Movie of the Week: Across the Wide Missouri (1951)
This week, Clark is roughin’ it as a 1800’s cowboy in Across the Wide Missouri.
Clark is Flint Mitchell, a fur trapper from Kentucky leading a group of French and Scottish trappers through the rugged West in the 1820’s. Battling Blackfoot Indians all the way, especially their chief Ironshirt (Ricardo Montalban), he finds love with an Indian chief’s granddaughter (portrayed by Mexican actress Maria Elena Marques).
When Clark was in New York City for a publicity tour for the film, he was interviewed by famed Los Angeles Times reporter Joe Hyams, who asked him about the film:
“It stinks,” [Clark] said, “and you can quote me on that.”
Indeed it rather does.
We have a lot here that could have been good: it’s one of Clark’s only handful of films in color, William Wellman is the director, the supporting cast includes Ricardo Montalban, John Hodiak and Clark’s longtime pal Adolphe Menjou.
But overall it just doesn’t come together. When the film wrapped, it was 135 minutes long. Test audiences reacted negatively, so back it went to the editing room. After they sliced and diced it, they added in a narrator to piece things together, which seems pointless. The narration comes in and out in random places; the whole thing feels disjointed. Howard Keel, portraying Clark’s son as an adult, is the uncredited narrator.
Extra cringe-worthy is Clark bartering a blackfoot Indian to marry his beautiful but willful daughter like she’s a piece of property. She doesn’t speak any English but yet they are supposedly in love. When she runs off one time, he spanks her in front of everyone. How lovely.
I do enjoy the scene where she throws things at him when he shows up drunk on their wedding night!
Ok, let’s be positive. Clark is really quite handsome in it this film, more than any of his other 1950’s movies in my opinion. He’s tan, he’s in shape, and yeah they used a lot of black hair dye in his hair but it looks pretty good.
Clark at this point was married to his fourth wife Sylvia Ashley and took her along on location. The making of this film proved to be one of the final straws in their already crumbling marriage. Lady Sylvia wasn’t exactly the type to be roughin’ it on location. She brought along seventeen trunks and her little dog Minnie, outfitted with a diamond collar. Sylvia would sometimes visit the set and sit on the sidelines in her finery as if she was in Beverly Hills, painting or doing needlepoint. Clark found this all quite embarrassing. But hey, they did pose for a bunch of cutesy photos that I highlighted in this post from a few years ago: Clark Gable Takes His Lady on Location
All in all this film isn’t horrible. Definitely not one of Clark’s all-time best, but tolerable for what it is. There are far better Westerns. Clark could do better. He makes good of what he has to work with here.
And hey, if you ever want to hear Clark sing and play “skip to my lou” on a hair comb or see Adolphe Menjou bathe Clark in a brook then this film’s for you.
Nutshell review is here