SERGEANT RUTLEDGE (1960)

Fascinating, if not entirely successful, this John Ford Western brings Civil Rights themes, an unsung sidebar issue in many of Ford’s post-war films, front and center. Woody Strode, more athlete than actor (but what an athlete!), works like a dog for Ford (whom he adored) as the Top Sgt. in the All-Black Ninth Calvary Regiment who’s being court-martialed on murder & rape charges (commanding officer & daughter) in the segregated army of the 1880s. (Shockingly, Army Desegregation was barely a decade old when this came out.) Dramatized as a trial with action flashbacks during testimony, Ford shoots and even lights much of this (Bert Glennon the imaginative cinematographer) in non-realistic stage play fashion, with hot spotlight fades & silhouettes that briskly cut in & out of the naturally shot action. Some on obvious studio sets and some in the Super-Realism of Monument Valley locations. (Glennon also makes striking, almost Gustave Manet-like use of leading lady Constance Towers’ fair complexion against the black soldiers.) More oddly, Ford also pushes the acting into stagy mannerism, and not only during comic relief. Note blustering Willis Bouchey in what would normally have been the Ward Bond role as a panel judge.* It has the (possibly inadvertent) effect of helping Strode, a magnificent physical presence, but an actor whose range went all the way from monumental to monumental, come off in a more naturalistic manner. In any event, the flaws matter less & less as the story picks up steam & interest. Too bad the big confession that clears everything up is puerile Perry Mason stuff, pulled out of the air thru the fierce purity of defense attorney Jeffrey Hunter’s blue, blue eyes. But the film earns serious points with a high comfort level on its many black characters (Juano Hernandez is particularly fine as an old army vet), and generally holds up better than other forward-thinking/racially sensitive ‘progressive’ films of the day. Less dated; less condescending.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Ward Bond, enjoying long delayed stardom on tv in WAGON MASTER (he’d even gotten Ford to direct one), was probably too busy for the role, dying (at only 57) a few months after RUTLEDGE came out.

DOUBLE-BILL: Strode is even better for Ford playing John Wayne’s ranch-hand/friend in THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE/’62 which also has a perfect example of Ford working in a bit of current Civil Rights commentary in a scene where Wayne insists Strode come into a ‘Whites Only’ bar with him. So off-hand as to be easily missed, but an unforgettable moment in its way. What co-star James Stewart would have called ‘a little piece of time.’