Linkshoch Wonderful Movie

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Cooktopi The acting in this movie is really good.

Richie-67-485852 This is the classic Western as it is just one of the millions of different stories of the old West but similar to all of them. You get a glimpse of the lifestyles, the risks and the rewards and yes the law was settled by gun-play until it was not. This Western has it all. Gunfights, horses, cattle, bar, whiskey, a love interest with a backstory and of course heroes and villain. Great emotional scenes that just push and pull on you too making it a must see for the viewer so you can be entertained. All the actors are at the top of their game too. Scenery is beautiful and one can easily imagine how pleasant it was to live this simple and rewarding life as the seasons changed. Nice song in the opening credits and later on too. Listen to the words for they are well chosen. Nice ending with good closure. Recommend a dinner meal with tasty drink followed by a good snack for the maximum viewing enjoyment. Saddle up, mount up, ride and then call it a night...

gordonl56 SADDLE THE WIND - 1958I finally got around to this 1958 western headlined by Robert Taylor, John Cassavetes and Julie London. The film is sort of a psychological Western written by the great Rod Serling. It was helmed by director Robert Parrish with help from an uncredited John Sturges. Robert Taylor is an ex gunfighter who owns a ranch in a high mountain valley. The man had worked for the main land owner in the valley, Donald Crisp for years. Crisp, in sort of a mentor role, had softened Taylor's hard edges and turned him into a solid citizen. Crisp had even given Taylor a piece of land to start his own cattle ranch. Of course there needs to be something to upset this pleasant image. And that is Taylor's younger brother, John Cassavetes. Cassavetes is a wild rather unstable lad who does not like living in the shadow of his popular brother. Cassavetes, just back from a supply buying run to the big city, arrives back at the ranch with his pretty bride to be, Julie London. London, a former dance hall singer, believes that Cassavetes might be her ticket to the good life. Taylor sees London as a gold digger and tries to send her back. The kid brother has shall we say, developed an itchy trigger finger. Taylor knows full well how such a liking for the gun will end. He tries repeatedly to get his younger brother to relax. London soon clues in on the fact that Cassavetes is really jealous of Taylor, and is a rat at heart.Cassavetes, Taylor, London and a few of the boys ride into what passes for the local one horse town. It is the small general store, bar and livery stable type burg. Cassavetes hits the bar for a few. Soon a famous gunman, Charles McGraw, enters. McGraw is looking for Taylor. Taylor shot his brother in a gunfight some years before and McGraw has finally tracked him to the valley.Cassavetes calls McGraw out not knowing just how good McGraw is. It is only through a bit of luck and McGraw being distracted at the right moment that Cassavetes emerges the victor. Needless to say this gives Cassavetes a swelled head. This leads to more idiot behaviour from the kid. He soon kills again and finds he likes it. His actions literally start what could end in a range war, when he shoots the leader of a group of squatters, Royal Dano. He then really stokes the fire when he shoots and badly wounds, Donald Crisp. Taylor of course has to settle the issue, brother or no brother. A somewhat grim, but very well-crafted film with an ending I was not expecting. The rest of the cast includes Ray Teal, who seemed to be in every second western, Doug Spencer, Jay Adler and Stanley Andrews. London is very under used here but she does manage to get in a song. The film was shot on location in Colorado which adds a nice look to the production. Director Parrish is well known to fans of film noir as the helmsman on CRY DANGER and THE MOB. He also handled the reins on the top Robert Mitchum western, THE WONDERFUL COUNTRY. Veteran cinematographer George Folsey is at the controls as the director of photography. The 11 time Oscar nominated Folsey's work includes. MEET ME IN ST LOUIS, ADAM'S RIB, MALAYA, THE BIG HANGOVER, VENGEANCE VALLEY, ALL THE BROTHER WERE VALIANT, EXCECUTIVE SUITE, THE COBWEB and HOUSE OF NUMBERS.

RanchoTuVu Saddle the Wind tells the story of Tony Sinclair (John Cassavetes), the troubled younger brother of Steve Sinclair (Robert Taylor) who both share ownership of a cattle ranch. They make for an interesting pair, the caricatured, out of control and insecure kid vs his mature, older, wiser, and better with a gun brother. What's more interesting, but isn't really developed very well, is the emerging situation between Taylor and Julie London, who plays Cassavetes somewhat reluctant fiancée that he brings home after a night of carousing. Charles McGraw has an interesting if abbreviated role as the well known gunfighter Larry Venables, who comes into town hunting for Steve (Taylor) but has to deal with Tony (Cassavetes). Purely by luck, Tony kills the far better Venables and now really believes he's a gunfighter. Not only did he kill one of the fastest gunmen around, but he defended his brother as well. He's a kid playing a man's game, and his actions get more out of control, leading to an inevitable showdown with his brother. Putting a juvenile delinquent in a Technicolor western wasn't unknown in the fifties, but Cassavetes is definitely more at home in Brooklyn than Wyoming.

stryker-5 The Sinclairs and the Deneens are two ranching families who share the open range in their remote western valley. Steve Sinclair is a fine, strong man who has put his gunslinging days behind him and is now a figure of rectitude and stability in the affairs of the valley. His younger brother Tony, however, is a hothead who is beginning to regard himself as a handy guy with a six-gun. Robert Taylor plays Steve with manly, tight-lipped stoicism, contrasting markedly with John Cassavetes' Tony, a jumpy dynamo of attention-seeking energy. This thoughtful MGM western sets up a whole web of conflicts and tensions: there is the inevitable clash between the two brothers, the uneasy modus vivendi with Old Man Deneen, friction between ranchers and homesteaders, as the latter try to settle on the free range. When Tony returns from a trip to the city bringing with him the beautiful Joan (Julie London) as his bride-to-be, yet another source of conflict arises. "Steve's gonna like you," Tony tells his new fiancee with unconscious irony, not knowing that it is Steve and Joan who will fall for each other. The romantic closeness between the saloon girl and the older man is never made explicit, but it is plain that they are destined to be a couple. The psychology of this tentative relationship is sensitively portrayed, for instance in the scene where Joan remarks, "I've seen reformed gunmen before." Steve reacts with a mixture of shame and hurt which tells us that he desires her good opinion. Prefiguration is a stylistic leitmotif running through the film. Larry Venables refuses to have his saloon table cleared, and then later Tony prevents Manuelo from clearing another table. Deneen's young son was killed in a futile gunfight, an event which has impacted on the life of the whole valley, and we see the tragedy re-enacted as other men lose their lives needlessly. Tony and Dallas act out a playful 'mock' draw on the exact spot where Ellason is later gunned down. A good deal of the film's psychological import is conveyed, not in dialogue, but through visual communication. Joan's reaction when Venables makes trouble in the saloon suggests that she knows the bad guy but is trying to conceal the fact. After the shooting, we see Tony fail the 'test', though nothing is ever said directly. Joan wants to be taken home, and Tony's immature decision to stay drinking with the boys signals the breaking-point of the relationship. Joan moves away from the group and sits alone. The ploughshare which is used for shooting practice symbolises the threat posed to wholesome farming life by irresponsible gunmen. Tony places his arm on Steve's shoulder, and Steve dislodges it with the subtlest of movements, showing the rift that is growing between the brothers, but which neither wishes to acknowledge. In the very next image, Hank tries to take the whiskey bottle away from Tony, but Tony clings to it, his pattern of destructive self-indulgence now well established. Once Deneen (the marvellous Donald Crisp) has decided to choke the range with wire fences, we see bales of barbed wire thrown down onto the ground with force. They glint harshly, their steely newness a hostile presence, harming the soil. When the brothers finally meet, we see each of them silently preparing his gun. The scene in which Steve and Joan ride back from town is nicely done, with its change of tempo from hard anger to a quieter, more reflective mood. Steve shows himself to be a man of complex emotions beneath his stern facade. The film is shot in Cinemascope and MGM's own colour process, Metrocolor. In the first scene, Venables menaces the bartenders in the saloon, a drab brown man in a drab brown setting. This is this creature's element. A very striking effect is achieved as the scene changes and we see the open range, the beautiful sunlit countryside contrasting powerfully with what has gone before. By the end of the film, the sage is in bloom, and the image of the young man dying on a brilliant purple carpet of natural luxuriance is almost unbearably poignant. Elmer Bernstein was the Musical Director, and in his characteristically understated style he did his usual excellent job. By 1958 it was beginning to be ambarrassing for audiences to see a character breaking into song, but the restrained guitar accompaniment as Julie London croons the theme tune salvages this one from seeming too obtrusive. Everybody is looking for his place in the world. Deneen dreams of establishing a paradise where violence is unknown, and Steve is striving to be a good rancher and to live down his past. Tony wants to make a name for himself, while Joan is hoping to escape the squalor of her earlier years. Venables wants the kudos of having killed Steve Sinclair, and Ellason is yearning for the homestead of his dreams. Some achieve their persoanl nirvana, but most don't. The film's message is that violence and confrontation don't move anybody forward in life.