It took 75 years, but thanks to a Quentin Tarantino sidebar event at this year’s Cannes Film Fest, two B+ Westerns from stalwart director George Sherman (1908 - 1991/129 credits) will serve as his Cannes debut. Sherman didn’t only make Oaters, but from serials to programmers/B-pics to a late-career ‘A,’ Westerns are what he was known for. So, worth the attention? Well, yes & no. Here, CANYON the better executed (and with an unusually strong supporting cast for Universal); COMANCHE of more interest. In CANYON, brittle Ann Blyth, tomboy daughter of ranch owner George Brent, wants to show Dad she’s as good as any man when it comes to cutting wild prairie horses out of the herd, specifically Black Velvet (played by the magnificent ‘Diamond’). Only problem, horse trainer Howard Duff is planning to catch & train the same wild beast to run in Brent’s race. What makes the film something to see, and likely attracted Tarantino, is the fine location shooting (not a process shot in the film) and the way Sherman turns the riderless horse on the run into a real presence, a real actor. But you could count the story beats backwards in your sleep.
COMANCHE completely different, opening with savage In’juns using Macdonald Carey’s Jim Bowie and Will Geer’s ex-congressman for target practice before Chief Quisima (Pedro de Cordoba) stops them to complain about the latest broken peace treaty covering valuable silver mining rights on the reservation. Seems in spite of first impressions, Indians are the Good Guys by the end. (The norm in ‘50s westerns.) Turns out, the town’s controlling siblings, Maureen O’Hara and Charles Drake, have literally pocketed the treaty for their own gain and Carey will have to change her mind or lose the peace. All handled with an attempt at an underlying comic tone only Geer is able to pull off. O’Hara pushing too hard; Macdonald hardly light on his feet. Again, barely a process shot in sight, but putting up a more blatant color palette from D.P. Maury Gertsman than seen under Irving Glassberg on CANYON. (Glassberg shortly going on to shoot masterpieces for Anthony Mann and Douglas Sirk.) Both worth a look, probably catching Tarantino’s attention thru Sherman’s work with horses, land, and the big donnybrook of a bar fight in COMANCHE. Why not catch a flight to Cannes and find out why he choose these two for yourself.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: *Better than either of these, another director who churned out Tarantino-approved Western programmers was William Witney. One of his best happens to be with COMANCHE’s Macdonald Carey as a trusting preacher in the fine, largely overlooked character piece, STRANGER AT MY DOOR/’56. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2021/10/stranger-at-my-door-1956.html
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