The Big Land

I remind this Gordon Douglas' western not because of Alan Ladd's presence - the good guy, as usual - but because of the villain character, which is also here as usual Anthony Caruso - nearly a cliché.... But I love this kind of role, as was Jack Palance in SHANE vs the same Alan Ladd. No real surprise here, despite the Gordon Douglas's flawless directing. The latest was a true professional anyway...Useless to say that I highly prefered Alan Ladd in ONE FOOT IN HEL, where his charater was so complex and ambivalent.... So, this western deserves to be seen, especially if you are a western buff, you can't miss it; I only gave my opinion, tha's all.

When Chad Morgan (Alan Ladd) rides home to Texas after the Civil War, he finds another enemy to battle: Brog, a corrupt cattle buyer who forces honest ranchers into financial ruin. Morgan thinks he can thwart Brog by building a town at a new rail spur where cattlemen can safely bring their herds to market. But Brog and his henchmen set out to destroy the town and it may take a gun-blazing showdown to vanquish him.

Familiar yet well-made western with some good characterisations that stars Alan Ladd and Edmond O'Brien, who does some scene chewing as Edmond O'Brien as an alcoholic architect with the know-how to construct the town. Virginia plays his sister who is engaged to another man but falls for Ladd. A unique feature is the town construction element, which isn't covered much in westerns. Can be a bit slow in spots, a bit talky, however it's pleasant viewing and ends with an exciting cattle stampede sequence.

Westerns of the 40's and even better the 50's held their own for entertainment and pleasure. Who doesn't like a story involving outdoors, cattle, the untamed west, shoot-outs, ranching, a love interest and more that when thrown together well gives us a memorable good time of it all. This is not a magnificent western but instead a standard for the western itself. On that note it delivers. Alan Ladd has a quiet type nature that is easy on the viewer and even when he gets mad he is still a nice guy. By contrast, the bad guys are just bad and stay that way all the time. In the background is still the civil war that is over but bad will is still harbored which in time goes away as we know. We get to like the characters and care about them having spent some background time getting to know them. This movie works and for that reason you get to spend your precious time watching a worthy movie. Everyone wins including the happy ending which wont let you down. Be clear that towns sprung up all over and it was the people in those towns that made sure they survived this difficult time in our history. It wasn't easy but then, anything worth having has a price beyond what we can see. The question is: Will we pay that price to have it? You see that is the true test of how bad you want it. In this movie, men on both sides risk their lives but the side that stuck up for law & order, for what's right and true will win every time. Good slow-eatin popcorn movie or delicious snacking with a tasty drink here. Mount-up and lets ride!

The more I see of Alan Ladd the more I come to regard him as the male Kay Francis; a good actor who made a cargo ship full of mediocre to crappy movies. This is yet another, a fifties western from Gordon Douglas that, aside from early intimations of a homo erotic relationship between Ladd and Edmund O'Brien that is snuffed out the moment curvaceous Virginia Mayo arrives on the scene, is at best a "Shane" with tired blood. Give it a C.

PS...This is the second time that Edmund O'Brien has played a possibly, if not plausibly, closeted character in a Gordon Douglas film. The first was "Between Midnight And Dawn", made in 1950, in which O'Brien's cop had an unusually strong interest in keeping his partner away from marriage to Gale Storm.

Director Gordon Douglas, one of Warners' more versatile directors, teamed previously Ladd on 'The Iron Mistress', 'McConnell Story' and 'Santiago'...

Alan Ladd has the familiar assignment of a man of action who has seen enough of killing in the late war... He brings it off in his smoothest style...

Here, he is a six-shooter with no alternative, in a tale about cattlemen and wheat growers, who join forces in building a railroad near their land in an attempt to crush the activities of ruthless cattle-buyers... Ladd is forced to take action against Anthony Caruso and his henchman before settling down to marry the lovely Mayo and rebuild the new town...

Virginia Mayo gives the film its few moments of sensitivity in the scene where she takes out on Ladd her grief over her brother's execution...

Edmond O'Brien is cast as an educated man turned alcoholic... He is a wanderer disgusted by his cowardice, and gunned down when he makes a hopeless attempt to stand up to a heavy, bad man...

Despite a few pretentious moments, 'The Big Land' is, on the whole, an undistinguished star Western..