La valle degli uomini rossi

Valley Of The Sun is an offbeat comic western that stars Lucille Ball in a role you would normally see Dale Evans do over at Republic with Roy Rogers. But Lucy and the rest of the cast acquit themselves well under the handling of director George Marshall.

Lucy runs the Busy Bee Cafe in Yuma where she's all set to marry Indian agent Dean Jagger who makes a nice living cheating the Indians. That was a great racket in the old west and who's to complain as they don't have the right to vote as yet. Army scout James Craig cares however, but he's had to bust jail after helping a couple of falsely accused Apaches escape.

In making his escape Craig runs into both Lucy and Jagger and then has a dual mission to stop that wedding and get some justice for the Indians. Do you doubt he will succeed?

This western moves at a really nice clip with the comedy some of the rough house kind like Jagger having a stagecoach run over some cactus to dislodge Craig who is riding by hanging on to the boot. Nevermind though Craig pays him back good in stopping that wedding and I won't reveal how.

George Marshall was one of the great comic directors from the last century and never gets the due that he should. This minor picture for RKO shows him at his best.

I remember back in the day in New York City when I was a kid, Valley Of The Sun was run frequently on WOR TV as they owned the entire RKO Library. It seems to have fallen out of favor in the past several years though for reasons I can't explain. This is a really fine film.

Once again George Marshall, who directed DESTRY RIDES AGAIN, brings wit and sass to the old west. James Craig, who was a hit in the previous year's ALL THAT MONEY CAN BUY for RKO, does a fine job as the amiable hero. Lucille Ball displays a large amount of her comic abilities, both physical and character with some wonderful double takes. Even Dean Jagger, usually a very dour character indeed, has fun in VALLEY OF THE SUN. The story is slight, friend of the Indians tries to prevent the wedding of a girl he's met with the man who turns out to be the crooked Indian agent. More important than the actual plot are the progressive set pieces that evoke laughs and thrills. Billy Gilbert is a riot as the stuttering, sneezing (only one) judge; Cedric Hardwicke is an enigmatic immigrant; Antonio Moreno wears a false beak as the Indian chief; and western star Tom Tyler appears as Geronimo in a terrific scene where he challenges Craig. Seeing this movie puts the lie to all that hogwash that's been printed about Tyler having to play crippled Kharis in THE MUMMY'S HAND two years earlier because he himself was crippled with arthritis. Excellent musical score by Paul Sawtell is the icing on the cake.

I highly recommend this spirited horse opera.

This entertaining western is an interesting mix of comedy and adventure, complete with cowboys, indians and couple of black hats. Be sure and watch for the very funny wedding scene involving a bunch of ants. Starring Lucy in her only western movie role, and co-starring John Craig, Cedric Hardwicke and Dean Jagger.

Worth a peek

Curious head-scratcher of a western directed by George Marshall features James Craig as a drifter in 1868 Tucson who disrupts the wedding of feisty barmaid Lucille Ball, later stopping a war between the white man and an Apache Indian tribe! Lucy-completists will want to take a look, but this may be one example of why her movie-career never caught fire. The picture is just a second-string quickie, despite writers Clarence Budington Kelland and Horace McCoy tossing in some comedic overtones (which help). Unfortunately, it just doesn't add up to much. I'd trade all those tumbleweeds for a cameo by William Frawley. ** from ****

Not being a particular fan of westerns, I watched this primarily because I wanted to see Lucille Ball in something other than an "I Love Lucy" or "Lucy Show" type of role. Here she plays Christine Larson, owner of a saloon in the Arizona Territory in 1868 who's about to be married to the unscrupulous local Indian agent (Dean Jagger.) Ball's performance was OK - nothing really more than that; she didn't blow me away. It succeeded for me in that the role was very different from what I'm accustomed to seeing her in - there was very little of the outrageous physical comedy she later became famous for, although the movie tried to maintain a gently amusing feel throughout. (A typical funny line - "there's two ways to deal with women - and no one knows either one of them!") I didn't find the story all that compelling, although I appreciated that the Indians were shown as the victims of the Indian agent. There's typical shootout action and a lot of horses - your typical western in other words. As to Christine - we pretty much can guess from the beginning how her planned marriage is going to end up; it's just a question of how she's going to get there. If you like westerns, this would be a pretty typical one with a bit of humour thrown in. If you're not big on the genre, this will be lacking. I'm not big on the genre. 3/10