Bend of the River
|
List Price: Our Price: $3.88 You Save: $6.11 (61%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $1.68 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Bend of the River
Movie Review: old school western
Summary: 5 Stars
Cool movie with stunning shots of Mt Hood. I got this mostly for the landscape shots.Movie Review: "There is a difference between Apples and Men"
Summary: 4 Stars
Beautiful, allegorical Western from the legendary team of director Anthony Mann and star James Stewart results with fine action and great cinematography.
Stewart portrays a loner leading a wagon train westward trying to escape his renegade past. Along the way he runs into mysterious Arthur Kennedy, whom Stewart saves from a lynch mob's noose. They have great cameredrie, but that is tested when Stewart has to get supplies for his wagon pary who will not survive if they get through. Gold miners in the area need the supplies as well and offer a high price for the goods, which leads to conflict among the two men.
Mann was a director who brought alot to the Western. He matured the genre and always made the films lean and mean with alot of intelligence and social commentary. He also brought out the best in his lead actor. Stewart gives a fine performance in this film as a man who wrestles with a past that he is still not sure he has left behind. The actor handles the violent action scenes well bringing a sense of realism and hard edgeiness that other actors could hardly compare with.
The rest of the cast performs adequately including Kennedy, who is rather likeable, despite his sadistic ways. Rock Hudson is on board as a young gambler who aids Stewart and it's not surprising to see how he became a star. The two female leads are very lovely including the always likeable(and sexy) Julie Adams as the love interest of both Stewart and Kennedy. Lori Nelson portrays her sister and falls for Hudson. It's funny that both actresses are in this film because they'll both be the leading ladies to the Creature From the Black Lagoon. Adams, of course, most famous for her sexy swim in that white bathing suit in the first film and Nelson replacing her in it's sequel, "Revenge of the Creature"(1955). Even this film's soundtrack features music that will be later used in that film.
It's unfortunate that this DVD is practically bare bones with only a Theatrical Trailer, but the print is nice and the price ain't bad.
This movie is also available on Universal's Westerns of James Stewart collection which includes this and other works the actor did with Mann and some other noteable genre achievments.
Movie Review: Classic Wester starring the great Jimmie Stewart with Arthur Kennedy
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a classic western from 1952. The post war America had a taste for optimistic and wholesome entertainment with unambiguous good guys and bad guys. That isn't to say the characters are simple or simplistic, just that by the end of the movie it is clear who has chosen the good path and who has not (and is likely dead).
James Stewart was a perfect actor for these films (he made many fine Westerns) because he was a most convincing good guy, but was able to show a threatening undercurrent and the ability to fight that was able to enrich his characterizations and overcome the bad guys. Here he is Glyn McLyntock, a man with a past who is leading a wagon train of honest settlers who dream of rich farms in Oregon. The wagon train is led by Jeremy Baile (the very well cast Jay C. Flippen) who has two eligible daughters. Along the way he saves and becomes friends with Emerson Cole (Arthur Kennedy) who has a suspicious past of his own. They are attacked by Indians along the trail and the older daughter is wounded, but survives. The wagon train comes to a booming Portland right at the beginning of the California Gold Rush. The settlers hire a steamer to take them up river to their land and purchase supplies they will need for the winter (paid in advance). Tom Hendricks (Howard Petrie) is the apparently affable man who seems to run everything. Emerson decides to part from the settlers and the oldest daughter has to be left in Portland for a month to recuperate from her arrow wound.
The settlers prosper, but as it gets into October the supplies that were due in September have not come and winter could prove fatal without them. When McLyntock and Baile go into Portalnd to find their supplies the rest of the movie is set up as is their being joined by the handsome gambler played by Rock Hudson. It is an enjoyable tale even if the sets look like sets and nature shots seem quite different from the rest of the movie.
Quite enjoyable and great family entertainment. The movie does pose the question if a men can change or if their past dooms their future course and chooses an interesting answer to the question.
Movie Review: Solid but a bit dated
Summary: 4 Stars
There's no doubt that this is a solid, entertaining western, but of all of the Anthony Mann/James Stewart westerns, Bend of the River has dated the worst. The scenes with the pioneers, are, to be perfectly honest, pretty painful. They're filled with the sort of characters and dialogue that detractors of westerns use to mock the genre. Jay C Flippen is nothing short of a sanctimonious pain in the butt, and the women folk are the kind that immediately swoon for any square-jawed type (in this case, James Stewart, Arthur Kennedy and Rock Hudson) who happen to ride along. Then there's the negro comic relief complete with yassa boss voice and rolling eyes - pretty hard stuff to sit through nowadays. Fortunately things hit a more solid footing in the second half with the pursuit across the mountains. Arthur Kennedy does a fine job as James Stewart's darker half, changing from rogue into cold-blooded killer. There's fine support too from Harry Morgan and Royal Dano (although you're never to sure what sort of accent he's trying to put on). Rock Hudson's character doesn't seem to have much purpose - you get the feeling that Universal put him in as part of a contractural obligation after the script had been completed. The Anthony Mann westerns (with and without Stewart) were genre highlights of the 1950s and if you watch them sequentially you'll notice how much more mature they became as they went along. The first one, Winchester '73, follows the lines of the traditional rough and tumble shoot em up, while the last (Man of the West) veers into the nightmare territory of the horror movie. Being the second, Bend of the River is closer in tone to Winchester '73, which may explain why it hasn't aged as well as some of the others. My advice is check out Man of the West, The Far Country (a great parcel of villains) and The Man From Laramie.Movie Review: Best of enemies
Summary: 4 Stars
Bend of the River is in many ways Anthony Mann's `nicest' Western, but underneath the gorgeous Technicolor location work there's a darker side to Stewart's border raider desperate to reform and his relationship with friendly enemy Arthur Kennedy that threatens fireworks to come - and when they do, in the last 20 minutes, there's no problem in believing the depth of Stewart's rage or the relentlessness of his pursuit. Shot on many of the same locations as the even darker The Far Country, it's still terrific entertainment. Stepinfetchit's role is a little uncomfortable, but compared to the humiliation inflicted upon him in other pictures he's allowed a bit more dignity here than usual, closer to Hank Worden's Old Mose Harper in The Searchers than the racial stereotypes other directors expected.
As with Universal's DVD of Winchester '73, the print quality isn't always quite as good as it could be, but it's mostly an acceptable transfer.