The John Ford Film Collection (1936)

John Ford: Four classics and an Edsel

John Ford was arguably the greatest American movie director of the 20th century. His career spanned the end of the silent era to the Vietnam era, and though he is most famous for his Irish films - namely "The Quiet Man" and his John Wayne westerns, this five movie set is an interesting mix of his non-Wayne movies. The development and perfection of his craft can be seen through this range of five films. The people who put this collection together, however, were faced with an impossible task - show the scope, power and breadth of John Ford's career WITHOUT including any John Wayne movies! The actor and director were so inseperable, that the decision to exclude any Wayne film meant that the very best of Ford's movies are missing. And one wonders, seeing most of John Ford's stable of actors wandering through these five movies, except Wayne, if some of these films might not have been better with John Wayne in a starring role.

"The Lost Patrol" is a decent World War I film, that displays the burgeoning talent of the younger John Ford, who had not yet cut his ties to the silent film era. This movie is overdramatized like a silent film, and would only need to have the dialog replaced with cue cards to be a run-of-the-mill silent movie. Yet the promise of Ford's directorship starts to leak through. This movie stars Victor McLaglen, who has trouble deciding if he is acting with a British Accent, an Irish Accent or an American accent and a young, tall Boris Karloff (!). The most interesting thing about this movie is we see the beginning of not only John Ford's family stable of actors in this film, we also see names like Quincannon and Corporal Bell that will appear again and again in Ford's later western films.

"Mary of Scotland" is the only painful movie of the batch. It is a sad costume drama with Katherine Hepburn trying to play the title role. This movie comes off as a stage play performed before the camera. The movie is about as difficult to watch as a mediocre opera, with people in immaculate costumes, posturing their way through dialog, only without singing. I suspect that this was either one of the movies Ford was forced to make for a studio in order to get the funding for a project he would have preferred to do, or else it was one of those director's pet projects that would better have been shelved. In a "garage" full of Ford classics, this movie is an "Edsel".

"The Informer" was a very low budget film, and, like the later "Rio Grande", John Ford turns the lack of money for sets and extras into strengths, getting the most out of his characters and script, and using the camera and lighting (or lack thereof) to enhance the story. Victor McLaglen plays a former IRA terrorist who turns in his own best friend for a reward in order to get the money to flee to America with his doxie girl friend, and is so consumed by guilt that he tries to lose himself in a night of debauchery, but cannot escape the consequences of his actions. The interesting thing about this film is that the IRA are not protrayed as heroic buffons (as in The Quiet Man) and the English occupiers are not portrayed as villians. This is John Ford at his best!

"Sergeant Rutledge" is the forgotten treasure of the collection. Jeffery Hunter stars as an army officer who defends an African American Buffalo Soldier accused of rape and murder. Woody Strode excels as Sgt. Rutledge, trapped in a situation where it appears there is no chance of his receiving justice because of the color of his skin. John Ford stacks the deck to make it appear that Rutledge is indeed guilty of the charges against him, and Jeffrey Hunter as a misguided crusader. Jeffery Hunter is most famous for making the most bone-headed Hollywood career move ever made. Offered the role of Captain Pike in the TV Series "Star Trek", he turned the role down in preference of his movie career. He lived only four years after making this decision, and thus lost his one chance at film and TV immortality.

"Cheyenne Autumn" is the only one of these films to receive continued critical acclaim and air time. It is noteable as John Ford's final western. Ford returned to Monument Valley for the final time in order to make this movie, and it is interesting to watch as he tries to use different vistas of the region to pass for Nebraska and the Dakotas and every place inbetween, none of which the land resembles. The cinematography is beautiful. Ford also called upon the natives of the Monument Valley to protray the Cheyenne - but only in bit parts. As if to reinforce his patriarchal attititude towards the Native Americans, he puts white actors like Delores Del Rio, Sal Mineo, and Ricardo Montalbahn in the indian speaking roles. Surely by the time Ford made this movie there were enough Native American actors in the business to have filled these roles. Although the story contains powerful material, Ford is unable to pull it off with anything like the power of "The Searchers". The movie wanders, with a completely ridiculous and unnessesary comic relief section in the middle where Jimmy Stewart plays Wyatt Earp as a buffoon, fool and dandy. This overlong section completely destroys the pacing and tension built up over the course of the pursuit. It is almost like Ford suddenly realized that the humor in his earlier westerns was missing and so he decided to throw some in. "The Searchers" ended with John Wayne standing in a doorway, determined face set, looking in on an unseen domestic future he has no part in. It is a powerful scene that speaks volumes, possibly the best ending in any Ford movie ever. In "Cheyenne Autumn" the aging and ailing Ford was unable to pull such a grand and subtle performance from his actors, and relies instead on a cliche ending with Ricardo riding away into a sunset. "Cheyenne Autumn" is a very good Ford western, it is just not a great Ford western. One wonders why John Ford did not cast John Wayne in this movie. There were three or four roles Wayne could have played, and he might have given Ford the focus necessary to pull the movie off better. Perhaps Ford believed the public would not have accepted a John Wayne sympathetic to indians but given the strength of Wayne's performance in some of his final films, there is no doubt he could have pulled it off. It may be that since Wayne had his own career directing and producting films, Ford did not want to have another "director" - especially one he had brought along from nothing - hanging over his shoulder.

Thus this Wayne-less collection spans most of Ford's career, and is thus a good representation of his body of work (if one wanted to do so by ignore all the John Wayne movies) though I do wonder if some better choices might have been made for some of the pictures. "The Iron Horse" might have been a better choice for his early career than "The Lost Patrol". And certainly Ford made some oddities that could have been a better pick than "Mary of Scotland", after all, he directed such unusual actors as Will Rogers and a young Shirley Temple. I would like to see a second collection of non-Wayne Ford movies, that might include "The Iron Horse" as well as some classics like "My Darling Clementine", "The Long Grey Line", "Two Rode Together" and "The Plow and the Stars". September 23, 2007

Five from Mr. Fenny aka John Ford

I agree with one reviewer that "The Hurricane" should have been included. Also, "Three Bad Man" and "The Iron Horse" need to be accessed but they very likely still belong to Fox. My take on the films here:

"The Lost Patrol" Victor McLaglen and Boris Karloff made an odd team indeed. McLaglen has led this patrol to somewhere in North Africa and he has to thankless job to hold his men together to maintain his own sense of sanity. Karloff already lost his and there's really not much anyone can do until the rest of the troops find them. Almost ten years later, Bogart would star with an all male cast in "Sahara", but the outcome would be different. Kurasawa may have been influeneced with the simple graves at the end as he used graves to an even more haunting ending in the "Seven Samurai".

"The Informer" As mentioned in the extras, Ford was very influenced with German Impressionism and loved "Sunrise" that starred George O'Brien, Ford's early star in the above mentioned silent westerns. So, it could be said that this Irish tale is actually a film noir, years before its name was ever invoked. Very sad to watch as the viewer clearly sees that poor Gypo doesn't know what he's doing. This is clearing the best film of this lot and stands as one of the best films Ford has ever done. Very catholic, too, as the poor lad dies forgiven. Kudos to the rest of the cast as well.

"Mary of Scotland" There is actually to lot to like about this movie. After all, this stars Katherine Hepburn who gives great a regal performance not too different from all the other roles she's done. This also costars Fredrick March, who appeared in many high brow movies in this time period. The language is rich but is guilty of being too wordy. It's interesting to compare this to other costume drams that starred actresses of this time period, such as Marlene Dietrich "The Scarlett Empress", (my favorite), Greta Garbo "Queen Christina" (a masterpiece, but it bombed at the time), Norma Shearer "Marie Antoninette" and Bette Davis who got away with several, including two in which she played Elizabeth I.

"Sergeant Rutledge" This is intentionally an umcomfortable film to watch and the same theme was much more sucessful in "To Kill A Mockingbird", made just a year later. It must be said that Woody Strode was a very stiff actor. He was such a demanding presense that he usually was given little or no lines in the movies he appeared. Here, he's the title character, a black man accursed of raping and strangling a white woman. After different viewpoints are shown in flashback, he's called upon to give a speech in which he does say the n word. I actually don't have much problem with Jeffrey Hunter. The guy did what he's supposed to do, but Montgomery Cliff he wasn't. He suffered the same kind of blandness John Agar had. It was the Perry Mason type ending, which was a hit show back then, that I have a problem with. The guilty party confesses only because his conscious bothers him. It's simply not believable.

"Cheyenne Authumn" I actually like this film. True, Gilbert Roland, Ricardo Montaban, Sal Mineo and Dolores del Rio weren't actually native Americans but they wouldn't weren't bad at playing them. Ricard Widmark is between a rock and a hard place when he reluntuntly leads the natives. There's also the Quaker love interest played by Carole Baker. There's tension in every meeting they have. I must commend Ford for having the "got to kill me an Indian" scene. Natives ride up to whites begging for food and one gets murdered and scalped in the process. This is quickly followed with Ford satirizng himself. The killer gets accidently shot, then relunctantly treated by a poker playing Wyatt Earp, played by James Stewart. Then we get the Indians trapped by Karl Marden, who claims he knows all about Indians due to all the books he got about them, most in German. Widmark sneaks off to get Edward G. Robinson and they both get to save the Indians from slaughter for the time being. This is a sad movie to watch but there is much to appreciate here. It was a brave film to make in 1964. March 20, 2007

Where s WAGONMASTER?:

Would have been a much better set with a few other classic s. December 21, 2006

Mixed Bag...Mostly Disappointing

It's as if they reached their hand into a bowl w/ all of John Ford's non-John Wayne and non-Henry Fonda titles written on ping pong balls and drew out five at random. There's no rhyme or reason to these five movies from the beginning and end of Ford's illustrious career to be grouped together and the wide variety of subject matter and quality atttest to this.

1. The Informer: An excellent morality play about a ratfink in the IRA. Tightly scripted and well acted. Won four Academy Awards including statuettes for star McLaglen and director Ford. Easily the best of the bunch.

2. Mary of Scotland: Ford had the hots for Katherine Hepburn and, story goes, the feeling was mutual. Ford lost interest in the dull script and the movie shows the listlessness of a slack production.

3. The Lost Patrol: The other gem of the group. A detachment of soldiers get lost and wander the desert as they are picked off one by one. Not a great movie by any means but it is interesting to watch Boris Karloff of Frankenstein's monster fame play a religious nut.

4. Cheyenne Autumn: Well intentioned but awful movie. An aging and purhaps slightly senile Ford careens wildly all over the place as he tries to show the settling of the American West from the Native Americans point of view. He uses white actors to portray Native Americans, thus undermining his own point. There is a long and bafflingly irrelevant middle scene with James Stewart playing the least convincing Wyatt Earp in any movie ever.

5. Sergeant Rutledge: Another well-intentioned mess. Ford tries to show the African-American Buffalo Soldier experience. Kudos for making a Western with a black star, Woody Strode. Alas, Strode is willing but the script is weak. Ford seems to have felt the need to lighten the mood with silly jokes and comic relief. Why? He does the same thing in many other movies, most notably The Searchers, and it never works right. Like his forced macho roughhousing in The Wings of Eagles, Donovan's Reef and The Calvary Trilogy. It ends up being filler that detracts and lessens the excellence of the story. November 25, 2006

John Ford Collection... WOW

Perfect condition, arrived on time. Two of the movies I have searched for two of the movies in the collection for many years. I am SO HAPPY!
July 27, 2006

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