'LONE RANGER' GIVEAWAY, PLUS COMPLETE GENE AUTRY TV REVIEWED

If you had told me that 2013 would bring a more controversial Western to the screen than the previous year’s DJANGO UNCHAINED from Quentin Tarentino, I’d have said you were crazy.  But 2013’s THE LONE RANGER, directed by Gore Verbinski and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, ruffled more feathers than any other Western I can recall in decades.  As a matter of fact, Tarantino himself surprised many when he put LONE RANGER on his own ‘ten best list’ for 2013. "The first 45 minutes are excellent…   It was a bad idea to split the bad guys in two groups; it takes hours to explain and nobody cares.  Then comes the train scene—incredible! When I saw it, I kept thinking, 'What?  That's the film that everybody says is crap? Seriously?'"

There is one shameful omission in the film which I missed at the screening, but caught watching the BluRay: when the credits roll, nowhere are the names of Frank Striker and George W. Trendle, the men who created the Lone Ranger and Tonto, and in the case of Striker, wrote hundreds of radioplays refining the characters.  It is a disgrace that neither name appears on the screen, and should be remedied.

LONE RANGER is coming to home video this Tuesday, December 17^th, and the good folks at Disney have given the Round-up a pair of BLU-RAY/DVD/DIGITAL Combo-Packs to award to two lucky Round-up readers.  You’ll find the contest below, after all the review-type-stuff.  (If you want to skip to the contest, and read the rest of this later, I’ll understand.)

LONE RANGER Movie Review

Originally posted July 1, 2013

It looks like director Gore Verbinski, producer Jerry Bruckheimer, and writers Ted Elliot, Terry Rossio, and Justin Haythe have done what no one else has managed to do in decades: make a new Western that will delight and satisfy die-hard fans of the genre and the characters, and introduce the form to a young and fresh audience who will hopefully want to come back again and again. 

Among the fine major Westerns of the last several years, 3:10 TO YUMA (2007), APPALOOSA (2008), and DJANGO UNCHAINED (2012) were rated ‘R’. TRUE GRIT (2010), like LONE RANGER, was ‘PG-13’, and featured a child protagonist in Mattie Ross, but there was no great ‘reach-out’ to a younger audience.  But ‘The Lone Ranger’, since its inception in Depression-era radio, through two Republic serials and 217 TV episodes and three feature films, has always been for kids, and this new version, as the same production team did with their PIRATES OF THE CARRIBEAN franchise, has built a movie that will draw in the interest of kids while exposing them to the classic elements of westerns, which have delighted audiences for generations, nay, for over a century. 

I know there will be classicists who will accept no substitutes for Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels, and I can only tell them that they’re missing out on something they would thoroughly enjoy – a Western made with so much money that there is nothing left out because of budgetary restraints, made by people who have a clear love, respect for and knowledge of the genre, and who flex the art and craft they’ve honed for years.  Is it perfect?  No.  Will you love the best parts so much that you’ll forgive its imperfections?  Hell, yeah!  This is not a museum piece, it is living, breathing – sometimes hyperventilating – art that builds on the past without requiring a knowledge of the past to be appreciated.

The story opens, unexpectedly, at a carnival in San Francisco in 1933, perhaps not coincidentally the year The Lone Ranger premiered on WXYZ radio.  Will, a little boy with astonished and astonishingly large brown eyes, all dressed up in a cowboy suit and six-guns, is visiting a nearly-empty side-show, examining the stuffed bison and other displays, and jumps with surprise when an ancient Indian figure sitting outside a tepee, a crow atop his head, suddenly comes to life, and seeing the boy with a black mask on, addresses him as “Kemo Sabe.”  It is, you guessed it, Tonto, looking easily ninety.  They talk, the boy frightened at first, but soon fascinated, as Tonto tells him the story of his relationship with John Reid.  Soon the old Indian’s words take on visuals, and the story of how Tonto and John Reid met, and how Reid becomes the Lone Ranger, begins. 

Most of the story revolves around Promontory, Utah, and the upcoming driving of the golden railroad spike that will complete the laying of track for the Transcontinental Railroad, linking the East and West coasts of these United States together.  As a demonstration that peace and civilization have come to the frontier, railroad magnate Cole has ordered that the most despicable of villains, Butch Cavendish, already sentenced to die, be brought there by train, to hang.  Also being transported is a lesser criminal named Tonto.  A group of Texas Rangers are on the way to assist, while the Cavendish gang is on the way to thwart the law.  On the train is John Reid, a young lawyer from a family of lawmen, coming out west to reunite with his family. 

When all of these people with differing plans collide, you have one of the two tremendous train-bound extended action sequences that book-end the movie, and it is so beautifully constructed that it’s exalting to watch – it’s everything you’re hoping for, and more.  I hope it’s not a spoiler to say they don’t get to hang Butch Cavendish that day.  The hunt for Cavendish and his gang, and his hostages, and the search for an insidious conspiracy, drives the movie through two hours and twenty minutes of thrills, action and humor.

Much has been said, in anticipation of this film, about the diminishing of the Lone Ranger to build up Tonto.  That isn’t what happened.  Instead, the story is, as it always has been, about the creation of the man, the identity, of the Lone Ranger; but this time, it is told from Tonto’s point of view.  And it works – after all, Tonto is who he always is.  It’s John Reid who takes on the new identity, and telling the ‘why’ is the purpose of the film.  

The original masked man and faithful Indian companion had little back-story, and these have been expanded, giving more heart and humanity and motivation to the characters, and not a few surprises.  John Reid still has a brother, Texas Ranger Dan Reid, but there is also a woman in his heart, who just happens to be, awkwardly enough, not his wife, but his sister-in-law.  We learn about John Reid’s background early on, but only discover the astonishing truth about Tonto as the story races along.  The mask is there.  The silver bullets are there, but while they were a minor part of the story of the original Lone Ranger, they take on startling significance in this telling. 

Johnny Depp’s characterization of Tonto borrows nothing from Jay Silverheels, which is good, because we don’t want an imitation, we want a performance, and we get it.  It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen Depp do before, diametrically opposed to his theatrical-to-swishy personification of Captain Jack Sparrow.  But it is still Depp, and his dramatic work, as well as his comedic timing, are spot-on as always.  More poker-faced then stoic, he reveals his emotions with his words and actions, almost never his expression.  Depp is virtually unrecognizable in his two distinct make-ups, as the young, and as the very old Tonto, and the masterful work by the make-up department under the direction of Joel Harlow is worthy of Oscar consideration.  Incidentally, Depp’s previous westerns are the highly regarded DEADMAN, directed by Jim Jarmusch, and last year’s animated RANGO.     

As the man who transitions from by-the-book lawyer to masked crime-fighter, Armie Hammer impressed as twins in THE SOCIAL NETWORK and as J. Edgar Hoover’s lover in HOOVER.  His look of doe-eyed innocence works perfectly with his character’s self-assured arrogance early in the story.  But in addition to the comedy, and he does play Costello to Tonto’s Abbott, he has a sincere believability which makes the pain of his many personal losses in the story moving to the audience. 

Striking British actress Ruth Wilson is effective as brother Dan Reid’s wife and mother of their son Danny (Bryant Prince), and projects that sort of inner strength we associate with frontier ladies.  She also has a lovely face for period stories.   James Badge Dale plays John’s more down-to-earth and down-and-dirty brother, Ranger Dan Reid, with the traditional restraint of the western hero, but with heart and courage.

Among the less likable characters is Tom Wilkinson as Cole, the railroad mogul more interested in profit than progress.  As Butch Cavendish, William Fitchner, star of the series CROSSING LINES, excels, portraying a character so revolting in his passions that I wouldn’t dare spoil things by giving it away here.  His make-up, including a hair-lip is, like Depp’s Oscar-worthy. 

Other performances of note include Helena Bonham Carter as Red, a madam with valuable information and an ivory leg.  Barry Pepper plays the dashing Fuller, a character modeled on Custer.  No stranger to westerns, he was Lucky Ned Pepper in the TRUE GRIT remake, and even turned up on episodes of both LONESOME DOVE spin-off series.  Saginaw Grant impresses as Chief Big Bear in a scene where the Lone Ranger learns about the earlier life of Tonto.  Mason Cook, who plays the little cowboy in the introductory scene is, surprisingly, a western veteran, having well-played a key role in last year’s WYATT EARP’S REVENGE.

Leon Rippy, who plays the key role of the tracker Collins, is disguised from his DEADWOOD fans (where he played Tom Nuttal) with a revolting spray of facial hair, gives a sometimes comic, sometimes emotional, and dramatically critical performance.  And though it’s just a cameo, it’s nice to see Western veteran Rance Howard as a train engineer.

From the moment the action moves from Depression San Francisco to the old west, the delights are many, with extra kicks for we western nerds.  The filmmakers express their reverence for Sergio Leone’s ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST frequently, and in a way that cleverly extends the honors farther still.   The building-of-the-railroad through Monument Valley echoes not only Segio Leone’s similar use of the location in ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, but also reminds us that Leone was paying his respects to John Ford.  An early scene at a railroad station brings back not just the opening of IN THE WEST, but it’s homage to Zinneman’s HIGH NOON.  A later scene of growing menace in an isolated farm acknowledges not just IN THE WEST, but Leone’s love of George Steven’s SHANE.  For that matter, when a train-board revival meeting features, “We Will Gather At The River,” it’s not just a salute to Sam Peckinpah’s THE WILD BUNCH, but to John Ford and all of the other filmmaker who’ve used it.  And if you don’t know that guns will be drawn before the end of that hymn, then this must be your first rodeo. 

Are there some flaws?  Sure.  It’s funny when it should be, but sometimes it gets too jokey, and after you’ve been emotionally involved, you’re pulled out of the story by the silliness.  There’s a visit to ‘hell on wheels’, a traveling amalgam of sinful entertainments to entice the track-layers, that is amusing, but grinds the action to a halt for too long.   

I saw the movie at Disney Studios, with an audience of other press and industry types, but mostly with families with exuberant kids who just ate it up.  The one criticism I heard the most?  “The Lone Ranger spends too much time being stupid.”  Dramatically, it’s logical to delay the transition from dope to hero for as long as possible, but for those of us who knew what must ultimately be coming, the wait was sometimes frustrating.  But don’t worry – you do get the William Tell Overture in the nick of time, and from that moment on the film is an enthralling gun-battle and two-train chase to the finish.   

Yugoslavian-born cinematographer Bojan Bazelli shoots like he’s been doing westerns all of his life.  Hans Zimmer’s score is big and grand as it should be, and while there are musical motifs that are a nod of respect to Ennio Morricone, they are nods, and not imitations. Art Director Jeff Gonchor was nominated for an Oscar for TRUE GRIT, and continues to do meticulous work, including the three trains and two towns which were all built from scratch.  Penny Rose, who has done the costumes for all of the PIRATES films, has a beautiful eye for westerns as well.  I’ve seen five big new summer movies in the past week, and THE LONE RANGER is miles ahead of all the rest!  Hi-yo Silver!  Away!

LONE RANGER – The Special Features

There are three featurettes included, all of them entertaining and informative.

ARMIE’S WESTERN ROAD TRIP lets the star provide an overview of the movie’s many locations – Monument Valley, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Comanche Country – and a sense of the challenges the cast and crew faced in each.

BECOMING A COWBOY details the ‘boot camp’ experience of the actors being trained with horses and guns for the film.

RIDING THE RAILS OF ‘THE LONE RANGER’ is the most interesting of all the special features, documenting the building of the trains, the laying of five miles of track, and the work of the gandy dancers who swung the sledges.

Additionally, there’s an amusing BLOOPER REEL, and a single DELETED SCENE, but like nothing I’ve seen before, as the scene is done entirely in 3D animation – fascinating!

THE CONTEST: MATCH THE ‘RANGER’ AND THE ‘TONTO’

Here’s what you need to do to win one of the two LONE RANGER BluRay/DVD/Digital sets!

On the left are numbered the names of the men who played the Lone Ranger, and on the right are lettered the men who played Tonto (I left out an unsold pilot version, but hopefully didn’t miss any others).  And no, it’s not a mistake that some of the ‘Tontos’ appear more than once.

Match the correct Rangers to the correct Tontos, and in an email, type them together (9J for example), include your name and mailing (snail-mail) address, and email your entry to swansongmail@sbcglobal.net  .  The first two entries I receive that do all of the match-ups correctly will win the LONE RANGER sets.  This contest is for readers in the domestic U.S. only – the discs wouldn’t play correctly in other regions anyway.  Good luck, Kemo Sabe!

1)Robert Livingston                                                                            A)Jay Silverheels

2)William Conrad                                                                               B)Chief Thundercloud

3)Brace Beemer                                                                                  C)Michael Horse        

4)Lee Powell                                                                                       A)Jay Silverheels

5)Clayton Moore                                                                                 D)Johnny Depp          

6)Klinton Spillsbury                                                                            E)John Todd

7)Armie Hammer                                                                                F)Ivan Naranjo

8)John Hart                                                                                         B)Chief Thundercloud

Winners will be announced in next week's Round-up!

THE COMPLETE ‘GENE AUTRY SHOW’ ON DVD!

A Home Video Review

One season at a time, Gene Autry Enterprises has been overseeing the restoration of THE GENE AUTRY SHOW.  It’s been a long-term commitment, a tremendous undertaking by the Timeless Media Group, Shout! Factory, and Gene’s own Flying ‘A’ Pictures Incorporated.  Now they’ve gathered all five seasons together and released them in a complete 91 episode, 47 hour set! 

Depending on your age, and where you grew up, these shows may be entirely new to you, or fondly remembered pieces of your childhood.  Either way, they stand up beautifully 63 years after the series first ran.  And the more I see of murky, shaky, duped prints, the more I admire the vision of Gene Autry, who acquired the rights to all of his movies and TV shows, to make sure that they were maintained in the highest possible quality. 

Gene spent more than two years studying the difference between movies and television before shooting his first episode, analyzing questions like what is the best way to show action on a tiny, blurry screen.  He concluded that his television movies would have less long-shots, more close-ups, and more side-to-side rather than head-on action.   

Why was Gene, just back from the war, eager to get into the new market?  In Gene’s own words, “Like everyone else in show business, I had become very much interested in the possibilities of television. And, in addition, I had a special reason for wanting to hit the video channels. During my three and a half years in the service, a whole new generation of children had been born. These youngsters are still too young to attend many movies (if at all), but they’re not too young to watch television. And in these days, cowboy fans, like charity, begin at home.”

Gene wanted to build a pipeline of new fans from the TV series to his films at the movie theatres.  But movie exhibitors, whose venues were disappearing with the competition of the new medium of television, were not at all pleased when he decided to make shows directly for TV.  Some even cancelled their contracts to play his pictures, saying no one would buy a ticket to see him when they could watch him on TV for free.  To show how different the show-biz world of the 1950s was from today, Gene correctly countered that by-and-large, only rural areas played his movies, while only big cities had TV stations, so his films and TV shows were serving almost completely different markets.  He further pointed out that his new Columbia-produced films were not getting the playdates they should, because exhibitors, to save money, were instead booking his pre-war Republic films, which he didn’t own (yet).

One thing that set THE GENE AUTRY SHOW apart from its competitors was that the episodes were approached as self-contained mini-movies.  In THE ROY ROGERS SHOW, THE LONE RANGER, or HOPALONG CASSIDY, the identities and relationships of characters were always the same.  In Autry’s series, just like in his theatrical movies, Gene could be a lawman or a ranch hand or a well-known entertainer, and sidekick Pat Buttram could be an old compadre, or someone he just met.  Sometimes Pat is the sheriff who hires Gene as his deputy!  It made for a wider variety of story possibilities.  And also consistent with Gene’s features, there is always music, a not preachy but clear core of morality, and comedy supplied by Pat Buttram, who is very .  And there’s plenty of fighting and riding action, what Gene Autry Enterprises President Karla Buhlman calls ‘the five minute rule’ – that’s the maximum time allowed between fistfights!

The shows often do feel like a very tight little movie rather than a TV episode, and the casts are peppered with actors who had worked with Gene in features, or would star in the shows he produced.  Dickie Jones, who would star in both THE RANGE RIDER and BUFFALO BILL JR. series; Gail Davis, who would do a number of features with Gene before he cast her as Annie Oakley; Myron Healy, a smug villain with more than 300 acting credits; Denver Pyle; SUPERMAN villain Ben Weldon; Abbott & Costello’s ‘Mike the cop’, Gordon Jones; and Harry Harvey, who almost always the sheriff both to Gene, and in Roy Rogers’ town of Mineral City.  There are also actors just starting on their career ascent like Denver Pyle, and Lee Van Cleef – in the season 3 episode, Gene beats Lee within an inch of his life!

In addition to about six episodes per disc, most of the fourteen discs include a special feature selected to place the shows in a historical context.  Among the entertainments are photo-galleries of Gene on vending cards; Gene starring in MELODY RANCH RADIO SHOWS; a photo gallery of Gene’s 1953 tour on England; and Gene’s movie trailers. 

And even if you’ve bought all of the individual seasons, there is one disc you do not have.  Back in the 1970s, in order to raise money to buy the rights to some of his features, Gene sold off the rights to the four other TV series he produced.  Although Autry Enterprises no longer owns them, the bonus disc includes two episodes from each of those series, all of them period westerns.  ANNIE OAKLEY, starring Gail Davis, was the most popular of Gene’s other productions, especially with girls who loved that Annie was the hero, and in charge, without anyone needing to comment on how unusual it was.  She was also beautiful.  THE RANGE RIDER starred Jock Mahoney and Dickie Jones, two of the best horsemen and stuntmen in the business.  The shows were non-stop action, and thrilling to watch.  Dick Jones followed up as BUFFALO BILL JR., which was more small-kid-aimed, but still a lot of fun.  THE ADVENTURES OF CHAMPION starred Gene’s horse, with 12-year-old Barry Curtis as the only kid who can ride him, and former ‘Red Ryder’ Jim Bannon as his dad.  There is a pair of episodes from THE GENE AUTRY SHOW as well.

If you’re an adult watching for your own enjoyment, you can watch the shows any way you want – binge-view a season, watch them chronologically, jump around randomly.  After all, each show stands up well on their own.  But if you’re going to show them to kids, I have a suggestion: start with season five.  While all the rest of the shows are in black and white (except for two from season one), the thirteen episodes of season five are in beautiful color.  Over the years I have introduced literally thousands of schoolkids to Laurel & Hardy, when a class had worked hard all day, and had earned a treat for the last twenty minutes of the school day.  But I learned that I had to use the colorized versions – they simply wouldn’t look at black and white.  But once you’ve got them hooked – on Gene or Laurel & Hardy – they’ll not only watch black & white, they’ll even listen to the radio shows! 

After re-reading the above, I fear I have shortchanged Pat Buttram, who is Gene’s sidekick in the series.  Pat was a very bright and clever guy, and seamlessly mixing ‘dumb-guy’ humor was a wry, observational wit.  Incidentally, there was one time during season one when Pat was nearly killed by a prop cannon.  For the next several episodes actors Fuzzy Knight, Alan Hale Jr. and Chill Wills took turns donning Pat’s duds and filling in for him (you can learn more about this HERE  in my review of PAT BUTTRAM, ROCKING CHAIR HUMORIST).

If you’re looking for a highly enjoyable way to spend forty-seven hours, I highly recommend THE COMPLETE GENE AUTRY SHOW.  And if you’d like to learn more about Gene Autry, and how he ran his business, please read my interview with Gene Autry Enterprises President Karla Buhlman HERE .

KARL MAY – HITLER’S FAVORITE COWBOY!

Once again I have to thank Karl Tiedemann, who never misses a thing on BBC radio.   Here’s a half hour podcast about the world’s most popular western writer, German 19^th century author Karl May.  Virtually unknown in the English-speaking world, everywhere else he’s the King of the Cowboys.  Here’s the link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03jz22h

ENNIO MORRICONE TO MAKE U.S. DEBUT IN MARCH!

Back in October of 2009, many of us followers of the great maestro of the Italian cinema – especially of the Leone spaghetti western – were crushed when, due to health concerns, Morricone had to cancel his Hollywood Bowl performance.  Now, under the sponsorship of TCM, the brilliant composer with over 520 scores to his credit, will have his first United States tour in March, starting with an appearance at the Los Angeles Nokia Theatre on March 20^th, followed by a New York appearance three days later.  It’s not yet clear whether more dates will be added.  He will be working with a 200 piece orchestra and choir.  It’s not something you see – or hear – every day.  You can learn more HERE 

  .

‘BILLY JACK’ STAR TOM LAUGHLIN DIES AT 82

Just as I was about to post, I got word that Tom Laughlin, writer, director and star of the BILLY JACK movies of the 1970s, has died.  A self-made filmmaker and movie star, Tom loved Westerns, and in addition to the contemporary BILLY JACK films, where he played an American Indian with martial arts skills, he also appeared in THE MASTER GUNFIGHTER, THE LITTLEST HORSE THIEVES, and did a cameo as a member of the Butch Cavendish gang in 1981’s LEGEND OF THE LONE RANGER.  I had the pleasure of hearing him and his wife and partner Delores Taylor talk about their lives and careers in October 2012, when he was honored with a SILVER SPUR AWARD.  You can read what he had to say, and the rest of the article, HERE .

THAT’S A WRAP!

I had a terrific time Saturday morning, being a guest on the ‘AROUND THE BARN’ chatting with these charming ladies – Roy Rogers’ and Dale Evans’ granddaughter Julie Fox Pomilia; host Nancy Pitchford-Zhe; Gene Autry Enterprises President Karla Buhlman; and OutWest purveyor and host Bobbi Jean Bell, on KHTS 1220 AM in Santa Clarita.  We discussed Gene Autry, what’s coming in the Round-up, and we heard a lot of Gene’s great Christmas music.  I was given a pair of delightful Gene Autry Christmas CDs, and my wife and I loved listening to them as we drove to and from a Christmas party that night.  It doesn’t begin and end with RUDOLPH and HERE COMES SANTA CLAUS – there’s also FREDDIE THE LITTLE FIR TREE, and many more.  Bobbi Jean has them all HERE 

If you missed AROUND THE BARN, or if you want to hear it again and again (and who can blame you?), I’ll be posting the link as soon as the Podcast is available.  

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents Copyright December 2013 by Henry C. Parke -- All Rights Reserved

GRINDHOUSE RELEASES ‘THE BIG GUNDOWN’ TUESDAY!

(Updated 12/12/2013 -- see SHANE story)

Grindhouse Releasing will release their new beautiful Blu-Ray edition of THE BIG GUNDOWN (1966), directed by Sergio Solima, and starring Lee Van Cleef and Tomas Milian, on Tuesday, December 10^th.  Lee is a lawman-for-hire who agrees to track down a child-killer, Tomas, but of course, things are not as ‘black & white’ as they are first presented. Scripted by Sergio Donati and Solima, GUNDOWN is considered a high point in the careers of all four men; it is one of the finest of Spaghetti Westerns, and will finally be shown in its complete length for the first time in the United States.  The 4-disc set consists of a Blu-Ray of the expanded 95 minute U.S. cut, featuring three new scenes; a DVD version of the U.S. 95 minutes cut; a DVD of the 110 minute director’s cut of LA RESA DEI CONTI, the original title, in Italian, with English subtitles; and a music CD featuring the marvelous score by Ennio Morricone!  There’s even a companion booklet with liner notes by Joyner, and by Euro-music expert Gergley Hubai. 

Court, Bob Murawski and me

There are other special features, including interviews with Sergio Solima, Tomas Milian, and Sergio Donati, and I had the pleasure of doing audio commentary on GUNDOWN with fellow Western writer and film historian C. Courtney Joyner (keep an eye out for his new Western novel, SHOTGUN), under the direction of Oscar-winning editor Bob Murawski (you can read about that adventure HERE  ), and I’m as eager to see the finished product as anyone else.

GET A GREAT TAX DEDUCTION, AND ‘TREASURES 5 – THE WEST’

As 2013 comes to a close, many of us are looking for a way to do good, and to save on our income taxes.  If you liked the sound of ‘TREASURES 5 – THE WEST’, which I reviewed in last week’s Round-up (if you missed it, HERE is the link ) from the National Film Preservation Foundation, you can contribute to the important mission  of film preservation, and get yourself this wonderful video set, or a different set.  The NFPF is a non-profit public charity, affiliated with the Library of Congress, and for a contribution of $200 or more, you can have your well-deserved tax deduction, and the set of discs of your choice.  For details, visit this site: https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1397805

ROUND-UP’ ON THE AIR AND ‘AROUND THE BARN’ ON SAT. DEC 14TH!

Bobbi Jean with her commendation from the L.A. County

Board of Supervisors

On Saturday, December 14th, I will be a guest of Nancy Pitchford-Zhe and Bobbi Jean Bell on their Saturday morning show on  KHTS AM 1220, ‘Around The Barn.’  Heard every Saturday from 9 to 10 a.m., they discuss western culture, music and lifestyle.  Nancy is the founder and director of Heads Up Therapy on Horseback, and Bobbi Jean is the lady behind the Outwest Western Boutique and Cultural Center in Santa Clarita:http://www.outwestmktg.com/ 

The topic for Saturday will be ‘It’s all about Gene Autry!’ and Karla Buhlman, President of Gene Autry Enterprises, and I, will be in-studio guests.  Karla is a very interesting woman (you can read my Round-up interview with her HERE  ) , and it’s perfect timing for me, as on Sunday in the Round-up, I’ll be reviewing the just-issued DVD set, THE COMPLETE GENE AUTRY TV SHOW.  

If you’re not in the immediate listening area for KHTS 1220 AM, you can hear the show on-line starting at 9:00 a.m. at www.hometownstation.com, and if you’d like to call-in with a question, you can do so at 661-298-5487.  And if you want to sleep late on Saturday, you can listen to the podcast later.  You’ll find all of the Around The Barn podcasts HERE http://hometownstation.com/podcasts/around-barn .

DON’T MISS ‘SHANE’ SATURDAY AT THE AUTRY

All year, folks attending the monthly ‘What Is A Western?’screenings at the Autry were asked to vote for their all-time favorite Western with the winner to be screened in December.  The big winner was SHANE (1953), the George Stevens-directed classic based on the novel by Jack Schaefer.  Starring Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin and Brandon De Wilde, it is one of the most wholly satisfying films in the genre.  Among other memorable performances are the evil Jack Palance, the conflicted Ben Johnson, and the heroic-as-only-a-doomed-little-guy-can-be Elisha Cook Jr.  If you haven’t seen this, in 35mm, on a big screen, you should.  It starts at 1:30 in the Wells Fargo Theatre.  

LOOKIN’ FOR HELP TO FILM ‘NIETZSCHE OUT WEST’!

I’ve had a couple of very interesting emails from a Swedish-born filmmaker named Sven Anders.  He attended the recent Almeria Western Film Festival, where he worked to promote some interest in a Western version of Nietzsche’s ZARATHUSTRA , “an attempt to put some new wine in old boots, if you like,” to be shot on the Western sets in Spain. 

He tells me he pitched the idea to two of the Festival’s guests, Spaghetti Western stars Robert Woods and Nicola Di Gioia, “an idea which went down well with these charming western icons.”  He started a group-funding campaign through Indigogo, but has had, frankly, not much of a response.  He asked me to share his proposal with the Round-up readers, and I am doing so.  See what you think:  http://indiegogo.com/projects/el-encendero

DON’T FORGET THE BEST WESTERN CALENDAR I’VE EVER SEEN!

Just a little reminder that if you’re Christmas-shopping for someone with a sagebrush-and-pulp frame of mind, you should check out the beautiful Vintage Westerns calendar from the folks at Asgard Press (if you missed my review, HERE is the link). And don’t forget the 10% discount on any calendar for Round-up readers.  Here’s the link:  http://www.asgardpress.com/?promocode=HWR13

And here’s the promo code: HWR13

TCM FANATIC - WESTERN NOW ONLINE!

And speaking of TCM (okay, nobody was), have I mentioned that the segment I was interviewed for is now viewable here?








THAT’S A WRAP!

Next Sunday I’ll have my review of the new COMPLETE GENE AUTRY SHOW DVD collection, and a book review or two, among other things.  Have a great week!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents Copyright December 2013 by Parke – All Rights Reserved

BEST OF THE WEST 1898-1938 FROM NAT. FILM PRES. FOUNDATION!

TREASURES 5 – THE WEST, 1898-1938 – Video Review

Cavalry & Indians at Little Big Horn

The wonderful, dedicated folks at the National Film Preservation Foundation, who brought you LOST & FOUND – AMERICAN TREASURES FROM THE NEW ZEALAND FILM ARCHIVES (if you missed my review, HERE is the link . ) have outdone themselves for Western fans, and just in time for Christmas. 

TREASURES 5 – THE WEST, a three disk set, plus a 110 page book, runs for more than ten hours, and contains forty films, from one-minute newsreel clips to several full-length features.  From slapstick to melodrama, from documentary to real drama, they offer a kaleidoscopic view of the American West from a vast range of perspectives.  Additionally, each film has an optional audio commentary, from experts in Western history, filmmaking, and film preservation.  It’s wonderfully entertaining, highly informative, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. 

Nearly every important film company of the era is represented – Biograph, Selig, Nestor, Kalem, Essanay, Vitagraph, Thomas Ince, Famous Players – Lasky (later Paramount).  The stars featured include Tom Mix, Clara Bow, Richard Dix, Bronco Billy Anderson and Mabel Normand.  The directors include D.W. Griffith, Victor Fleming, Gregory La Cava, Mack Sennett and W. S. Van Dyke.  The story sources include authors Bret Harte and Sinclair Lewis. 

Among the unexpected delights are every-day events filmmakers recorded nearly a century ago. HOW THE COWBOY MAKES HIS LARIAT (1917), though only three minutes, shows the entire process, starting with culling the hair from his horse’s tail; it’s probably the only in-depth recording of the all-but-lost process ever made.  LIFE ON THE CIRCLE RANCH (1912), presents typical daily ranch work convincingly.  But wait until you watch it again with the commentary, and realize how much of it was staged for the camera, and all of the rules of ranching that were broken in the process!

from OVER SILENT PATHS

On D. W. Griffith’s very first trip to make films out west, in 1910, he filmed OVER SILENT PATHS: A STORY OF THE AMERICAN DESERT.  Starring Marion Leonard and Dell Henderson, the barren desert also stars; it was an unusual film locale at such a time, when most Westerns were shot in and around lush East-coast forests.  Marion and her prospector father W. Chrystie Miller are a set to pack it in and go to civilization, when her father gets robbed and killed by unsuccessful prospector Henderson.  When she, desperate, meets up with Henderson, she has no idea he killed her father.  Can you see the romance coming?  Shot by the great Billy Bitzer, using the then-ruined and abandoned San Fernando Mission as a location, it’s as emotionally affecting as you expect with Griffith.  And fast?  It was shot in two days the first week in April, and released in May.  And the previous week he’d shot RAMONA, with Mary Pickford, at the ranch where Helen Hunt Jackson had set her story.

from THE TOURISTS

TOURISTS (1912) was also shot by the Biograph Company, by a small ‘B’ unit following the bigger Griffith unit.  Slight but fast and amusing, this one’s directed by Mack Sennett shortly before he left Biograph to start his Keystone company.  Shot entirely in the Santa Fe Train Station in Albuquerque, using the exteriors of Fred Harvey’s (as in THE HARVEY GIRL) Indian Building, and clearly improvised, it stars Mabel Normand as a tourist who gets in trouble with local Indians when she and her friends miss their train, and the chief takes a liking to Mabel.  And going against the not-yet-established Hollywood tradition, many Indians are played by Indians.  Speaking of Fred Harvey, also included is the 1926 film THE INDIAN DETOUR, a how-to film as well as a travelogue, featuring the wonders of ancient New Mexico as seen from modern Harvey trains and buses.  This film helped Harvey introduce and popularize the concept of cultural tourism.

Some sponsored films are more subtle than others.  SUNSHINE GATHERERS (1921), in often stunning color, shows and tells the story of Father Serra bringing Christianity to the beautiful new world of California.  Only gradually do we realize that the ultimate master plan is to make the riches of California available to the world through Del Monte canned fruit.  I felt positively noble eating my canned peaches while watching this with breakfast! 

Many of the fictional films make great use of their exotic locations.  A prime example is THE SERGEANT: TOLD IN THE YOSEMITE VALLEY (1910).  Part of the great treasure-trove of American films discovered in the New Zealand Film Archive, SERGEANT is a Selig-Polyscope film, starring one of the screen’s first great leading men Hobart Bosworth as the title character, trying to rescue his kidnapped  beloved.  Taking full advantage of Yosemite’s remarkable features, the film’s inter-titles both advance the story, and identify where each sequence is shot.  Similarly, SALOMY JANE, A STORY OF THE DAYS OF ’49, PRODUCED IN THE CALIFORNIA REDWOODS (1914), opens with the title gal emerging from a cut in a redwood.  Made by the once-thriving California Motion Picture Corporation of Northern California, it’s the only one of their films known to survive. 

Clara Bow

Among the more unexpected pleasures of this set are a pair of sophisticated comedy features with western settings, MANTRAP (1926), starring Clara Bow, directed by Victor Fleming and lensed by James Wong Howe; and WOMANHANDLED (1925), starring Richard Dix and Esther Ralston, and directed by Gregory La Cava.   When New Yorkers Dix and Ralston meet, she tells him she’s tired of prissy city-men – metrosexuals before the term was coined – and Dix sets out to become the westerner she wants.  Not only does he remodel himself to please her, finding the West she longs for to be gone, his does his best to recreate it.  In MANTRAP, big-city manicurist Clara Bow marries backwoodsman Ernest Torrence, but devoted as they are she soon becomes bored with his life, and falls for his unlikely friend, big-city divorce lawyer Percy Marmont.  It’s set in Canada, but shot around Lake Arrowhead.  And Clara Bow is an absolute delight, playing a woman so independent and naughty and lacking in guilt that she could only exist in Hollywood in the pre-Code days.

BRONCO BILLY AND THE SCHOOLMISTRESS

In fact, one notable feature of many of these westerns is that the women are so plucky and strong.  In BRONCO BILLY AND THE SCHOOLMISTRESS (1912), Billy’s romantic pursuit of the new teacher puts him at odds with every other man in town.  His judgment is so clouded that he nearly gets himself killed – and guess rescues the cowboy hero?  In the similar LEGAL ADVICE (1916), Tom Mix, who wrote, directed and starred in the film, tries to get himself into legal trouble in order to make time with the new lady lawyer!

THE BETTER MAN

Of course, it’s not all hijinks and hilarity.   In THE BETTER MAN (1912), a Vitagraph film shot in Santa Monica, the heroine and her sick child are alone as the worthless husband goes off to drink and gamble.  An Mexican outlaw with a price on his head comes to the house to get food, and is about to make his escape when the plight of the mother and child touches his heart, and he goes out seeking the doctor, not guessing that the erring husband is looking for the outlaw, and a quick reward.

LADY OF THE DUGOUT - Al & Frank Jennings 

question a lawman

Made six years later, the feature THE LADY OF THE DUGOUT (1918) has a similar plot to THE BETTER MAN, but with a remarkable twist: some of the actors are playing themselves!  Ten years earlier, former U.S. Marshal Bill Tilghman, whom, with fellow Marshals Chris Madsen and Heck Thomas rode for Judge Parker, and were known as The Three Guardsmen, decided to make a western movie.  Called THE BANK ROBBERY (not a part of this set), it starred himself, Heck Thomas, Quanah Parker, and bank and train robber Al Jennings.  Jennings found he loved the movie business, at least in part because he could rewrite his own history.  His film BEATING BACK (1904), which is considered lost, set the pattern for films about outlaw do-gooders. 

Al robs the bank

Produced and co-written by Jennings, and starring himself and his brother Frank, and Corinne Grant, LADY OF THE DUGOUT is directed by the great W.S. ‘One-take-Woody’ Van Dyke, and is one of the greatest treasures of this collection.  The plot is much like that of BETTER MAN; a pair of outlaws robs a bank, and when they run short of food, they come upon a woman living in a dugout house on the prairie, she and her child starving as they wait for worthless dad to come home with some food.  The outlaws are so moved that they get provisions and bring them back, endangering themselves.  Director Van Dyke, who would go on to direct TARZAN OF THE APES, the THIN MAN MOVIES, and so many more, is a wonderful visual storyteller, and his use of reflections and night-for-night photography is memorable.  But it’s his collaboration with Jennings that shows off the startling authenticity of the criminal behavior.  There’s a chilling naturalness to a gunman’s stance while shooting away; removing a bullet from a shoulder room is shown unflinchingly by the camera, born indifferently by the wounded man.  Incidentally, the little starving boy grew up to be Ben Alexander, Jack Webb’s first DRAGNET partner.

Lawman in the dust, Al & Frank

make their getaway

Of course, Jennings spins the story his own way.  The criminals are so noble, and the law so venal that when a train is reported robbed, it’s assumed that the sheriff is behind the crime.  Poor real lawman Bill Tilghman must have concluded that he’d created a monster, and he produced and starred in PASSING OF THE OKLAHOMA OUTLAW (1915) as a response to the glorification of the bad guy.  Though not complete, it’s a satisfying chunk of film detailing the apprehension of many of the Oklahoma Territory’s most infamous bandits, and the lawmen are in many cases played by the very men who did the deed: again Bill Tilghman and Heck Thomas, as well as Arkansas Tom Jones.

The travelogues are stunning, some going as far back as 1898, and featuring railroads, Yosemite, Yellowstone, and Hot Springs, Arizona.  Among the remarkable finds is an 8 minutes segment from the feature-length FROM THE GOLDEN WEST, an amateur film made by an unknown Easterner for club screenings.  It’s ‘L.A. as seen from a blimp’ footage is delightful.

Soundstages seen from a blimp in

THE GOLDEN WEST

Newsreel clips are included, some celebrating the American Indian, others patronizing him, and one sequence features 7^th Cavalrymen and Lakota and Cheyenne warriors ‘burying the hatchet’ at The Little Big Horn fifty years to the day after the event. 

In DESCHUTES DRIFTWOOD (1918) we get a travelogue of Oregon trains and waterways from the point-of-view of a hobo who’s been sprung from jail to do the honors.  Eighteen years later, in a Hearst newsreel, we see THE PROMISED LAND BARRED TO HOBOES (1936), showing roadblocks set up in California to keep the unemployed out.   

Made during the Mexican Revolution, MEXICAN FILIBUSTERS (1911) is a romantic tale about gun-smuggling.  AMMUNITION SMUGGLING ON THE MEXICAN BORDER (1914), is also about gun-smuggling, but stars a sheriff re-enacting his own kidnapping and his deputy’s murder, just weeks after it had actually happened. 

The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power produced ROMANCE OF WATER (1931), about getting water from the Owens Valley.  It’s followed by a Hearst newsreel clip, A NEW MIRACLE IN THE DESERT (1935), and no matter how loudly you turn up the sound on these two, you can still hear John Huston and Jack Nicholson talking in the back of your head.

I know that I’ve just brushed the surface of this terrific collection – I haven’t even mentioned a great Thomas H. Ince feature, THE LAST OF THE LINE, but hopefully I’ve given you a sense of the wonders to be found in this set.  And I should mention that each of the forty films has an original music score.  I heartily recommend it as a gift for anyone on your list with a love of Western movies or Western history, or American history in general.  At more than ten hours – twice that with the commentary – this is not a set to be consumed at a sitting, but to be savored over days or weeks or months.  Then again, if you’re a binge watcher, have at it!

Although it lists for $59, you can buy it from Amazon for $32 HERE. 

THAT’S A WRAP! 

I apologize again, for the Round-up being several days late again.  I’m still getting over this bug I’ve had for nearly two weeks.  I’m very touched by all the get-well wishes I’ve received.  I don’t want to give the impression that something serious is wrong – it’s just an upper respiratory infection; not even the real flu!

Anyway, I’d better get well soon, as I’ve got a bunch of book and movie reviews coming up, and some very cool giveaways just in time for Christmas! 

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents Copyright December 2013 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved