Just perfect...

From my favorite movies..

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The first of director Edward Dmytryk's four oaters, "Broken Lance" draws its title from the clash between Robert Wagner and Richard Widmark, the sons of Spencer Tracy's patriarchal figure, in ad sprawling horse opera about a cattle baron and his offspring. Joe MacDonald's Cinemascope lensing imbues this soap opera with a sprawling sense of dignity, and Dmytryk prefers to use compositions that accentuate real-life settings. Furthermore, Dmytryk was so enamored of the 2:35.1 compositional frame that he rarely cut into the various long shots that appear in this melodrama. No stranger to westerns, MacDonald lensed John Ford's "My Darling Clementine," William A. Wellman's "Yellow Sky" and Dmytryk's "Warlock." For the record, "Broken Lance" is a remake of the 1949 Edward G. Robinson contemporary melodrama "House of Strangers." This frontier yarn benefits from a superb cast and stunning scenery, but the story is hopelessly lame. "Broken Lance" concerns the twilight of the cattle industry because the Richard Murphy screenplay deals with Spencer Tracy's baron after he has made himself into a central figure influential enough to install his own personal choice for governor in the office. The plot deals with a showdown between Tracy's cattle baron and a copper mining outfit's organization. Sadly, "Broken Lance" doesn't boast enough audacious scenes to offset the long stretches of talking among the principals. Nothing surpasses the scene where Wagner pulls another man's gun and blasts a rattler poised to strike in the first part of the film. After this interesting opening, "Broken Lance" degenerates into a loquacious soap opera. Three-fourths of the action occurs in flashback as we follow Wagner after he serves a three-year stretch in prison and comes home to find everything changed with the passage of his father. Spencer Tracy's patriarchal figure Matt Devereaux has four sons. Three of them came from his first wife, while the Robert Wagner character was the product of Matt's third marriage to an Indian (Katy Jurado of "High Noon"). "Broken Lance" appropriates a social consciousness stance because it favors the emergence of Robert Wagner' half-breed adult and how he contends with his racist siblings. Richard Widmark, Hugh O'Brien, and Earl Holliman are cast as Matt's American children that he loathes as much as they hate him. The main crisis occurs when Matt and his sons discover 40 of their cattle have died from drinking from a river contaminated by a copper mine. Altogether, "Broken Lance") isn't very exciting.

As the film begins Joe Devereaux is picked up and told that he is being taken to see the state governor; when he gets there he learns of a deal that has been struck between the governor and his three brothers… he has just finished a three year jail sentence and they want him well away; to this end they give him ten thousand dollars and instructions to be on the night train to Oregon. Instead of accepting the deal he throws the money in the spittoon and rides back to his family's ranch; it has been abandoned for some time but a portrait of his father still hangs over the fireplace. The action then jumps back a few years to when his father Matt Devereaux was still alive and running the ranch. We quickly learn that he is a hard man who pays his sons the same amount that he pays the rest of his hands and thinks nothing of trying to trick Barbara, the governor's daughter, into eating a chilli pepper during dinner. She eats it even after being told what it is and after dinner she and Joe spend some time together and grow close. Shortly afterwards the governor tells Matt that he doesn't want Joe seeing her because he is half Indian; it is clear that this prejudice is the thing that offends Matt the most. Soon afterwards they discover some of their cattle dead; poisoned by the run-off from the nearby copper mine. When they go to visit the manager a confrontation ensues and the mine buildings are destroyed. This is the beginning of the end for Matt; taken to court, he faces losing everything till Joe claims to have drawn first; he is jailed so Matt decides to settle… his other sons won't allow it though. Joe ends up spending three years in jail and his father gradually fades away and dies while his brothers run the ranch the way they want under the leadership of eldest brother Ben. When events catch up with what we saw in the opening scenes Joe says he intends to leave with Barbara; Ben has other ideas though and the two of them must confront each other.This western was different from most I've seen; usually the cattlemen are fighting each other or trying to run farmers off their land but here a cattleman is in conflict with a mining company and the conflict is resolved on the floor of a courtroom not in the middle of the street with a pair of six-shooters. Spencer Tracy did a fine job as the elderly Matt Devereaux; portraying him as a strong, harsh man who did have a protective side towards his Indian wife and half-Indian youngest son; as his character became broken he remained believable. Robert Wagner did a good job as Joe and Richard Widmark impressed as Ben, the eldest brother who had a long standing, and to a degree justified grievance against his father. Often in films of this era the Native Americans are portrayed as the villains but this film treats them far more sympathetically with one protagonist married to an Indian woman and the other, his son, half Indian; this made a refreshing change. While this isn't this most action packed western I've seen it has enough and the story is good; I'd certainly recommend it to fans of the genre.

Broken Lance sticks mighty close to the time-proved Western formula, but thanks largely to the skill of director Dmytryk who makes the most of the movie's rich production values, is all the more powerful because of this close adherence. What we have here is (1) an engrossingly realistic story with plenty of strong narrative action and realistic character conflicts; (2) breathtakingly rugged scenery; and (3) star value, particularly in the persons of Spencer Tracy and Richard Widmark (although the latter is let down badly when the screenplay suddenly deserts him at the climax). Hugh O'Brian, Earl Holliman and Katy Jurado also contribute forceful characterizations, easily out-classing the too boyishly eager Robert Wagner and the disappointing Jean Peters (who is further burdened by unflatteringly frumpish photography and colorless costumes).

This 1954 Cinemascope flick, full of action, was inspired by Shakepeare's King Lear (as was West Side Story by Romeo and Juliet) and you can appreciate that in the script adaptation (which won an Academy Award). There's some great acting in it. Tracy, Peters, Wagner, Widmark and Katy Jurado (also nominated as best supporting actress for the film) are all top rate. Dmytric directed a very special western (that is much more than just a simple western because it has character). The film, his direction and most of its players should have been considered for Academy Awards. Nominated were also the cinematography and the musical score (which won). If you like westerns, definitely see it. If you don't, you should consider some of its other outstanding assets: Its theme, plot, suspense, no-nonsense romance, bigot-ism, action, family betrayal and the exceptional combination of great cinematography, with top level direction and acting. This was movie-making at its best. They don't make them like that anymore!