Dodge City (Warner Bros.) (1939)

VVFAT VINEE 1 ERROL OLIVIA De tJ § UNS A. wh FT XUEVE E FLYNN (Review) HAVILLAND HERIDAN @rxAi ¥ $ fee 4 1: & cane etes 104 Minutes FRROL FLYNN AT Errol Flynn Daring Gunfighter _ WIDE OPEN RANG STRAND THEATRE 4 Epic Western, IN “DODGE CITY” Errol Flynn comes to the screen of the Strand Theatre today in a role that is, on the surface, altogether unlike any he has ever played before, for he is the straight-shooting hero of “Dodge City,” a film about the period when the littl Kansas town of that mame was the roughest and wickedest community of the old west. Warner Bros.“Dodge City” is a spirited and authentic re-creation of those hectic days in the 1870's when the coming of the railroad to the little town at the northerm end of the famed Chisholm Trail made it the leading cattle shipping center of that era. Notable scenes in the picture include the stampede of a big herd of longhorns, a brawl involving more than a hundred men in the biggest saloon and gambling hall of Dodge City — which is easily the most spirited battle of the sort ever filmed — and a tense and suspenseful gun battle in a railway mail car which ends with Flynn and two companions being locked in the car as it is set in flames. How Flynn manages to get out of the flaming railway ear, rescue his companions and then turn the tables on the outlaws is a climactic scene with a terrific impact of turbulent action. In the brilliant cast which supports Flynn are Olivia de Havilland, Ann Sheridan, Bruce Cabot, Frank McHugh, Alan Hale, John Litel, Henry Travers, Henry O'Neill, Vietor Jory, William Lundigan and Guinn “Big Boy” Williams. The production was di | by Michael Curtiz. The brawling, turbulent, sudden-death milieu of the toughest, roughest town in the cattle country of the 1870’s is the hackground against which Errol Flynn projects his virile, adventurous personality in “Dodge City,” the Warner Bros. production which opened yesterday at the Strand Theatre. Dealing with the most turbulent era of the old west, it is a production of a scope and authenticity that may well make it remembered as a milestone in motion picture history. Making the unmistakably British Errol Flynn its hero may seem a novelty to the casual film-goer but it will require no stretching of credibility on the part of those who are steeped in the history of the period and the region which are covered in “Dodge City.” For there were a number of adventurous young Britons who became well-known figures in the pioneer days of the west and it is easy to believe that such a fellow as Flynn is in actuality could well have been one of them. With this blessing of historical authenticity, Flynn makes an ideal figure as a venturesome young Irish soldier of fortune who has become a cowboy in Texas after having fought in the army of the Confederacy during the Civil War. The story of the picture picks him up when he has become. the trail boss of an outfit driving a huge herd of Texas longhorn steers up along the Chisholm Trail to Dodge City, the little town in southwestern Kansas that had become the largest cattle shipping eenter in the west after the Santa Fe Railway had been extended to what had merely been a drinking and carousing center for the soldiers from nearby military post, Fort Dodge. Mat 205 ERROL FLYNN with OLIVIA De HAVILLAND, left, end Ann Sheridan, right, head the cast of the smash hit, “Dodge City,” a drama of the west which mede its local bow yesterday at the Strand. In the screen play written by Robert Buckner, events are contrived to get Flynn to accept the post of sheriff of the wicked town, where the six-shooter was the final arbiter of all arguments. He sets about cleaning up the town, and this he finally succeeds in doing. There are many impressive and hair-raising scenes in the produc tion, but those that the spectator is most likely to remember longest are a cattle stampede in the early part of the picture, a rousing saloon brawl in which more than 100 men make a veritable shambles of the place, and a climactic pistol battle in a railway mail car which is given a sudden and horrible twist when the car bursts into flames. Flynn, of course, dominates the action of the piece throughout, but he is given valiant assistance by a very expert ensemble of supporting players. Notable among them are Olivia de Havilland, as a pioneer newspaper girl who falls in love with the sheriff and helps him in his campaign to clean up the town; Ann Sheridan, Bruce Cabot, Frank McHugh, Alan Hale and others. All that really need be said about the direction is that it was handled by Michael Curtiz, for he has long since established himself as the best director in Hollywood for large-scale pictures. ‘Dodge City’ SHOWN IN FILM The old range wars of western frontier days have long since become history, but the fences that led to many of the bloody battles between rival cattle factions have not ceased to give trouble of an entirely different nature. In the days when the west was at its wildest and woolliest, some cattlemen would object and there would be a fight. Today the range fence stands by right of legally-established ownership but it is still a pain in the neck when a motion picture company decides to film an old time western production. That was the case when Warner Bros. decided to film scenes for “Dodge City,” now playing at the Strand Theatre, on a location between Modesto and Sonora, Calif. “Dodge City,” which stars Errol Flynn, is laid in 1872, when range fences hadn’t even been thought of in southwestern Kansas, locale of the story. Unfortunately, though, the rolling prairie between Modesto and Sonora, where the film company worked, is covered with range fences. There was only one solu tion for the problem: eliminate the fences. As a consequence, studio laborers with the permission of the property owners, tore down approximately twelve miles of barbed wire fence. A He-Man Motorist Rain or shine, Bruce Cabot likes to travel with the top of his rakish convertible coupe down. He never wears a hat and he presented quite a figure tearing along the roads with his hair, grown long for his role in ‘‘ Dodge Gity,”” streaming in the wind.