Sunday 16 July 2023

The Big Sky (1952 Howard Hawks & prod)

Marvellous and interesting drama in which archetypal Hawks buddies Kirk Douglas and Dewey Martin team up with a band of Frenchmen and journey from St Louis up the Missouri 2000 miles to trade with Blackfoot Indians; rival traders are the bad guys. The French colouring and location filming are a point of difference. Their journey is complicated by the presence of a Blackfoot woman, Elizabeth Threatt, who stirs up feelings in our duo.

Typical Hawks mixture of tough men and tough girls, bravery, comedy, action, tight groupings of actors, songs.

Good acting. With Arthur Hunnicutt, Buddy Baer, Steve Geray, Henri Letontal, Hank Worden (Indian, The Searchers, Red River), Jim Davis.

Photographed by Russell Harlan, edited by Christian Nyby; RKO. Written by Dudley Nichols. Filmed in Idaho (according to the director).


Hawks says the studio took twenty minutes out of it including much of the Martin-Threatt relationship and ruined it.

No comments:

Post a Comment