The team behind True Grit – producer Hal Wallis, director Henry Hathaway and screenwriter Marguerite Roberts – make the mistake of thinking that lightning will strike twice in a tale of an older fella, in this case a bank robber rather than a lawman, saddled with a younger woman, in this case a child rather than a sassy teenager. It’s not the only mistake. The title is a misnomer, for a start, and there’s a rather dumb use of shooting the apple off a child’s head a la the “Swizzer” William Tell. In reality, it’s a revenge tale, and a violent one at that, mixed in with a sentimentality that’s at odds with the story.
Like James Stewart and John Wayne, Gregory Peck was in something of a default position in terms of the movies he was now making. This trio, in particular, now specialized almost exclusively in the western. From 1966 of the nine movies made by Wayne seven had been westerns. For Stewart, over the same period, it had been exclusively westerns – five of them. Now Peck was beginning to go down the same route – this would be his third western in three years.
The reason wasn’t hard to find. Of all the genres churned out by Hollywood, westerns were the most sellable abroad. So, at the global box office at least, this trio still held sway, justifying their hefty fees.
Clay Lomax (Gregory Peck), just out of prison, seeks vengeance on ex-partner Sam Foley (James Gregory) who shot him in the back after a robbery, leaving him to carry the can, and made off with the loot, which he has used to build a ranching empire. Learning Lomax is out, Foley puts a sadistic trio – Pepe (Pepe Serna), Skeeter (John Chandler) and Bobby Jay Jones (Robert F. Lyons) – on his trail, with orders not to kill him, which is pure torture for the bloodthirsty thugs, but just to track him and report on his whereabouts. But thuggery will out, and instead the thugs kill Trooper (Jeff Corey) in heinous fashion.
Quite why the narrative dictates that the gunslingers are not to kill Lomax is anyone’s guess because it makes little sense, unless Foley is aware how unfair a fight it will be and that the veteran outlaw will be more than a match for his crew. And that’s how it turns out, Clay knocks them six ways to Sunday and that’s just for disturbing his peace in a hotel.
The narrative takes another odd twist with the arrival of the seven-year-old Becky (Dawn Lyn) who is put in Lomax’s charge. When he fails to offload her, he takes her with him, only stopping off to bushwhack the thugs and steal their weapons.
Quite why Lomax doesn’t just shoot the gunslingers and be done with it is also anyone’s guess but that leaves the trio able to jump Lomax when he’s taken refuge with the kind of widow drifters tend to come across in westerns. It gets quite unnecessarily confusing at this point but given Lomax is close to finding Foley something needs to create a delay.
And that’s done with an overlong unduly sadistic session by Bobby Jay as he attempts to emulate the Swizzer by shooting cups off Becky’s head. But the upshot of all this is Bobby Jay ends up killing his buddies and making off with the kid. Naturally, Lomax is soon in pursuit, but the promised “shoot out” doesn’t materialize, at least not in the traditional sense of gunmen facing each other in the main street.
What makes the movie work is what they should have concentrated on in the first place, Lomax taking a parental interest in the girl. That neither wants the other makes for decent enough tension and there are enough moments to flesh out their relationship, with Lomax unwilling to accept that he might well actually be her father.
Of course, a jailbird as a father doesn’t sit right with the filmmakers, even though Lomax is clearly capable of keeping the little one washed and fed and comfortable at night. So that’s where your lonely widow Juliana (Patricia Quinn) comes in. Interestingly, that’s the only scene that’s completely devoid of sentiment. She’s had long enough – five years – of loneliness and consoling herself with whisky at night to be happy to take the first half-decent fella who comes her way.
The action, when Lomax is sorting things out fist first, is acceptable enough, but whatever movie Hathaway and Co thought they were making just doesn’t come off. Certainly, it doesn’t come close to True Grit.
The Magnificent 60s 