It's an engaging Western. Henry Fonda is Frank James in post-civil war Missouri. His brother Jesse is dead, killed by the Ford brothers and engineered by the railroad. Many of the characters are carried over from "Jesse James," a year or two earlier.
Poor Fritz Lang. From the monumental "Metropolis" to Jesse James' less colorful older brother. Such was the fate of many who were escaping the Nazis. Lang's wife was Jewish but he was thought so highly of that he was asked by Goebbels to head the propaganda division of the Third Reich. According to Lang, his reply to Goebbels was, "I'm tickled pink," and then he was on the fastest airplane out of Germany. He went on to film some very effective noirs in the 50s, including "The Woman in the Window" and "Scarlet Street." However, here he is, behind the camera on a sequel. And it's not bad. The script is proficient, though without the exciting action scenes of the forebear, but shot in the magnificent color that was characteristic of 20th-Century Fox Studios at the time. This movie is suitably dark but some of the studio's musicals were in such loud colors that they resembled animated cartoons.
Anyway, Jesse James was shot in the back by the Bob Ford and his brother. Frank quickly dispatches the other ford but Bob remains an elusive target. In the course of his pursuit, Frank James stages his own death and assumes a different identity. In this peaceful guise, he runs into Gene Tierney, a woman of sass and principle, for whom saving a life is better than causing a death.
It gets complicated but winds up a courtroom drama in which the plain-spoken Frank is being tried for murder. He's defended by the choleric Henry Hull, newspaper editor and lawyer. Hull shouts his lines, including a paraphrase of Shakespeare from Henry VI, Part 2, in which a revolutionary cries: "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Frank James is found guilty and is drawn and quartered, his intestines spilling out, the giddy spectators splattered with blood. Just kidding. He gets off.
It's WHY he gets off that's a little disturbing. The narrative is involving, but its values are those of "Gone With the Wind" and "Birth of a Nation." The Confederaly was "good" and the Yankees were "bad," and that's all there is to it. All the heavies are cowards. And they're the cause of all dysfunction. The prosecutor in the case, for instance, is a man who is being paid by the Yankee railroad. He's made ridiculous. The judge is biased, the jury is biased, the defense is biased, the audience is biased, and the viewers -- willy nilly -- endorse the notion that the Confederacy was good, partly because a man settled his own affairs, like shooting his enemies in the front instead of the back.
Disregarding that, Henry Fonda does a nice job as a subdued ex bandit driven by family honor. Henry Hull's character has only one dimension but it's an amusing one. Gene Tierney is exquisite but has a voice that -- if a mouse could speak -- would sound like a mouse's.
Treat it as fiction and enjoy it.
Poor Fritz Lang. From the monumental "Metropolis" to Jesse James' less colorful older brother. Such was the fate of many who were escaping the Nazis. Lang's wife was Jewish but he was thought so highly of that he was asked by Goebbels to head the propaganda division of the Third Reich. According to Lang, his reply to Goebbels was, "I'm tickled pink," and then he was on the fastest airplane out of Germany. He went on to film some very effective noirs in the 50s, including "The Woman in the Window" and "Scarlet Street." However, here he is, behind the camera on a sequel. And it's not bad. The script is proficient, though without the exciting action scenes of the forebear, but shot in the magnificent color that was characteristic of 20th-Century Fox Studios at the time. This movie is suitably dark but some of the studio's musicals were in such loud colors that they resembled animated cartoons.
Anyway, Jesse James was shot in the back by the Bob Ford and his brother. Frank quickly dispatches the other ford but Bob remains an elusive target. In the course of his pursuit, Frank James stages his own death and assumes a different identity. In this peaceful guise, he runs into Gene Tierney, a woman of sass and principle, for whom saving a life is better than causing a death.
It gets complicated but winds up a courtroom drama in which the plain-spoken Frank is being tried for murder. He's defended by the choleric Henry Hull, newspaper editor and lawyer. Hull shouts his lines, including a paraphrase of Shakespeare from Henry VI, Part 2, in which a revolutionary cries: "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Frank James is found guilty and is drawn and quartered, his intestines spilling out, the giddy spectators splattered with blood. Just kidding. He gets off.
It's WHY he gets off that's a little disturbing. The narrative is involving, but its values are those of "Gone With the Wind" and "Birth of a Nation." The Confederaly was "good" and the Yankees were "bad," and that's all there is to it. All the heavies are cowards. And they're the cause of all dysfunction. The prosecutor in the case, for instance, is a man who is being paid by the Yankee railroad. He's made ridiculous. The judge is biased, the jury is biased, the defense is biased, the audience is biased, and the viewers -- willy nilly -- endorse the notion that the Confederacy was good, partly because a man settled his own affairs, like shooting his enemies in the front instead of the back.
Disregarding that, Henry Fonda does a nice job as a subdued ex bandit driven by family honor. Henry Hull's character has only one dimension but it's an amusing one. Gene Tierney is exquisite but has a voice that -- if a mouse could speak -- would sound like a mouse's.
Treat it as fiction and enjoy it.