The Outcasts of Poker Flat

The second of the four filmings of Bret Harte's best-known Gold Rush mining story was mostly shot in a saloon set with many closeups. Virginia Weidler (who would play Katherine Hepburn's younger sister in "The Philadelphia Story") prefigures Tatum O'Neal's Oscar-winning performance in "Paper Moon" as the cardsharp devoted to the gambler John Oakhurst, suavely played by Preston Foster. Van Heflin was surprisingly (to me anyway) handsome but already very earnest here as the parson. The good girl they both want is played with some spunk by Jean Muir and the partner pining for Oakhurst by Margaret Irving. The film looks good (credit cinematographer Robert De Grasse) but lacks the sparks of Marlene Dietrich and James Stewart in "Destry Rides Again." As in that film, the virtuous hero is not a goody-goody and is slow to resort to violence.

The Outcasts of Poker Flats (1937)

** (out of 4)

Decent version of a couple Bret Harte stories has been told many times over the years including a 1919 version by John Ford. This one here features Preston Foster playing John Oakhurst, a gambler working out West when the gold rush struck. He's got the biggest business in town but things start to change when a teacher (Jean Muir) and a preacher (Van Heflin) show up. The story itself wasn't too original but I found the performances to be so great that they made the film worth viewing. Foster is extremely good in the lead because he really makes one believe the character development that he goes through. I thought the actor managed to do the more action packed scenes well and he made you believe that he was this tough gambler who really didn't care about anyone but himself. Muir is also extremely good in her part and she and Foster has some great chemistry that leaps off the screen. Heflin easily steals the film as the young preacher who shows up hoping to change this rather dirty town. The supporting cast includes nice work from Virginia Weidler, Si Jenks, Al St. John and Billy Gilbert. I think the biggest problem with the film is the direction of Christy Cabanne who simply never makes it too interesting. Visually the film is quite flat and a lot of the emotion that the story is going for never comes off and this is especially true during the final minutes. Still, the performances are so good that fans of the actors will still want to check this out.

Preston Foster is a tough saloon owner who must deal with a changing town which doesn't want him anymore. Central to his personal dilemma is his foster daughter "Luck", born on the eve of the first strike in a gold rush, and the new schoolmarm in town, to whom he has become attached. Some crisp dialogue, interesting use of close-ups in shootouts prefigures Italian style of 30 years later. Lackluster photography in the literalist RKO mode. Heflin appears as a town minister who's determined to be fair to Foster regardless of his occupation and their penchant for the same woman.

Why did they mix the storyline and characters from two very good Bret Harte stories:1) The Outcasts of Poker Flat and 2) The Luck of Roaring Camp? It's confusing and makes this movie suck.

Bret Harte's classic story about a gambler/saloon owner in the Gold Rush days in California has had many adaptations to the big and small screen. This one starring Preston Foster, Jean Muir and Van Heflin is a good, albeit elaborated telling of the tale.

Preston Foster is our lead character, he owns the local saloon in a rip roaring mining camp in gold rush California. But times they are a changin'. He recognizes it too, Foster even goes so far as to sponsor the building of a church and a new parson in the person of Van Heflin comes to be its pastor.

A new schoolmarm comes as well and Jean Muir evokes the interest of both Foster and Heflin. Like John Wayne and James Stewart in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Foster and Heflin represent the old and new west.

Unlike Vera Miles in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Muir's choice is kind of forced on her when one of them dies. Who will it be?

The Outcasts of Poker Flat also has a fine performance by young Virginia Weidler as Foster's foster daughter. It's really for her that Preston realizes change in the west is inevitable.

This version of The Outcasts of Poker Flat is a an unpretentious telling of a classic tale by a great American writer.