THE MAN FROM LARAMIE B
USA (104 mi) 1955 ‘Scope d: Anthony Mann
I don't suppose we spoke ten words comin' down here, but I feel that I know ya, and I like what I know. —Charlie O’Leary (Wallace Ford)
The last of the James Stewart collaborations with this director, but this has to be one of their weaker efforts, as Mann’s distinct brand of realism is undercut by some uncharacteristically weak acting performances by several of the major players in this film. Shot entirely on location in New Mexico, Stewart as Will Lockhart leads a wagon train into Coronado, New Mexico carrying supplies from Laramie, Wyoming, which miraculously arrives unscathed despite traveling through Apache country (where the reason becomes apparent with Lockhart’s real identity). When they arrive into town, what’s most interesting is seeing the presence of so many Indians mixing peacefully with the other white residents in town, something not often seen in Westerns. Barbara, the proprietor of the mercantile store turns out to be Cathy O’Donnell, one of the doomed lovers from Nicholas Ray’s noirish THEY LIVE BY NIGHT (1949). When she gives a look of disappointment at the discovery that the goods she ordered and paid for actually arrived, this gives the audience premonitions of things to come. There are several glaring flaws in the narrative, one of which happens next, as Lockhart decides he doesn’t wish to return to Laramie emptyhanded, so in searching for cargo to load the wagons with, Barbara indicates there’s salt flats nearby, but it’s dangerously close to Apache country. As they’re seen filling the wagons with salt, they’re besieged by cattle ranchers who take them for rustlers trespassing on their land, where the quick tempered Dave (Alex Nicol) sadistically ropes Lockhart, drags him through fire by horses, burns his wagons and shoots most of their mules in order to send a message. In the aftermath, Lockhart pays off his men who return to Laramie, but he decides he has unfinished business in town, riding in alone on his mule, which has a different feel than most Westerns, as riders on horses display a certain dignified independence and flair, while a mule is ridiculed and frowned upon, and seen as a sign of weakness.
However that mood is quickly countered by an explosive scene in town where Lockhart spots Dave bringing in some cattle, pulling him off his horse before beating him to a pulp, then having to contend with the next in command, Vic (Arthur Kennedy), where an older woman with a rifle Kate (Aline MacMahon) sitting in her buggy vows to shoot anyone who interferes, causing a stir among the dozen or so ranch hands on the scene. Dave’s father Alec (Donald Crisp) puts an end to the nonsense, agreeing to pay Lockhart for any damages caused by his son, but pretty much orders him out of town. Alec owns nearly all the land in every direction for a three day ride, which includes Indian land, claiming he has an agreement to live together peacefully. Lockhart asks about evidence he found of an Indian massacre of a U.S. Cavalry patrol nearby, where they were shot by repeating rifles, asking if that was part of the agreement? This reveals an underside to the story, as Lockhart’s younger brother was killed in that raid, and he’s bound and determined to find out who’s responsible for selling those rifles to the Indians. However, if that’s the case, that he planned to stay all along, why was he filling his wagons to head back to Laramie? Still not sure who he’s searching for, Lockhart decides not to heed the advice of all interested parties and instead sticks around for awhile. But he’s jumped by a man with a knife, luckily escapes unharmed, but is immediately arrested for that man’s murder, as he’s found stabbed to death a few moment’s later. Rather than rot in jail, he is released to Kate’s custody on the provision that he work as her ranch foreman, as she’s one of the few holdouts to still own property that isn’t under the control of Alec.
But when Kate sends Lockhart to a remote pasture to separate her cattle from Alec’s, Lockart is ambushed by Dave, a continuing theme, a hot-headed bully who shoots first and asks questions later, never thinking of the consequences, continually embarrassing his father, who unbeknownst to most everyone is going blind. Lockhart, however, shoots him in the hand before he’s surrounded by Dave’s men, who in turn hold him down and shoot Lockhart point blank in his hand. The two wounded souls go wandering off, Lockhart back to town to get mended by Barbara and Kate, while Dave has a wild-eyed scheme to sell repeating rifles which he has hidden atop a rocky hill to the Apaches, alerting them by smoke signals. But Vic arrives and the two tussle over what to do, with Vic deciding the only way to stop him is to shoot him, killing him on the spot, bringing him back to the ranch on his horse where everyone immediately suspects Lockhart was out for revenge. No one, by the way, asks Vic what happened. By this time it’s clear Alec’s house is not in order, with the two fighting over superiority, they end up bringing the house down in disgrace. But not before even more damage is done. The staged finale is actually the weakest element of the film, making little sense, where this may be the poorest written of the Stewart/Mann collaborations. The first to be shot in ‘Scope, this film emphasizes the brown emptiness that stretches to the horizon, land with little visible vegetation, a hard scrabble life to make a living off this scorched dry earth, where the toughness of the land was matched by the toughness of those who initially settled there, but now their dreams and ambitions have been compromised by greed and short-sightedness, where before Alec lost his sight, he was blind to what those two men were doing right before his eyes. He just never suspected the rotten to the core thievery would come from within his own family. Despite all the hints left along the way, by the end, Lockhart reveals his mysterious identity and his true mission, as he was a military Captain on an undercover military reconnaissance mission all along. It is this knowledge that throws much of the early story into question. This kind of film, however, predates the Sergio Leone “Man with No Name” Westerns made famous by Clint Eastwood.
