Two Rode Together

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Two Rode Together is a western film directed by John Ford. The 1961 film stars James Stewart, Richard Widmark and Shirley Jones. Also Linda Cristal, best known for her performance as Victoria Cannon in The High Chaparral. The film was shot on location in Brackettville, Texas, USA.

[edit] Overview

This is widely rated as a good film, if not a classic.^[1] James Stewart's character is interesting, no hero but not a villain either.

The main theme is the attempt to recover white captives from the Comanches. McCabe insists that this is a bad idea - anyone taken as a child will now see themselves as a Comanche and will not remember their own family. But if he's paid enough, he will do try to buy back the captives.

The film has some moments of humour. A widow has just given birth, a year after her husband was buried in the church house. McCabe's response is:

Well, there are some men you just can't trust to stay where you put 'em.

But this is not a comic western: there is also a lot of tragedy and loss, dealt with seriously. The film also makes interesting points about cultural assimilation and cultural acceptance.

[edit] Plot

The army is being importuned by settlers who have lost relatives whom they hope to recover. Marty Purcell (Shirley Jones) cannot let go of the memory of her lost younger brother and keeps a music box that he values. McCabe (Jimmy Stewart) warns her that the brother will not remember him. But he goes along with the mission because he expects it to pay well. First Lieutenant Jim Gary (Richard Widmark) is offended by this cynicism, but also hopes to do some good with McCabe’s help.

They find four white captives among the Comanches. One is a young woman who is now married and has babies, as was predicted earlier. She does not want to come back, and nor does an old woman who was believed dead and regards herself as dead. There is also a young man whom McCabe hopes to trade for a thousand dollars to a rich man who has promised to recover his wife’s lost son from an earlier marriage. And there is a Mexican woman, Elena de la Madriaga, (Linda Cristal,) whom McCabe takes charge of. She is the wife of 'Stone Calf', a militant rival of Chief Quanah Parker, the Indian that McCabe does business with. You could interpret this as a plot between the two men to kill off a dangerous rival warrior, which McCabe does indeed achieve when Stone Calf comes after him.

The young white man raised as a Comanche is utterly hostile, does not remember his origins and McCabe’s rich employer won’t accept him. It is suggested that he be released and allowed to return to the Comanches, where he feels at home. But another man does claim the lad, hoping to please his demented wife who thinks that this is her lost son. He isn’t, and also he gratuitously kills the woman after she frees him and then tried to trim his long hair. The setters hang the lad, despite Lieutenant Gary’s protests. As they are dragging him to be lynched, he knocks over the music box, hears it play and claims it for his own. This is Marty’s brother, whom she never recognised, as McCabe had warned. She accepts that there was nothing that could have been done and marries Lieutenant Gary.

Elena meantime wants nothing more than to re-assimilate, but finds herself rejected as a woman who submitted to savages. She decides to try her luck in California. Meantime McCabe learns that he was reported dead and has been replaced. He complains "I didn't get a chance to vote for myself - not even once." But also he now loves Elena, thinking she showed courage just by surviving. "You know, sometimes it takes a lot more courage to live than it does to die." He decides to go to California along with Elena.

[edit] References

1. ^ It's no classic, but it is quite a good film. Jimmy Stewart plays Marshal Guthrie McCabe, a gruff, old, drunken sheriff who can speak Comanche. Richard Widmark plays First Lieutenant Jim Gary, a cavalryman assigned to accompany him on a mission to buy white captives away from the Comanches.IMDb