The Hawk

We all start somewhere and in this case director Edward Dmytryk who did such classics as The Young Lions, Crossfire, Raintree County and so many films that I really like cut his directing teeth on this poverty row western from an outfit called Affiliated Pictures entitled The Hawk. The only thing that distinguishes this film particularly is that the villain is the title role.

Other than Dick Jones who had a substantial career on the big and small screen unless you are devotee of B westerns you will not know any of the other cast members. Jones is only 8 years old here playing a stepson to rancher Lafe McKee whose herd and others is being systematically robbed by a mysterious outlaw known as The Hawk.

The second part of this story concerns young cowboy Bruce Lane who is told that he's McKee's son by his dying mother and to go back and claim his inheritance. Why they split we're not told, but McKee can't prove anything to the sheriff so he robs the post office of one of a series of registered letters been sent to all the nearby towns.

And the sheriff actually gives chase. They must have a truly crime free town unparalleled in the real west or the Hollywood west for that to happen.

At this point Lane gets to McKee's ranch and says nothing at first for a number of reasons. McKee is all involved in trying to catch The Hawk and they have to form a vigilante committee because law and order ain't as good as it is where Lane came from. There's no way any viewer won't figure out who The Hawk is.

This is about as cheap a western from the Gower Gulch poverty row studios as they come.

It's another of the innumerable B westerns shot on a five-day schedule for states right release. Its big star is child actor Dickie Jones, who gets a lot of screen time, and yes, he is very cute, arguing with leading man Bruce Lane and dancing to "Turkey In The Straw." The story.... well, I'm sure it made a lot more sense on the page as written by James Oliver Curwood, but by the time it made it to a theater screen, it was as full of holes as a machine-gunned Swiss Cheese. It's a B western. The story doesn't matter.

So why bother? Well, it's the first movie directed by Edward Dmytryk; he was on the editing staff at Paramount when some guy from Poverty Row made him the offer. Dmytryk also edited under a pseudonym. The result isn't a movie that makes sense -- the script prevents that. What it does is move along.

Understand that in 1935, a B western was sluggish. If they wanted to show a man walking into a house, they started at the gate, with the camera watching as he walked through the yard, opened the door, and disappeared within. Dmytryk doesn't do that. His average shot lasts less than 10 seconds, and during the chase and shootout that invariably climaxed B westerns, a similar editing pace applies. You don't have to watch for thirty seconds as the hero rides his horse across the screen in medium long shot. You don't have to sit while two people hold a conversation by saying things slowly, and then t'other thinks a while before making a trite reply. People get on with things, and this motion picture moves. Which is the first and most important thing about a movie.

Dmytryk went back to editing and didn't sit in the director's chair again for four years, but he shows what he can do with a typically shoddy B western with no time, no budget, and cast whose only other performer I recognize in Lafe McKee.

I can't recommend this movie on its absolute merits. The story as it appears is a stinker, and that sinks the entire thing. But as a historical document of the rise of a considerable talent, and how a decent editing pace can make something watchable, well, this is a good example of that.

Implausability after implausibility mars this ridiculous film here. Essentially this tale is about a man who seeks out his Father after his mother passes away. After arriving at the ranch where his Father works, which of course, he doesn't tell anyone that he's kin, he learns of a cowhand's plan to sabotage his father's cattle drive. OK, I'll get this right out in the open. Why on earth would the son keep a secret like that from his father when he could've revealed it? The "proof", a locket, disappears, but my gosh, wouldn't he believe him if they just sat down and talked? Very bizarre. Of course, that's not the only thing, we have the annoying kid cowboy, the over-stereotypical cook, (this time he's Italian) and of course the way-too-smart dog companion. Finally, I wonder if audiences in the thirties were smart to realize that the love interest in the film, though he didn't realize it at the time, would technically be the hero's own sister.