Konterbande

This western is one of the best of the late forties, and I would say the forties, even without Randolph Scott as the lead. And once more in Ray Enright's westerns, it evokes the Civil War and once more for this decade, Victor Jory is the villain of the story. It is splendid though predictable, without real surprise. But the best elements are elsewhere, in the music, atmosphere, fast pace and above all characters symphony. But, after all, yes, you have a surprise. Zachary Scott is not a villain, the bad guy, but the hero's friend. Joel McCrea is terrific here. I think it was an iconic western in the past, for moviegoers, but unfortunately thos late forties period is not the best known. It's such a shame. This western should be more released, for young audiences.

Joel McCrea, Zachary Scott, and Douglas Kennedy were three friends who tried to ranch together, and dorothy Malone was the good girl they all loved. Then came the Civil War, and now in its closing days, their ranch is destroyed, so they turn to arms smuggling. But cracks show in their friendship, and when the War ends, will it mean the start of their battle?

Warner Brothers had been putting Erroll Flynn in handsome westerns for some time, and this looks like it was intended as another. It's handsome, engaging, has a fine cast, including Alan Hale as a politician, Alexis Smith as the bad girl with a heart of gold, and Bob Steele as the mean henchman. But despite Karl Freund's typically fine camerawork, it all seems like a b western writ large. Perhaps it's because the villain of the piece is Victor Jory as Quantrell, but they were afraid of a lawsuit, so they called his 'Cotrell'. There are no obvious errors, just a feeling it has too many moving parts that never quite mesh.

Good old fashioned Western, the plot however is very similar to the Jimmy Cagney classic "The Roaring 20's" re-fashioned to a Western setting and with a sanitised ending, McCrea as the Cagney character survives and Scott as the Bogart character is killed after changing sides back to the law and Order camp. Worth watching as a good example of Hollywood in its pre message era when a Western was for entertainment. The production values were good with great Technicolour and a strong cast. McCrea was always good in his Westerns having played both comedy and drama in his earlier years and Zachary Scott was a very under-rated actor, good in any movie he was in.

Lot of different things going on in this enjoyable civil war type western. The plot is set in motion in the opening frames when a ruthless raider named Luke Contrell (I guess he's the union version of William Quantrill) burns out the Three Bells ranch in Texas. The Three Bells is run by 3 friends, Joel McCrea, Zachary Scott and Douglas Kennedy (I hope you don't mind my convention of referring to the characters by the actor's names, it's just easier and apart from Contrell, the names don't mean much) who set of for Brownsville to get even. Contrell carries out his raiding under the protection of the union army, which prevents our hero, Joel McCrea, from doing much more than beating him up and telling him to leave town.

Our three heros -- it's weird seeing Zachary Scott as a hero -- are now kind of shiftless and looking for what to do next. Kennedy decides to join the Confederation and fight in the open. This is kind of different, the movie is set during the Civil War and one of the hero's decides to join the confederation and doesn't feel the need to talk about protecting his way of life. The union army might protect Contrell, but they don't like him much, and the commander offers to buy McCrea a drink after he beats up Contrell -- but McCrea don't drink with Yankees. McCrea and Scott get mixed up in gun running and take to the trade, blockade running guns from Mexico to the confederates.

The romantic sub-plot is that a saloon singer played by Alexis Smith has set her cap for McCrea and McCrea's gal, Dorothy Malone, has followed Kennedy into fighting the good fight as a nurse (the film just never really gets into the nitty gritty of the politics of the civil war). I found the romantic business, usually something of a drag in the avg McCrea feature, to be pretty interesting and not quite so ham handed as is often done.

The production values are not bad, the acting is pretty good, the story interesting and a little different. If you love westerns, and I presume you do if you've read this far, you could do a lot worse that this movie. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Joel McCrea, Douglas Kennedy, and Zachary Scott are partners in the Three Bell Ranch in Texas as the Civil War starts. When war does come it splits the partners up. The ranch is raided by Victor Jory and his cutthroats and the partners are wiped out. Kennedy opts for enlisting in the Confederate Army. McCrea and Scott decide to go into gunrunning to make enough money to re-stock the ranch. McCrea makes enough, but Scott likes the profits and he wants to keep on gunrunning.

As you can see the three partners all have different agendas. In fact everyone in this movie is working on his own agenda. The female leads Alexis Smith and Dorothy Malone have a hankering for McCrea. Victor Jory rides for the Union the Confederates and for himself. Bob Steele who's a slimy sort that Scott recruits in the gunrunning business has his own plans.

Believe it or not it all jells into a very nice plot and is good entertainment. Joel McCrea was his usual stalwart hero as was Douglas Kennedy. Zachary Scott was no better than he had to be on any occasion.

It's a good western and I wish it was shown more often.