Bend of the River: Anthony Mann

It's oddly appropriate that I watched Anthony Mann's Bend of the River on Halloween: James Stewart essentially becomes Michael Myers in the last twenty minutes. Slowly, in the dark of the night, he picks off a group of thieves who betrayed him and stole a wagon full of desperately needed supplies for homesteaders so they could sell them at inflated prices to prospectors. Stewart has perhaps never been so threatening. I love the film's focus on the idea of redemption; whether or not people truly can reform from a life of wickedness. This isn't just a Western intended to entertain: it's asks important questions designed to make its audience think. Also, just like Jacques Tourneur’s Wichita (1955), you could easily classify the film as an anti-capitalist Western since the heroes have to fight off corrupt capitalists who want to let a handful of innocent settlers starve so they can make a killing (pun not intended) on the market. I need to look further into whether or not there are enough anti-capitalist Westerns from the Classical Hollywood Studio System that they could count as an authentic sub-genre...

8/10