the failure of his television series, and you have a the result you identified above. Scott’s films almost all had a harder edge. He seemed genuinely threatening, on screen not on the golf course. And that persona played better. Does with me too.
September 1st, 2018 at 9:43 pm
The thing with McCrea and his earlier films has much to do with directors like Stevens, Wellman, Sturges, and Hitchcock, and leading ladies like Jean Arthur, Colbert, and Stanwyck. His early films and roles are quite a bit above Scott’s in the same period. And where Scott was always a Western star first, McCrea’s early Western’s tend to be big productions like WELLS FARGO, UNION PACIFIC, and THE GREAT MAN’S LADY instead of mostly B Westerns. While some of McCrea’s post war Westerns are good films he aged faster and mostly made poorer choices of material.
McCrea’s best post war Western’s came fairly early, like COLORADO TERRITORY and RAMROD. Scott, had that late run of films that were rediscovered on television and played off his status as an older actor.
The fact their screen personas are so different is likely why they played so well off each other in RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY, the righteous man and the good badman. I really can’t compare them to each other, their individual qualities influenced me as much as John Wayne or Gary Cooper who I wouldn’t dare to compare either as a Western icon.
September 1st, 2018 at 10:15 pm
And bear in mind David, Scott was top ten on the Motion Picture Exhibitors Poll four consecutive years, McCrea never made it. Those years, 1949 – 1953. Part of what you say, maybe all of it, is certainly so, but I think McCrea, a much more versatile actor, had that versatility work against him. Scott, while he could play comedy, projected something stern.
forbidding and deep. But Scott did work with some fine leading ladies early on, including Irene Dunne, three times, Joan Bennett and Carole Lombard, in a picture called Supernatural, but that was before either became what they became. it comes as little bit of a shock to realize Randolph Scott is substantially older, born in 1898, He always looked good.
September 2nd, 2018 at 1:40 pm
A totally off-topic observation: Edgar Buchanan must have spent much of 1962-63 leading a mule around and pretending to be a grizzled old prospector, at least twice on LARAMIE and (same wardrobe) once in McCLINTOCK.
P.S.: It’s good to have you back, Steve.
September 2nd, 2018 at 2:40 pm
Buchanan was always a marvelous performer, and not only in westerns. have a look at Penny Serenade, with Cary Grant and Irene Dunne. He is right there with them the whole way.
September 2nd, 2018 at 3:39 pm
[#14] Barry: My wife still gets teary-eyed at just the mention of PENNY SERENADE; as soaps go, it’s right up there near the top.