The breakthrough movie starring John Wayne as a film actor was the John Ford directed movie Stagecoach (1939). This movie of the American West adapted the 1937 short story The Stage to Lordsburg by Ernest Haycox into a feature length film that follows a group of strangers riding on a stagecoach through what the trope of the era considered dangerous Apache territory.
The movie was set in 1880 with a a group of strangers boards the stagecoach from fictional Tonto, Arizona Territory, to Lordsburg, New Mexico. Included in the group were prostitute Dallas, pregnant Lucy Mallory, alcoholic Doc Boone, and whiskey salesman Samuel Peacock. Dallas, Lucy, Doc and Samuel were portrayed by Claire Trevor, Louise Platt, Thomas Mitchell and Donald Meek, respectively.
The stage driver, Buck, looks for his shotgun guard Marshal Curley Wilcox aim to join head to Lordsburg on the stagecoach after hearing being joined by the Ringo Kid, who has vowed to seek vengeance on someone in Lordsburg after learning that his father and brother were murdered. Buck, Wilcox and the Ringo Kid were played by Andy Devine, George Bancroft and John Wayne, respectively.
The location of the movie then layers into the story unfolding as a United States Cavalry Lieutenant Blanchard, as portrayed by Tim Holt, warned that Geronimo and the Apache were on the warpath. An escort for a short period was promised, yet upon seeing that the pregnant Lucy Mallory is worried, the gambler Hatfield as portrayed by John Carradine joins the stagecoach to offer protection. Banker Henry Gatewood, who is absconding with money embezzled from his bank as portrayed by Berton Churchill, also gains transport in this sequence.
It is shortly after the introduction of Gatewood and the suspicion over the dangers of the Apache peoples that the stagecoach comes upon the Ringo Kid, stranded by his horse coming up lame. It is Marshal Wilcox that sees fit to take the Ringo Kid into custody, thus introducing Ringo Kid and Dallas. Significant detail develops from here, including interplay from the competing intrigues and entanglements of the romantic kind, which are taken at first with reluctance. The path that the interpersonal stories take have a feel good quality to them, and a meting out of justice feel as well.
Stagecoach offers an interesting look into some older movie and cultural tropes that existed for Westerns 80+ years ago. It is hard to tell looking back if this film had the hard hitting edge in its time that more contemporary films that I can think of. Acknowledging that contemporary cultural takes about inclusiveness today would take exception with parts of this movie, I do not shrink from giving Stagecoach as directed by John Ford 3.75-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.
Matt – Saturday, August 28, 2021
Matt Lynn Digital 