Across the Wide Missouri

"Across the Wide Missouri" was planned as a sprawling saga of early 19th Century Americana, so there are questions as to how and why it ended up in its present truncated 78 minute form, not much longer than a "B" picture. There shouldn't be any argument that director William A. 'Wild Bill' Wellman's original vision was grander in scope, even epic. Evidence of the cutting can be clearly seen in the cover of the DVD, which duplicates the original one sheet poster. Actor James Whitmore, a big favorite of Wellman's, is given co-star billing and is listed fourth overall in the cast behind MGM leading men Clark Gable, Ricardo Montalban, and John Hodiak and ahead of such venerable character actors as Adolphe Menjou, J. Carrol Naish, and Jack Holt.

Whitmore had starred in the director's previous film, "The Next Voice You Hear" in 1951 and had earned an Oscar nomination for his scene-stealing performance in Wellman's iconic 1949 WWII actioner "Battleground." In the released version Whitmore is not billed in the opening credits and does not appear in the 78 minute film until some 33 minutes into the movie. He cannot be spotted with the mountain men in the sizable "Rendezvous" sequence early in the picture and is not seen on the trek over the Rockies until they're halfway there when he suddenly appears out of nowhere on top of a snow-covered mountain. For the remainder of the film he has only a handful of unimportant lines, which makes one wonder why one of Hollywood's most respected character actors would be squandered in what is essentially a bit role. Among the many ironies associated with this film is that, according to studio records, his character's name is "Bit."

Wellman's MGM contract had concluded with the completion of "The Next Voice You Hear," but when Metro found themselves without a director for their scheduled epic, they asked Wellman to helm the film. 'Wild Bill' agreed on the condition that he be allowed to bring his family along with him on location - at the studio's expense, an offer he couldn't refuse when MGM agreed to his request. With three A-list stars, an exceptional supporting class of character actors, and breathtakingly beautiful locations, it should have been a blockbuster. It wasn't.

The blame, if any, can be laid at the feet of studio boss, Dore Schary, who undoubtedly panicked after attending a preview when he found that the audience that had cheered the opening credits "lost interest" about halfway through. Producer Sam Zimbalist, who wasn't involved with the picture, suggested drastic cuts to be bridged by an afterthought narration by Howard Keel. Although scripted by Talbot Jennings, one of the film's co-writers, the narration is leadenly heavy-handed and overly literal and drowns the director's visual subtleties. An embittered Wellman remarked, " They cut out all the action and put in a narration to fill the holes. This was a good, long picture the way I made it. I've never seen it and I never will." Ironically Wellman re-signed with MGM, and his next picture, "Westward the Women," covered some of the same territory as "Missouri," albeit more successfully.

An added irony is that the same Dore Schary, supposedly the most literate and tasteful of all studio heads in Golden Age Hollywoosd, was a serial offender. Only a few months earlier he butchered John Huston's brilliant adaptation of "The Red Badge of Courage" down to "B" picture length of a mere 69 minutes with bridging narration spoken by non-other than... James Whitmore!

One last sad irony... as I write this review, news that Judy Lewis, age 76, passed away today is on the Web. She was the secret love child of Clark Gable and Loretta Young, conceived during the filming of another Wellman Western epic, "The Call of the Wild" in 1935. Miss Young never acknowledged that Lewis was her biological daughter and claimed she was adopted. Lewis' memoir "Uncommon Knowledge" was published in 1995.

When one watches western films of the latter half of the 19th century, the settlement of the west was on a course that was nothing but bad for the American Indian. As good as some westerns are, always lingering in the back of any viewer's mind is the thought that no matter what the predicament of a given hero/heroine in any film is the fact that the might and power of the United States Cavalry will ultimately tip the balance towards the white man.

But the fur trappers of the early half of that century faced a far different situation. They were few and the Indians at that point outnumbered them. These people as typified by Clark Gable and the rest of the cast in Across the Wide Missouri were the really brave ones in our history. They wanted to trap their beaver and sell their pelts and the last thing they wanted was wholesale immigration of settlers. It took a lot of nerve to live in that lonely existence, days and weeks at a time where you couldn't count on a troop of soldiers to bail you out of trouble.

I'm a big old sucker for films about the earlier west and two good ones came out at this time, this one and the following year from RKO, The Big Sky. I give the nod to this one thought because it was done in color and on location.

Gable gets one of his best post World War II parts as the sturdy Flint Mitchell, mountain man who falls big time for Indian princess Maris Elena Marques. While grandfather Jack Holt approves of a white husband for his granddaughter, the match don't sit well at all with Ricardo Montalban his successor. The climatic duel between Gable and Montalban is staged very well indeed and quite thrilling.

Playing various fur trapper roles are Alan Napier, James Whitmore, John Hodiak and most of all Adolphe Menjou. Though one normally expects the debonair Mr. Menjou in tuxedo, he's really quite good as the French Canadian trapper and sidekick to Gable.

Maria Elena Marquess got her first of two chances in Hollywood and did well as the Indian princess. She was already a name in Mexican cinema and became an even bigger star down there due to this film with Clark Gable.

This film marked the farewell performance of Jack Holt who died soon after it was completed. His career spanned all the way back to the earliest years of Hollywood. He makes a very impressive chief of the Blackfeet.

Gable was a rugged outdoors-man in real life, he liked to fish and hunt and brought his fourth wife, Lady Sylvia Ashley on location. Unfortunately Lady Sylvia was not a big fan of the great outdoors and her experiences roughing it contributed to the Gables getting unhitched.

Director William Wellman kept things going at a good clip and though Across the Wide Missouri is slightly over 75 minutes for an A film, it's still a great item and rates being an A film for its cast and its production values.

This movie, for me, is just plain fun and it invokes a lot of memories at 68 years old. My grandfather, 1879-1966, used to speak the Chinook Trading Jargon. The Jargon was a trade language made up of English, French and Indian. It was primarily used on the west coast and as far east as Montana as a common language for trading etc. When I was a little boy my granddad and I used to talk back and forth in Chinook. What we hear in the movie is quite accurate, although they speak too fast for me to keep up with. Needless to say, that with the passage of time, the language has all but disappeared from everyday use. There are, however, people dedicated to keeping it alive and they sometimes have a yearly "rendezvous" where it is spoken and lessons are taught.

Thank you very one for your time. Klahowya Sikhs. (Goodbye friends).

Bernard DeVoto won a Pulitzer Prize for history in 1948 for his 1947 book, "Across the Wide Missouri." Some sources say that after MGM bought the film rights, the studio threw away everything except the title. That's hardly the case, because this film does a very good job of showing life in the early days of the American Northwest. DeVoto's book, and this film are mostly about the native Indians and the white trappers known as mountain men. The latter were a breed of early pioneers that flourished in the 19th century from about 1810 to the early 1880s.

The stage was set for all of this in 1803 when the U.S. acquired the Louisiana Territory from France. The 828,000 square miles doubled the size of the young nation. The purchase brought in all the lands west that drained into the Mississippi River. But most of the lands west of the Missouri River had not yet been explored. President Thomas Jefferson got Congress to approve an expedition to explore the Northwest to the Pacific Ocean.

After the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-1806, written accounts of it aroused great interest in the East. The mountain men became the first Americans of European descent to migrate to the region. They went first as trappers and explorers who made their living in the lucrative fur- trade. The mountain men peaked in numbers around 1840, at the time the largest U.S. migration began over the 2,200-mile Oregon Trail.

The mountain men helped open the emigrant trails. They explored and lived and dealt mostly at peace with the various Indian tribes. This movie shows all of this very well. MGM filmed the movie in Southwest Colorado, from Durango to Silverton. The spectacular scenery adds to the value and enjoyment of the film.

I am a history buff and during the years leading up to and through the 2004-2006 bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, I spent most of my summer vacations traveling and visiting sites along the Lewis and Clark route. One of my guides for these trips was "The Journals of Lewis and Clark," written by Bernard DeVoto in 1953. DeVoto and Lewis and Clark give excellent accounts of the Indians of the time. This movie covers two groups that are prominent in the journals – the Blackfeet and the Nez Perce.

I wonder how familiar the playwrights might have been with the journals. Their story of the young Indian maiden in the movie is similar to that of a real person with Lewis and Clark. Here, Kamiah is of the Blackfeet tribe. She was captured and raised by the Nez Perce. In the Lewis and Clark Expedition, a young Indian wife of a French Canadian trapper, Toussaint Charbonneau, became an invaluable guide across the Indian lands of the Northwest. She was Sacagawea, a Shoshone Indian from the Snake River country of Idaho. She had been captured by the Hidatsa and taken to their village along the Missouri River in what is now North Dakota. At age 13, she was sold to Charbonneau as a wife.

This movie has a large cast of first-rate actors. Clark Gable is excellent as Flint Mitchell. Adolphe Menjou excels as Pierre. Maria Elena Marques is dazzling as Kamiah. All the actors who played major Indian parts were very good. Ricardo Montalban plays Ironshirt, John Hodiak is Brecan, J. Carrol Naish is Looking Glass, and Jack Holt is Bear Ghost. The rest of the mountain men and the supporting cast of Indians add to the historical feel and enjoyment of the film.

There was an apparent controversy that arose over this film. From the various accounts I've read, it's not even clear what it was all about. The studio head at the time apparently chopped quite a lot out of the film. Enough, that director William Wellman disowned the movie and said he would never watch it. He alluded to the best action parts being taken out. Apparently, James Whitmore, who plays a mountain man, Old Bill, had much more of a part, and most of his film time was cut out. It would be nice to see a director's cut, which probably no longer exists.

But that aside, I think this is still a first-rate film. It has action, scenery and a beautiful story told about a very interesting time and place in America's history. From that standpoint alone, it is much more valuable than the two popular mountain men pictures that were made, "Jeremiah Johnson" (1972) and "The Mountain Men" (1980).

"Across the Wide Missouri" is a film that most should enjoy. It's an excellent snapshot of a pioneer period of the American West.

This is a lyric Western about trappers , it's a homage to integration between human being and Nature , being inspired by the book by Bernard De Voton with screenplay by Talbot Jennings . The story of a tough trapper , titan of a woman and her love for dashing Indian girl . Created by a a great picture maker at incalculable cost with a superb cast of thousands in especially recreated old Rocky Mountains . Turbulent adventure set against the rich ,romantic tapestry of early Colorado state . Trapper Flint Mitchell (Clark Gable) and other mountain men from the Rendezvous join forces to enter virgin trapping territory but must contend with a resentful Blackfoot chief . Flint marries an Indian woman (Maria Elena Marques) so he can trap beaver pelts on her people's rich land . On the trip to the Indian territory however , he falls in in love with his bride .

This colorful film contains beautiful scenery , tempestuous Indian attacks , war , lawless raids , a love story , intrepid men and women ; at last , in all its wild , brave magnificence , the motion picture of valiant trappers . Deliberately paced , elegiac Western , including marvelous landscapes from Rocky Mountains . Interesting historical/drama/Western is slightly marred by the continuous use of narration provided by Howard Keel . This poetic film focuses the insertion of human being into nature . Most of the "Native Americans" in this movie are all portrayed by Hispanic or Caucasian actors, because there was a noticeable lack of Native American actors at MGM at the time this movie was made. When the original version of the finished film was submitted to MGM executives, they didn't like it. The film went through heavy editing, and a producer had the idea of tying together the surviving pieces by adding voice-over narration from Mitchell's grown up son, as if he is telling his father's life story. Howard Keel, who had just finished making Magnolia, was brought in for this purpose as voice in off . The changes led to director William A. Wellman effectively disowning the film. When asked about it in an interview, he said "I've not seen it, and I never will" . Gable gives a good acting as a rugged fur trapper who marries an Indian woman , Clark along with Maria Elena Marques form a memorable couple . Clark Gable personally chose William A. Wellman to direct because he admired ¨Battlegroud¨. Lively acting from support cast as Adolphe Menjou as a French tippler , J Carrol Naish as quirky Indian Chief , and John Hodiak , Alan Napier as two Scottish men . Furthermore, debut of Timothy Carey and final film of Jack Holt .Evocative cinematography shot with heavy Technicolor cameras by William Mellor , filmed on location in Durango, Colorado,La Plata Canyon, San Juan National Forest, Durango, Molas Lake, Silverton, Colorado,Ouray County, Haviland Dam, San Juan National Forest, Little Boyce Lake, San Juan National Forest,Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, Durango, Colorado . Sensitive as well as enjoyable musical score by David Raskin , including an agreeable leitmotif .

The motion picture was stunningly directed by William A Wellman , a veteran professional from silent cinema . Wellman has directed all kind of genres as Wartime : ¨Alas¨ , ¨Battleground¨ , ¨The story of GI Joe¨ , ¨Lafayette Escadrilla¨ , Drama : ¨Nothing sacred¨, ¨Blood Alley¨ , ¨Good my lady¨ , ¨Magic Town and the Oscarized ¨A Star is born¨ , his greatest success , Adventure : ¨Beau Geste¨ , Gangster movie : ¨Public enemy ¨, and Western : ¨Buffalo Bill¨ , ¨The Ox-Box incident¨ , ¨Westerward the woman¨ and this A¨cross the wide Missouri¨. rating : Above average , worthwhile watching .