I’ve done enough walking to last me till Gabriel’s horn. Former brawler and womaniser Luke Fargo comes home to the South from the Civil War a reformed character. Following his traumatic experience at the Battle of Vicksburg, he is now a pastor, intent on rebuilding the town’s only church, which burned down, just like his own house. He is greeted with disbelief by his friends including Matty Miller (Nancy Kulp) and with plain hostility by the rest of the townsfolk as he fought on the Union side. Particularly opposed to him is Yancey Huggins (Raymond Burr) who sees a threat to his own iron-fisted control of the town. Huggins gets his aptly named enforcer Big (Richard Webb) to fight Fargo – but Fargo wins. Fargo encounters two contrasting women from his past: Southern belle and judge’s daughter Georgina Descrais (Allison Hayes) impoverished by the war and living with her ailing mother, tries to revive their romantic relationship, but he is not interested; local madam Selma (Jean Willes) is pleased by his return and accepts him on his own terms. Meanwhile, teenage orphan tomboy Lissy (Joanne Woodward) who has been living in the parsonage, initially dislikes him but gradually her feelings undergo a reversal. She insists on remaining there, taking over the kitchen, which causes Fargo a great deal of trouble, as the townspeople, alerted by Huggins, suspect him of falling back into his old ways and living with a girl. He does not help matters when he reluctantly gambles on a Sunday with prosperous businessman Albert Loomis (Philip Carey), winning a horse race to get lumber for the church building and is goaded into fighting Yancey’s men. Finally, the bishop (Robert Burton) is called in to resolve the situation … The war is over boys. Now there’s no sense in us fighting it all over again. Woodward’s film debut is big and splashy, Cinemascope and colourful and her role and performance are as broad and boisterous as this is long. She practically bounces off the walls with her strong will and orphan energy. Adapted from his story Calico Pony by Herb Meadow, this post-Civil War western traffics in the usual tropes – good versus bad, reformed versus irredeemable, decent women versus whores; the new nation-building imperative versus what’s left behind; and the overarching story here is then the guy trying to do right who doesn’t know he’s co-habiting with a girl of age. Living in sin is a phrase that rebounds a lot. Burr makes for a decent heavy, as ever; and the subplot with Hayes (who would be the Fifty Foot Woman, cult fans!) is well managed, particularly when she sets him up for a nasty fall. It’s one of Heflin’s best roles – complex and conflicted, a good ol’ bad ol’ boy. It’s nice to see the great comedienne Kulp (a former journalist and MGM publicist) in a big screen role a few years before she became embedded in everyone’s living room as Miss Jane Hathaway in The Beverly Hillbillies. She would appear again with Woodward in The Three Faces of Eve for which Woodward gained the Academy Award for Best Actress. There are some good comic scenes here particularly when it comes to Heflin’s attempts to persuade everyone he’s a good preacher and nobody’s there because he’s bought their horses. Premiered in Woodward’s home town of Thomasville, Georgia, you can’t help but feel for the woman Paul Newman left behind, as Ethan Hawke reminds us in his new HBO documentary series The Last Movie Stars when Stephanie Newman tells him that her illustrious father abandoned her mother actress Jackie Witte when she was a newborn, leaving them as well as her brother and sister (all under the age of five) for child-free Woodward. That’s the right reaction, she compliments Hawke when he puts his head in his hands in horror. The affair had been going on for five years, something nobody realised until much later. Seeing these two productions in close proximity leaves a sour taste. The things ambitious performers will do for their career. Woodward later admitted her own movie dream ultimately faded because of the three children she herself had with Newman, who was often away shooting films while she kept house. Karma’s a bitch, etc. but for a while her star burned bright. Never mind, this is nicely shot by Burnett Guffey and there’s a supremely witty score by George Duning. Directed by George Sherman. Don’t try to save the world – save me
mondomovies 