Ride Lonesome (1959)

Film: Ride Lonesome (1959)

Stars: Randolph Scott, Karen Steele, Pernell Roberts, James Best, Lee van Cleef, James Coburn

Director: Budd Boetticher

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2023 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the Golden Age western, and the stars who made it one of the most enduring legacies of Classical Hollywood.  This month, our focus is on Randolph Scott: click here to learn more about Mr. Scott (and why I picked him), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Throughout this month, we've watched two films (and a third today) from the storied partnership between our May star Randolph Scott and filmmaker Budd Boetticher, but we haven't actually talked about their partnership, until today.  By the late 1950's, Scott was still a hot commodity, though nowhere near as important as he was in the early 1950's, when he was a Top 10 box office draw.  His partnership with Boetticher happened by accident.  Boetticher, who had once studied to be a matador, had been working in Hollywood for over a decade as a director, most notably in the Robert Stack film Bullfighter and the Lady (for which Boetticher had been nominated for an Oscar), but had not really had much success, and was largely a for-hire director.  John Wayne had originally been offered the lead role in 7 Men from Now, but because he was making The Searchers, he had to turn it down and instead recommended Boetticher try making the film with Randolph Scott.  This set off a creative partnership between the two men that was moderately successful at the box office that spawned seven films (known as the "Ranown Cycle"), and with the possible exception of John Wayne & John Ford's collaborations, is the most-noted in the annals of classical Hollywood westerns.

(Spoilers Ahead) Today we're going to focus on one of the final films in the partnership, Ride Lonesome, which stars Scott as Ben Brigade, a bounty hunter who has captured Billy John (Best), the brother of a famed outlaw named Frank (Van Cleef).  As he's taking him into custody, they come across a way station, being run by Carrie Lane (Steele), a beautiful widow (she doesn't know it yet, but she's about to be a widow), who lives there waiting for her soon-to-be-dead husband.  Also there are two low-time crooks who want in on the Billy John capture, Sam Boone (Roberts) and his (rather stupid) sidekick Whit (Coburn).  As the film goes, we learn that Ben is really more after revenge, as Frank killed his wife by hanging her from a tree, a tree they happen across.  The movie ends with Billy John strung up by said tree, drawing Frank out, and allowing Ben to kill him.  He gives Billy John (and the reward) to Sam, Whit, & Carrie (whom we get the impression will fall for Sam as he's been lusting after her the whole movie, albeit with little reciprocation), telling them to change their ways, and the film ends with him burning the tree to the ground.

The Ranown Cycle is remarkable largely for the sheer, bleak artistry that it brings.  The films are beautifully-shot, almost exclusively outdoors & on location, and feature Scott in roughly the same, stoic character.  They all feature ominous music, characters with mixed moralities (though Scott is always the good guy), and a relatively dour ending, even the happy ones.  This was atypical for westerns at this point.  While The Searchers and Shane had a lot of commentary about the invincibility & heroic natures of the cowboy, by-and-large most films of this era showed uncomplicated lawmen or ranchers who fought the bad guys & got the pretty girl.  It wasn't until the 1960's with movies like The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Wild Bunch that the clear violence & ambiguity of this genre would become the norm.  As a result, the Ranown Cycle stands apart as ahead-of-its-time in addition to being well-constructed.

This is true of Ride Lonesome.  In terms of the Boetticher/Scott films we saw this month, it's my least favorite.  It doesn't have enough tension between Roberts & Steele, and Van Cleef's Frank needs more scenes.  But it's still good.  I love the way that Scott's Ben feels so detached the entire movie, as if he gave up on life long ago, and will surely disappear into oblivion at the end of this film.  It's the one movie that I've seen of him this month where it's very obvious he's not ending up in a resolved place after this (likely suicide or riding off into increasingly dangerous situations that will result in him joining his dead wife).  I wish that we were maybe a minute or two later in the Hays Code era so that he could say this out-loud, indicate he's beyond redemption, but alas...it's just implied.