GurlyIamBeach
Instant Favorite.
Spoonatects
Am i the only one who thinks........Average?
Onlinewsma
Absolutely Brilliant!
Wuchak
RELEASED IN 1954 and directed by Anthony Mann, "The Far Country" stars Jimmy Stewart as a self-centered cattleman, Jeff Webster, who conflicts with a crooked, self-appointed lawman (John McIntire) while driving cattle through Skagway, Alaska, to Dawson during the 1896 Klondike gold rush. Ruth Roman plays a formidable woman he meets on the steamship, who unfortunately works for Gannon (McIntire). Walter Brennan plays Jeff's best friend while Corinne Calvet plays a tough foreign settler with romantic inclinations.This was the fourth of five Westerns Mann did with Stewart. These were uncompromisingly harsh, psychological Westerns featuring themes of revenge, obsession, rage and redemption. They were spectacularly shot on location, rather than in the studio, providing a backdrop of authentic rugged beauty. This one was shot in Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada, with one episode involving Athabasca Glacier.The opening sequence on the steamship is memorable for the way Jeff (Stewart) escapes ship authorities with the assistance of Ruth Roman's character. Roman is stalwart, stunning and surprisingly vivacious (for her role as a woman in the rough NW wilderness). Gannon (McIntire) is an interesting antagonist due to the way he joyfully basks in his power and overt corruption.THE MOVIE RUNS 97 minutes. WRITER: Borden Chase. ADDITIONAL CAST: Jay C. Flippen, Harry Morgan and Jack Elam.GRADE: B
mortycausa
It vies with The Naked Spur as the best Stewart-Mann western, although Bend of the River and Winchester '73 are also excellent. What I particularly like about this Stewart-Mann western is Stewart's hero is presented as flawed, often maimed psychologically, and never more so than here. The hero is superior but not superhuman. He's very human. Jeff Webster is taciturn, even righteously egotistical. Which, I guess, means Stewart is playing against type and does so expertly. Jeff's credo is totally solipsistic: he'll look out for himself (and in a pinch his sidekick Walter Brennan) and no one else. Of course, there's a price to pay. In a sense, Stewart's take and that of the movie is on It's A Wonderful Life. Only here Jeff Webster gets to see the effects of his willful withdrawal from the community in real time. Definitely top-notch.
Robert J. Maxwell
This Anthony-Mann directed adventure yarn gets an extra point for its location shooting. It's not Skagway, Alaska, or Dawson, in the Yukon. It's in the Canadian Rockies and the landscape is majestic.Stewart and Brennan are two saddle buddies who have brought a herd of cattle to Skagway, where they are confiscated by the roguish villain and only law officer, McIntire. The local saloon mistress, Roman, takes a shine to Stewart and bails him out of jail. The shine on Stewart is buffed by an innocent, passionate, kind French girl, Calvet.All of them, Stewart's cattle included, wind up in the muddy camp of Dawson. They're followed by McIntire and his henchmen, who set about doing evil, robbing hard working miners of their claims, sneering, shooting innocent civilians and engaging in other such mishigas.Stewart doesn't care for anyone but himself and perhaps for his old buddy Brennan. But McIntire and his goons offend him once too often. Gunplay ensues. And, as is usual in an Anthony Mann movie of the period, the violence is pretty brutal.If you stripped the film of its lush budget and carefully drawn supporting characters, you'd have a John Wayne B movie from 1935 -- "The Man From Skagway." Maybe "Guns of the Yukon," or something of that ilk.But money and talent make a difference, and while is far from a challenging movie -- nobody's character evolves except Stewart's -- it's as entertaining as all get out, by gum.Stewart does a fine job, and Brennan is Stumpy in excelsis. Ruth Roman is stiff and Corinne Calvet is a little cloying, but so what? We have McIntire as a kind of Judge Roy Bean of the Far North. We also have Ruth Roman's men being buried beneath fifty feet of snow on "the ice trail." The ice trail is actually the Columbia Ice Fields. I watched them shooting these scenes as a child. When I visited the Columbia Ice Field some thirty years later, the location was barely recognizable because the glacier had melted so much that its edge had retreated more than a hundred yards.
daviddaphneredding
While I cannot honestly say it is among my favorites in Westerns, it is worth seeing, mainly because the Yukon is so beautiful, with all the mountains covered with thick snow. I do believe the scenery is breathtaking. Of course, the cast was well-assembled, the actors fitting their individual roles very well. John McIntyre was a crooked judge whom you were glad to hate. Robert Wilke, as he was in the earlier classic western "High Noon", was someone no one could like, to state it very mildly. Harry Morgan's personality was in a similar vein. Walter Brennan was his same fussy-yet-likable character, J.C. Flippen was laughable as the sorry drunk, and Ruth Roman was the best that Universal-International could find as the tempting lady who was on the crooked side. James Stewart went against type as a bitter, apathetic cowboy who was anxious to avenge the crooked judge and his crooked thugs for stealing horses, and he was willing to go all the way from Seattle to Dawson, Yukon to recover them and, again, settle a score with the crooked judge. Again, the extremely beautiful scenery was worth it all. See it.
