Trooper Hook

As settlers moved west in the United States in the 1800s, there were just some things that a husband/grandfather/brother would not allow happen to a woman traveling with the group. At the top of that list? Don't allow a woman to become a captive of any number of Indian tribes. These were were abused, tortured and beaten down if they were even allowed to live. Obviously a darker topic, westerns nonetheless explored the unpleasant topic, most notably The Searchers, but with other movies as well, like 1957's Trooper Hook.

Having led a successful attack on a warring Apache village, Sgt. Clovis Hook (Joel McCrea) is left in an interesting predicament. Among the prisoners is the leader of the rampaging Apaches, a chief called Nanchez (Rodolfo Acosta). That's just one problem though because a white woman, Cora Sutliff (Barbara Stanwyck), is among the prisoners, and she has a son with her. The father? Nanchez himself. Cora has been a prisoner of the Apaches for nine-plus years and has long since been feared dead. What can she do now? She can't return to the Apaches, but the white people in the fort and the surrounding towns are less than welcoming, questioning how a white woman could become an Apache warrior's squaw. Hook steps in, taking orders to take Cora to her husband, but nothing will come easy on this trip for either of them. 

From director Charles Marquis Warren, 'Hook' is a no-frills, low-budget western from the 1950s. It was filmed on a small scale -- with ample use of poorly built "outdoor" sets standing in for nature's majesty -- and it shows. But because of its dark, adult subject matter, it rises above its smaller, modest background. Besides McCrea's Sgt. Hook, basically everyone forms an opinion (and quickly) about Stanwyck's Cora. They look at her with disdain, like she's less of a human because she tried to survive rather than kill herself and take the easy way out. This is a story about the people though, not interested in any bigger picture of how the west was conquered and the Indians were defeated.

An actor who made a career out of playing staunch, resolute heroes in B-movies and westerns, McCrea never rose to the heights of a John Wayne or even a Randolph Scott. He was excellent at playing a niche, a part in his comfort zone, and this movie is right in his wheelhouse. His Sgt. Hook (not Trooper as the title suggests) is a veteran horse soldier, experienced and trustworthy in every way, brutally effective in his soldiering. As for Stanwyck, she wasn't the in-demand starlet anymore, but she still delivers the movie's best performance. She doesn't say a word for some 30 minutes, but when she does speak (with a swinging shovel as accompaniment), you'd better watch out! The relationship that develops between Hook and Cora ends up being the key and the most important thing going for the movie. In his only career performance, Terry Lawrence plays Quito, Cora's half-breed six-year old son. 

In a movie that's more interested in the people than the action, violence or gunplay, a handful of other supporting parts are worth mentioning. The best one going is Earl Holliman as Jeff Bennett, a down-on-his-luck cowboy who ends up traveling with Hook, Cora and the boy. A little inexperienced in the ways of the world, Holliman's Bennett is one of those archetypal western characters, a scene-stealing part for sure. John Dehner similarly has an interesting part not because it's a likable character but because of a question hanging over his head. He plays Cora's husband, a man who thought his wife was long since dead and now has to decide if he wants to care for someone else's son, much less an Apache chief's son. Edward Andrews, Celia Lovsky and Susan Kohner play other  people the group meets on the stagecoach; Kohner a possible love interest for Holliman's Bennett. Royal Dano also has some fun as Mr. Trude, the fast-talking ex-Confederate soldier and current stagecoach driver. 

While the story is anything but light and fluffy, I liked the low-key nature of 'Hook.' The action is kept to a minimum for the most part, and even when there is some gunfights, they're over almost as quick as they start. This is more a story about the people and how they choose to deal with a not so easy topic. How does a woman reintroduce herself to a life she knew so many years earlier? Will that life and society let her back? The story does a good job showing all the different possible answers here. That said, the ending loses some momentum once Dehner shows up. It's never in doubt where the story's going, but it takes awhile to get there. Still a worthwhile western, especially for parts from McCrea, Stanwyck and Holliman.

Trooper Hook <---fan-made video (1957): ** 1/2 /****

The First Texan

From the time I watched Fess Parker as Davy Crockett in the Disneyland episodes and John Wayne's The Alamo, I was hooked on the story of the famous 13-day siege in 1836 that ended with the massacre of the whole garrison on March 6.  It was a natural jumping off point to the whole Texas War of Independence which took place between late 1836 and spring 1836 as Texas fought for its freedom from Mexico. It's a little stretch of history that often gets overlooked in the shadow of the Alamo massacre, but one of our country's most unsung heroes, Sam Houston, played a major role in the war and the formation of Texas into one of the United States.

Now before I write this, yes, I realize Houston has a city named after him, but his name isn't always synonymous with the other heroes of the war for independence, Crockett, Bowie, Travis, Seguin, Stephen Austin.  He was a larger than life individual who hasn't always gotten his due through history.  In 2004's The Alamo played by Dennis Quaid, Houston's part was severely cut.  A 1980s TV movie Gone for Texas is a mediocre effort at telling his story even with a solid lead performance from Sam Elliott.  Add 1956's The First Texan to the list of bland attempts at telling Houston's involvement in Texas' fight for freedom in 1836.

In 1832, former Tennessee governor Sam Houston (Joel McCrea) rides into the Mexican province of Texas looking to start fresh with his life after a personal scandal back home helped ruin his reputation. Rumors abound about a coming fight with Mexico for Texas independence with infamous knife fighter and land owner Jim Bowie (Jeff Morrow) among the leaders who approach Houston to join the cause. Smitten by a young woman, Katherine Delaney (Felicia Farr), he meets in San Antonio, Sam just wants to move on with his life and build up his law practice. A natural leader like he is though, it's only a matter of time before he gets pulled into the conflict, especially when tensions escalate between the Texans and the Mexican government, prompting General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna (David Silva) to lead his army into Texas.

For starters, McCrea is a solid choice to play Sam Houston beginning with his physical resemblance.  Houston was a big man in real life, standing over 6' feet tall.  In one of his later roles, McCrea's presence lends itself well to this larger than life character.  Through most of his westerns, he typically played roles like this anyways, stout, resolute, heroic men who stood by their word and their gun as needed.  Making the jump then to play Houston (who by all accounts was a man like that) isn't a huge stretch then for McCrea.  He can be a little stiff at times, and his forced relationship with Farr's Catherine is unnecessary, but it's a solid leading performance.  Too bad the rest of the cast (mostly B-movie actors and TV guest stars) isn't quite up to the standard.

Biographies of a historical figure are always a tough project to tackle, especially in B-westerns like this that clock in at a slim 82 minutes.  Four years are glossed over in Houston's life in less than 90 minutes.  The scope and perspective are limited from the start with a smallish budget.  Worse though is that nothing is really done to try and disguise this.  The first 70 minutes are so ridiculously dialogue heavy that the whole pace of the movie gets thrown off.  The massacre at the Alamo is talked about but not shown (I'm assuming because of budget constraints), and then the next 20 minutes shows the Runaway Scrape. Watching men retreat across Texas and then bitching about it at night doesn't make for the most exciting visual experience either.  By the time the battle of San Jacinto arrives, it is just too late to save the movie.

For an Alamo and history buff, I look for certain things in movies like this that just have to work, have to click if the movie's going to be successful.  All the big names are here, starting with Morrow's Bowie and continuing on to Davy Crockett (James Griffith), William Travis (William Hopper), Stephen Austin (Dayton Lummis), scout Deaf Smith (Chubby Johnson), Mexican colonel Cos (Rodolfo Hoyos Jr), among several other recognizable names.  Unfortunately, the script basically pushes these guys aside for fictional characters who do the same things but with different names. There are so many characters they all become lost in the shuffle, hard to distinguish them all from each other.  One bright spot is McCrea's son, Jody McCrea as Lt. Baker, one of Houston's aides.

Trying to avoid sounding like that pretentious 'I know everything about history' guy, I'll keep this brief.  For the few topics I actually know something about, I hate seeing those things mangled in movie form.  'Texan' certainly plays free and easy with historical accuracy.  Sure, some of the mistakes can be chalked up to budget and time limitations, but The First Texan does a poor job overall, just randomly making things up and tweaking other things for the sake of doing it.  This isn't a good or bad movie. It's just boring, and is an inoffensive enough way to kill 82 minutes. I just wish it could have been better.

The First Texan (1956): **/****

Dead End

I knew them only by name for years, seeing them pop up in the TCM schedule occasionally on Saturday mornings.  I had little interest in seeing any of the movies mostly because they sounded pretty awful, but also because movies from the 1930s are so hit or miss.  It's that in between stage where feature films too often felt like larger scale plays as studios dealt with how to make silent movies into sound pictures.  Dubbed the Dead End Kids, this "tough" group of child/teenage actors became huge stars under a couple different names, but if 1937's Dead End is any indication of their stardom, I'm going to continue to steer clear of them.

This is a movie based on a successful stage-based play that has the potential to make the jump from stage to film, but it was a painful movie for me to get through.  There are three different storylines all working against one another -- including the most painful, the Dead End kids -- and never really giving any reason for any one of them to be interesting.  It's a story that follows the goings and happenings on a warm summer day in New York City, a street at a junction where the rich live on one side in their posh, high-rise apartments and the poor in their ratty, decrepit apartments. Oh, the rich and the poor, prepare yourself for a pretentious message on the classes! Eh, maybe not. I don't think this movie could have managed a message if it wanted.

It's a humid, nasty NYC summer day when a man returns to the street he grew up on. He's gone on to other things, earning the nickname Baby Face Martin (Humphrey Bogart). As a gangster/killer out west, Martin's supposedly killed eight people, but he's back now and he wants to see his mother (Marjorie Main) and his old girlfriend, Francie (Claire Trevor). An out of work architect, Dave (Joel McCrea), grew up with Martin and recognizes him, encouraging him to move along before any trouble arises. Then down at the end of the street near the river, a gang of kids and teenagers, the Dead End Kids, harass a doorman to a posh apartment and generally cause mayhem whenever they can because...well, they're idiots.

Let's get the positive (yes, singular) out of the way first because it won't take long.  This is Humphrey Bogart before he was a big star, before he was a household name. In the 1930s, he often played tough guy supporting roles, similar to the ones he would play later but from a leading role.  His talent though is obvious whether it be in a starring role or from a supporting part. It's too bad his part is smaller here, not requiring much of him other than wearing a suit, smoking an occasional cigarette and generally looking tough.  He goes 3-for-3 in that department by the way.  Unfortunately, much of the focus is on the other two plots that do end up crossing paths with Bogie's, but not enough.

Instead, we get lots of interaction with the Dead End Kids, a "tough" street gang of kids/teenagers who like to cause havoc wherever they go. I'm not going to break each character down one by one because they're all interchangeable.  They've got tough street names like Tommy, Spit, T.B. (because he's got tuberculosis...haha that's hilarious), and Milty. A typical conversation goes something like this. "Oh, yeah?!?"...."Yeah!"....."Yeah?!?"...."Well say that again!"...."Oh yeah," and then they push and shove for awhile before running away from a doorman or a cop or an adult.  Listening to these teen actors attempt their awful New York accents is like nails on a chalkboard. Any time they come on screen is nauseating and quickly had me reaching for the fast forward. Awful, awful stuff. How this act appealed to audiences I'll never know.

So on to our intrepid hero, Joel McCrea playing Dave, an out of work architect who now takes odd jobs around town for some cash.  As we meet him, he's painting a sign for a faux-Italian restaurant, and getting a good chuckle out of it at that.  He's currently going out with rich babe, Kay (Wendy Barrie), but also knows that regular girl, Drina (Sylvia Sidney), has a crush on him. Oh, also, Drina's little brother is one of the Dead End Kids....oh no! More drama!  Basically, Dave has nothing going for him, and he has this pretentious air about him that makes him the guardian of this street.  He's the most milquetoast main character/hero I can think of, and because of that, I ended up liking Bogie's killer more than McCrea.  None of this is a criticism of McCrea who I think is a fine actor, but this is not his best part.

Okay, there were a couple more positives to take away, however small they may have been.  Playing the doorman to the swanky rich person apartment is Ward Bond, future member of the John Ford stock company and all around good tough guy actor. He's one of my all-time favorite character actors, and even seeing him for a few scenes here and there made this movie more memorable.  Also, the studio set is pretty cool, claustrophobic and cluttered, making the setting interesting at least if not the goings-on.  A pretty bad movie overall, and one I won't be revisiting anytime soon.

Dead End <---trailer (1937): */****