The Man from Laramie

In the 1950s, director Anthony Mann and star Jimmy Stewart made eight successful films together, five of which were westerns, and they stand as some of the finest ones ever made. I could pick any one of those fives to talk about and make an argument as to why they are great, but almost at random I decided to choose their final film the made together, "The Man from Laramie", partly because I see it as their most ambitious (it was filmed in glorious Vista Vision), their most violent, and probably their most psychological.

"The Man from Laramie" casts Stewart as Will Lockhart, a former Army Captain who's come from Laramie a personal vendetta. Lockhart's brother was killed by a group of Apache Indians who had repeating rifles, and he wants to find the man responsible for selling them.

This brings Lockhart to a town that is mostly owned by a cattle baron named Alec Waggoman (Donald Crisp). Alec has his ranch run by his psychotic son Dave (Alex Nicol) and the more level headed Vic (Arthur Kennedy) who was hired on by Alec to more or less look after his son. When Dave mistakes Lockhart for stealing his father's salt, he goes crazy and lassos Lockhart pulling him across a burning fire, while burning his wagons and killing off his mules in the process. When Alec learns about his, he pays off Lockhart, he seems to want to get him out of town as soon as possible. It is later revealed that Alec believes Lockhart is a messenger of death he has dreamed about for years, will inevitably kill his son. We learn Alec is also going blind and knows that he must leave his ranch for Dave to run, something he has mixed feelings about. He feels more certain that Vic is the right man to take over the ranch, he is the adopted son, someone who has always wanted Alec's approval and love, but always comes second in favor of Dave who is his flesh and blood, even though he's obviously crazy.

Things come to a boil on a fateful day when Lockhart is hired by Kate Canady (Aline MacMahon) a rival ranch owner and Alex's former love interst. Kate has Lockhart separate her cattle from Alec's, which Dave sees, which he turns into a gunfight between the two men. Dave is wounded in the hand, but he quickly exacts vengeance on Lockhart as his men hold him down, as he shoots him point blank in the hand. Once this happens, soon all the pieces come together, and it isn't long till everything is revealed and in a way resolved.

Even though Lockhart is the central character, and the man with the mysterious past as the name in the title points out, most of the drama centers on the family dynamic of Alec, Dave, and Vic. Mann focuses on their story, where as Lockhart's own familial vengeance is put on the back burner until the end. Lockhart is more the observer, the witness to everything, he's almost playing detective here to see what everyone's motives are.

I find Anthony Mann to be at his best when he is dealing with high stakes in drama, which usually have a violent outcome. The shooting of Lockhart's hand is so memorable, because it's the culmination of Dave's psychotic behavior, we knew he was crazy, but we didn't know it would turn so sadistic. Even Dave's men feel shame when they see him do this, and they even help Lockhart with his gun and his horse when it is all over.

But you can see Mann revel in the Lear-like drama of Alec and his two sons. The themes of family, love, hate, and jealousy that are at the heart of what he is trying to explore.

The film is also wonderfully shot on location in New Mexico, capturing the desolate landscape, which is the perfect place for this story of family deterioration to take place. Mann shows off great compositions giving long takes with actors sometimes off in the foreground, but also showing great shots of close-ups, particularly Jimmy Stewart who does some of his finest acting in this film.

The casting of Stewart was the other masterstroke, as it was for the other westerns he did for Mann. It might be difficult to buy Stewart as a western hero at first, but that's because he is so unorthodox. He stands tall, yet gangly, he's often soft spoken, but there is a spark of madness in his eyes. Unlike the John Wayne western hero, Stewart looks like someone who could lose in a fight, and it's often that he does in a Mann film, or he struggles to gain the upper hand.

Stewart's characters in these films are usually seen as loners, either on a quest for vengeance, or escaping a shady past. These are usually typical characters found in film noirs, which is not an accident, considering Mann began his career making some of the most memorable film noirs ever.

Stewart brings a sense of pain and anguish to these characters, however the role he plays in"The Man from Laramie" is more melancholy, he's somewhat quiet and reflective. He's probably the most decent character in all the westerns he made with Mann, yet ironically, he's probably punished the most. He's still dealing with the death of his brother, and we can see the conflict in him as he is trying to find the man responsible, and when he inevitably does, his reaction becomes somewhat much more surprising after all the pain he's had to bare throughout the film.

To me Stewart was always the more real western hero, when he is shot in the hand by Dave, he doesn't hide the true pain and hurt he is feeling, his voice cracks, and he screams in agony, not many movie stars would let you hear them scream. Stewart's always been a fascinating actor, who is mostly known to mainstream audiences as the modern everyman hero, yet his range and choice of characters have always been more interesting than that. Anthony Mann was the right director to tap into his darker side, and they made some of the greatest western because of it.

Though "The Man from Laramie" is a great film on its own, I'd recommend visiting all of the Anthony Mann/James Stewart westerns: "Winchester 73", "Bend of the River", "The Naked Spur", and "The Far Country" being the others, they all deal with dark, and violent themes, and are unique among the western genre.