El valle de los gigantes

This colorful western is a terrific tribute to the California forests, as also was, but at a lesser scale, Jospeh Kane's TIMBERJACK, starring Sterling Hayden. But this Warner Bros picture is of course, I repeat, far far better. We can appreciate here the quality, the trademark of Warner studios, despite the absence of the likes of Errol Flynn or Ann Sheridan. But the settings, scenery, and the overall atmospere compensate totally the lesser cast. And the action scenes are overwhelming, jaw dropping, even for today's audiences. Don't forget it was made in the late thirties. If you crave to those magical sequioas in Redwoods National park, don't miss this movie.

The plot is interesting, the actors are sympathetic and they look good on the screen. There are fights, shootings, shots of beautiful nature. I think this movie is worth reaching for. Best Western of 1938 together with "Gold is where you find it" , ,,Of Human Hearts" and "The Texans". The film was made in Technicolor and visually looks very nice for the year of production. I think that should have higher average.

While an undistinguished piece of filmmaking, "Valley of the Giants" dovetails nicely with Warner Bros.' often cited theme of Resistance to Tyranny and Struggle for Justice, so often seen in films as diverse as "I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang," "The Adventures of Robin Hood," "The Life of Emile Zola" and "Confessions of a Nazi Spy," the unusual subject here being ecological devastation (also visited the year before in Warners' first all-three-strip Technicolor feature, "Gold is Where You Find It.").

Interestingly, fourteen years later, when the studio remade the story as "The Big Trees," the original film's villain, Fallon ("Steve Fallon" in "Valley of the Giants." "Jim Fallon" in "The Big Trees") became the protagonist, tailored for the talents of Kirk Douglas, whose peerless aptitude for essaying misguided heels was already well established by the early 1950's.

It should also be noted that character actor Harry Cording, a mainstay at Warner Bros. in the 1930's and '40's, appears in both versions. The Hale family are also represented in both films: Warners contact player Alan Hale ("Ox Smith") appears in "Valley of the Giants," while his son, Alan, jr plays "Tiny" in "The Big Trees."

This overproduced Big Trees Epic from Warners in 1938 is given the full production treatment: Technicolor, script by Seton Miller and a cast so immense that Charles Bickford is placed near the bottom of the on-screen cast list. But the actor at the center of this epic is Wayne Morris, who was a reasonably capable actor whose specialty was the Naive Young Stiff.... and a role like this calls for a sense of power and confidence that he does not not show in this role.

As for the other actors, the pleasures of watching them is muted. Charles Bickford is given a limited range of emotion: he runs the gamut from greedy to mean and back again. Claire Trevor plays her usual hooker with a heart of gold, and the other actors, given their fourteen seconds of screen time each, cannot do much. Given my general level of irritation even the Technicolor winds up annoying me: the working loggers always seem to be wearing fresh-laundered, crisply maintained clothes.

Director William Keighley was an effective director for the fast-moving Warner Bs, but he always seemed out of depth in these super-production. Look at stuff like BULLETS OR BALLOTS or the crisply turned farce of BROTHER RAT, not this.

Out of the two dozen films I watched this past weekend, this was the one I enjoyed the most. It is early technicolor and seeing the magnificent redwood trees was great. Wayne Morris delivers in the role of the timberman who has 21st century conservation values of not cutting too much and reforestation. Bickford is okay as the greedy villain. Claire Trevor is in cohoots with Bickford at the beginning but switches sides near the end. Alan Hale is a joy in his role as Ox and a real scene stealer. I believe I caught my favorite - Clem Bevans - in just a few seconds of screen time and Jerry Colona was a saloon singer extraordinaire. Other familiar character actors included Russell Simpson, Frank McHugh, Donald Crisp, and John Litel. This film is a treasure trove of character actors.