Randolph Returns 1949
Randolph Scott’s filmography gives us two themes in 1949, railroads and Victor Jory. The first film, Canadian Pacific, is set against the backdrop of constructing the Canadian Pacific Railroad. Scott plays surveyor Tom Andrews charged with unraveling a route through the Rockies. No small fete when the powerful fur trade decides the railroad will be bad for business. Fur trader Dirk Rourke (Jory) and an accomplice named Cagle conspire to stop Andrews and the railroad. Andrews is injured in a dynamite attempt on his life. He recovers in the tender care of crew doctor and pacifist Edith Cabot (Jane Wyatt). She joins a romantic triangle with Andrews who is engaged to Cecile Gautier.
Rourke’s campaign against the railroad turns to stirring up Indian trouble. Andrews straps on his guns over Edith’s objections in time for the showdown shootout with Rourke, Cagle, and the Indian uprising. Edith finds life in the west too violent to her taste and heads back east leaving Andrews and Cecile to happily ever after.
The second film, Fighting Man of the Plains, revisits familiar themes from our recent run of bad man films along with railroads for robbing and Jory in a supporting role as a gambler. Scott plays Quantrill Raider Jim Dancer, befriended by Jesse James, played by Dale Robertson in his first credited role. Dancer kills a man named Slocum at Quantrill’s Lawrence Kansas massacre, mistaking him for the brother who killed Dancer’s brother.
After the war, Dancer becomes an outlaw captured by a Pinkerton detective. Dancer survives a river crossing mishap, while the detective he is handcuffed to drowns. When passersby Dave Oldham (Jory) and saloon owner Florence Peel (Jane Nigh) find Dancer and the deceased on a riverbank near the town of Lanyard, Dancer assumes the detective’s identity. Dave and Flo aren’t fooled. In town ‘detective’ Dancer discovers the Slocum he should have killed runs Lanyard with designs on its railroad. Dancer becomes town marshal but is arrested when recognized as the man who killed Slocum’s brother. Tried and sentenced to hang he is on his way to a tree when Jesse and the Younger gang arrive. Slocum and his accomplices are killed in the shootout. Jesse and the Youngers ride off leaving Dancer to Florence. The end.
Next Week: Colt .45 (OK, OK. I couldn’t resist.)
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Ride easy,
Paul
Rourke’s campaign against the railroad turns to stirring up Indian trouble. Andrews straps on his guns over Edith’s objections in time for the showdown shootout with Rourke, Cagle, and the Indian uprising. Edith finds life in the west too violent to her taste and heads back east leaving Andrews and Cecile to happily ever after.
The second film, Fighting Man of the Plains, revisits familiar themes from our recent run of bad man films along with railroads for robbing and Jory in a supporting role as a gambler. Scott plays Quantrill Raider Jim Dancer, befriended by Jesse James, played by Dale Robertson in his first credited role. Dancer kills a man named Slocum at Quantrill’s Lawrence Kansas massacre, mistaking him for the brother who killed Dancer’s brother.
After the war, Dancer becomes an outlaw captured by a Pinkerton detective. Dancer survives a river crossing mishap, while the detective he is handcuffed to drowns. When passersby Dave Oldham (Jory) and saloon owner Florence Peel (Jane Nigh) find Dancer and the deceased on a riverbank near the town of Lanyard, Dancer assumes the detective’s identity. Dave and Flo aren’t fooled. In town ‘detective’ Dancer discovers the Slocum he should have killed runs Lanyard with designs on its railroad. Dancer becomes town marshal but is arrested when recognized as the man who killed Slocum’s brother. Tried and sentenced to hang he is on his way to a tree when Jesse and the Younger gang arrive. Slocum and his accomplices are killed in the shootout. Jesse and the Youngers ride off leaving Dancer to Florence. The end.
Next Week: Colt .45 (OK, OK. I couldn’t resist.)
Return to Facebook to comment
Ride easy,
Paul
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