The Big Trees

Okay western tells the tale of Kirk Douglas as a would-be lumber baron with more charm than business savvy. Not as good as it could have been with a little sharper direction, but the dialog has some spark and Douglas shines like a new penny when he smiles.

He gets adequate support from the usual suspects, with Patrice Wymore particularly good as his dance hall prostitute girlfriend. Eve Miller as the real love interest is a bit flat by comparison, even granted that she's stuck in the role of a holy roller trying to protect California's giant redwoods.

The plot manages to get genuinely clever at times, with the local judge conspiring to help the Quakers foil Douglas's lumber scheme, Douglas scheming right back, and then the whole thing going topsy-turvy. Still, something is missing (and the faded print I saw didn't help) but the ending goes big to try to save it and nearly succeeds. Worth the time for fans of Douglas, but not a must-see title.

I have a home in the middle of a redwood forest, so I was thrilled to see "The Big Trees". Imagine my surprise when I then learned that the story was set very close to us--in the Mendocino National Forest. Much of the film was filmed closer to the coast in Eureka...but both are certainly beautiful places and are pretty much unspoiled today...something that might shock folks when they hear of California.

When the story begins in 1900, Jim Fallon (Kirk Douglas) is trying to fast-talk his men, as he keeps making promises but he's a lying huckster. Now his latest scheme is to get rich off California redwood lumber...and he has a new partner, Yukon Burns (Edgar Buchanan), and he sends the man out west to investigate the land before he arrives a bit later. When Fallon arrives, he learns that Yukon has been taken in by some very nice Quakers and this partner doesn't realize Fallon is a scheming jerk who wants to cheat those folks off their land.

So is this any good? Well, not especially. Although Warner Brothers did some nice location shooting and filmed the movie in color, it really is a B-western with only a few minor changes. This time, instead of the baddies trying to steal all the land for their cattle empires (the most familiar plot in these B-westerns), it's folks stealing land for trees. And, although Kirk Douglas stars in this one, he really wasn't a big star yet...though he was well on his way. But I couldn't love this slick movie because some of it simply doesn't make sense--especially the love interest. We are to believe that although Fallon, at least indirectly, was responsible for a man's death, only moments later in the film the dead man's daughter announces she's in love with Fallon! Plus, Fallon never really deserved this love...he was an underhanded jerk...at least until the obligatory redemption at the end. Overall, a nice looking film....and I liked the trees...but one that I can understand why Douglas himself wasn't very proud of the movie. Overall, watchable but not much more.

Kirk Douglas offered a very good performances in a movie that I really didn't expect much out of, but that turned out to be surprisingly interesting. Neither the title nor the plot gave me high hopes. The story is about the efforts of a religious community to prevent the cutting down of California's giant redwoods by a Wisconsin lumberman. It doesn't sound particularly exciting, but actually turns out to be pretty good. Douglas is the lumberman - Jim Fallon - a charismatic conniver who seems able to convince anyone of his good intentions, even while he plots to take as much advantage of them as he possibly can. There's some decent enough action, particularly the scene in which Fallon tries to rescue Sister Chadwick (Eve Miller) from the out of control train. There's also good use of humour, provided both by Douglas and Edgar Buchanan as "Yukon" Burns, who becomes first Fallon's right hand man and then his antagonist - and who actually ends up being appointed as a marshall by a local judge (Roy Roberts) who's sympathetic to the religious folk and is willing to twist and turn every law on the book to help them.

That evolution is one of the problems with the movie, however. People change too fast from good guys to bad guys, or from friends into enemies, and it's hard to really understand how the changes came upon them, which sometimes makes it hard to keep track of who's on whose side at any given time, and the final evolution of Fallon - telegraphed as it from the moment he arrives in California - is still hard to believe. I also thought that aside from Douglas and Buchanan, the performances were average at best. Still, it's not a bad watch. 6/10

RELEASED IN 1952 and directed by Felix Feist, "The Big Trees" stars Kirk Douglas as a conniving lumber baron, Jim Fallon, who schemes to make it rich in Northern California in 1900 when a new law means large tracks of land are up for grabs to whoever can pay the fees. He plans to cut down the mighty redwoods but a colony of homesteading Quaker-like Christians are unwavering in their resolve to save the largest of the sacred trees, which are the ones Fallon wants most. Edgar Buchanan plays Fallon's sidekick-turned-marshal in the Redwoods, Walter "Yukon Lucky" Burns.

This was a remake of Warner Brother's "Valley of the Giants" from fifteen years earlier. While Douglas worked for free to get out of his WB contract it doesn't seem like it, as he has his usual gusto. The old-fashioned tone will likely turn off modern viewers but the environmental message was certainly ahead of its time. The story lacks drive, however, due to the convoluted dialog about legalities & finance; it's as though you need a doctorate on California land law in order to follow what's happening.

Fallon (Douglas) naturally becomes smitten by religious beauty Alicia Chadwick (Eve Miller) while having dubious links to blonde showgirl Dora "Daisy Fisher" Figg (Patrice Wymore). Speaking of whom, jaw-dropping Wymore has a memorable song & dance sequence that's worth the price of admission, particularly when she, um, never mind.

There are several other highlights, like a scene that shows how ancient the redwoods are (e.g. they were fully grown when William the Conqueror invaded England in 1066). Furthermore, there are fistfights, a falling tree that crushes a cabin, a dynamited dam, a thrilling runaway train sequence, a huge trestle that collapses under the train, a sacrificial death and a good moral(s).

I should add that the script perpetuates the myth that "The Lord helps those who help themselves" comes from the Bible. While a worthy proverb, it's not Scripture.

Watch out for Alan Hale Jr. (the Skipper from Gilligan's Island) playing Tiny.

THE MOVIE RUNS 1 hour 29 minutes and was shot in Redwood Groves, Orick and Eureka, California. WRITERS: John Twist and James R. Webb wrote the screenplay from Kenneth Earl's novel.

GRADE: B-/C+

While certainly watchable, "The Big Trees" had the makings of what could have been a better, perhaps much better, movie. With Kirk Douglas in the lead role, a supporting cast of solid character actors, settings that lend themselves to visually appealing scenery, and a story that raises worthwhile environmental and ethical issues, it could have been quite good.

As a predatory but charismatic lumberman, Douglas has a role that allows him to use some of his best strengths as an actor, and the scenario provides him with two main characters to play off of, with Edgar Buchanan as a loyal but incorruptibly honest associate, and Eve Miller as an idealist determined to save the redwood forest that Douglas's character plans to exploit. Buchanan is especially believable in his role.

The story and script, though, don't give Douglas or the others a lot to work with. The story never tackles the most important issues head-on, nor does it explore the most significant of the possible tensions in the characters' relationships with one another. The important environmental questions and other such topics are dealt with only on a surface level, and aside from Douglas's own character, who changes rather abruptly and unconvincingly, there is little character development. The religious angle was certainly well-intentioned, but it never seems to fit in comfortably with the other story elements.

It's still all right for lighter entertainment, and there are some good scenes. Then too, when Douglas gets the chance, he can be quite interesting to watch in this kind of role. As long as you don't expect too much, it might be worth seeing, but it missed quite a few opportunities to be a much more substantial movie.