Former gunslinger Glyn McLyntock guides a group of homesteaders across the American West, to Oregon, in Anthony Mann's 1952 western Bend of the River. Along the way, he hopes to leave behind his violent past and start life over as a peaceful rancher.
The film's two stars are apparent from its first frames: Jimmy Stewart and the beautiful Oregon landscape. Notice the colour palette. The blues greys greens of the sky mountain forest will become the colours associated with McLyntock himself.
The same landscape here, but with an added, artificial frame. The women look almost like they're watching a Jimmy Stewart western on the big screen!
The first part of a lightning-fast pan: this close-up of McLyntock massaging the scarf around his neck—which is hiding wicked rope burn symbolic of his outlaw past—will, seconds later, become the face of soon-to-be hanged man Emerson Cole, whom McLyntock will save from death.
After an attack on their camp by a small band of Shoshone, which McLyntock and Cole repel, the homesteaders set off again. Right to left, East to West.
They arrive in Portland, an idyllic outpost town on the banks of the mighty Columbia river. Here, McLyntock will charter a steamship to travel upriver. He'll also make a deal for supplies, which he'll pay for, and which will be shipped later. Except they won't come.
Shades of It's a Wonderful Life:
With Winter closing in and the newly-established farmers needing food to last them until Spring, McLyntock will return to Portland—and see it transformed into a hellish boom town feeding off a gold rush.
Much like George Baily, the character played by Stewart in the Capra film, McLyntock will see, first-hand, what a life full of bad men like his past self would entail: booze, greed, gambling, and death. Portland, previously so full of light, has been turned into a city of eternal night, lorded over by those with guns and money.
The loneliness of the long distance rancher: more than anger, McLyntock's expression is one of sadness. Dismayed at the moral corruption that's overtaken Portland, he also fears he's that's caused it—carried it with him across the frontier. One of the questions that hovers over Bend of the River is that of the possibility of redemption: can McLyntock, having been bad, ever be a good man again?
Perhaps the answer's in the colours. Blue shirt, green jacket, grey scarf. In terms of the visuals at least, McLyntock doesn't fit into gold-fevered Portland anymore.
Of course, that's the optimist's answer. The pessimist might say that McLyntock's trying too hard. He's trying not to fit in. But that's just external, superficial. Inside, he's the same man he always was. The homesteading life is a lie.
But back to adventure! McLyntock and the farmers aboard the steamship, Mann showing off Oregon. I wonder if Werner Herzog ever saw this film.
Unloading. Another great pan: from steamer to beach. Although the ship is now off the screen, it still asserts its presence.
On the spot where the farming village will be built. McLyntock walks with Jeremy Baile, the village leader and convinced pacifist. Mann sets these men as opposites, and asks: can the one on the right ever become the one on the left?
Buildings need timber. An interesting shot on its own, and used as a spatial and temporal link. In the next shot, McLyntock hauls the felled trunk into the village.
Time passes. McLyntock travels into hellish Portland, causes a ruckus, and escapes upriver with food for the farmers. There are problems, however: the men from Portland are on their tail, and some of McLyntock's own men—Cole included—are entering into temptation. There's a gold mine not far from the farming settlement, and the gold miners would pay quite handsomely for this supply of winter food.
After setting up temporary camp in a defensible position, McLyntock and his men wait for their Portland pursuers, and take them, guns blazing. They beat the attackers back, killing some, letting others flee, and proclaim victory.
The next day, however, mutiny! Some of the hired hands rebel, wanting to steal the food and sell it to the gold miners. With Cole's help, McLyntock gains the upper hand, tackles the head rebel, and:
Three key images of Bend of the River: McLyntock poised and ready to thrust his knife into the rebel leader's chest; a woman's scream; McLyntock hearing the scream, realizing what he's about to do, and stopping. Not only is this an excellent example of how our mind links separate images into a narrative (a Kuleshov editing experiment if there ever was one!), but it shows that McLyntock's natural reaction is still violence, still killing.
But, is this also a moment of change? Does McLyntock the killer, interrupted by a woman's face, become McLyntock the noble? It's certainly a nice thought to believe that Mann has captured the exact moment of McLyntock's redemption—that the McLyntock who emerges from this scene, punctured by a scream, physically closer on the strip of film to McLyntock the noble than McLyntock the killer, is the new man he desires to be. But, does the rest of the film support this nice thought?
Early on, McLyntock tells Cole that he's going West to escape from a dangerous man. A man named McLyntock. Does he manage to outrun himself? Considering that the farmers only win their food and freedom because McLyntock is the better marksman, stronger fighter, and smarter stalker than his enemies, it's doubtful. He's still a gunslinger. The consolation: he's now gunslinging for a better cause.
The night before he's betrayed by Cole, the two buddies share some coffee by the campfire. They talk about their former lives, and their current prospects. Cole is hovering: help the farmers, or help himself?
From a nearby wagon, Jeremy Baile listens. For the first time, he learns about who McLyntock actually was: a Missouri raider. Having already professed that bad apples spoil the whole barrel and that men can't change, he'll now have to rethink his beliefs. The choice, however, isn't purely ideological.
Mann doesn't explore this murky area too much, but don't you always go with the guy who's on your side? Whether McLyntock is good, bad, in between, doesn't matter when he's the only one who, for whatever reasons, will fight to get your food, save your village, extend your Oregon dream.
The goldmine in the distance proves irresistible. Cole turns his guns on McLyntock, and commandeers the food supply.
Clash of titans on Mount Olympus: McLyntock, battered by Cole but not beaten, looms large over the Oregon horizon. If there's one thing to be said about Mann, it's that he's not shy about crafting mythologies.
As the wagons and the food roll through the mountains toward the mining camp, Jeremy and his daughter discuss the situation. McLyntock, they agree, wouldn't leave them. Beyond, in the snow, he's in pursuit.
Eventually, the climax comes. McLyntock arrives, outsmarts and out-guns Cole's men, then defeats Cole in a fistfight set on a bend on the Columbia river. It's a well-shot action scene, and one of many in a film full of them.
Emerging from the frigid waters, his scarf lost in the battle, McLyntock stands before Jeremy and his daughter with his entire past, his dark secret, laid bare: he was to be hanged once, and his body still bears the marks. What about his soul?
The farmers rejoice. Their lives have been saved and the future of their village preserved. Their entire journey from Missouri to Oregon has not been for nothing. And all thanks to Glyn McLyntock, former gunslinger, former thief, former killer.
As for McLyntock, he spends the extremely brief happy ending looking enigmatic as ever. I can't read his face. Is he happy? Will he be able to live as a rancher? The best answer I can muster: hopefully.
But I'm most reminded of the ending to Akira Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai. In that film, after the bloodletting has been done and the bandits defeated, the remaining samurai meet by the graves of their fallen friends. And, as the farmers rejoice in their Spring harvest, which, thanks to the brave samurai, they'll be able to keep, Kambei, the oldest and wisest samurai, speaks:
"Again, we are defeated. The farmers have won. Not us," he says.
I wonder of McLyntock isn't thinking the very same thing.
Post-script
I have one more image to post, and, because it doesn't fit within the film, I thought I'd separate it from my post about the film, too. It's tucked away in the brief happy ending. It's not held for a long time. The character is not an important one.
But it's such a lovely shot: the light through her hair, the soft marshy background, even the colours. It may not belong to
Bend of the River in any real sense, but I'm glad Mann captured it and gave it a home.
