Movie of the Week: The King and Four Queens (1956) and Band of Angels (1957)

This week, Clark Gable is in two back-to-back color features, the Western The King and Four Queens (1956) and the Civil War-era drama Band of Angels (1957).

In this Cinemascope Western, Gable is Dan Kehoe, a fugitive outlaw on the hunt for gold. In one town, he hears the story of the bandit McDade brothers, who were blown up in an explosion after stealing a huge pot of gold. Three charred, unrecognizable bodies were found, meaning one brother escaped but nobody knows which one. The gold was hidden by their mother, who is guarding it and the sons’ four wives in the deserted town of Wagon Mound. Kehoe makes up a story and hides out in Wagon Mound, befriending (and flirting with) each of the McDade widows– skeptical Sabina (Eleanor Parker), bombshell Birdie (Barbara Nichols), sweet-natured Oralie (Sara Shane) and feisty Ruby (Jean Willes), leading them on in hopes one of them can lead him to the gold. This is all much to the chagrin of Ma McDade (Jo Van Fleet), who is determined to keep each of the wives virtuous for the one brother who may return.

Ehhhhh I don’t like this movie. I watched it again this week for the first time in probably six years. It’s just so blatantly sexist. The wives, with the exception of Eleanor, are all caricatures. Barbara’s the ditsy showgirl, Sara’s the sweet one, Jean’s the tough one. And the mother keeping all the girls on leashes because OF COURSE they would all throw themselves at the first man they’ve seen in two years (and of course, they do).

I guess something can be said about the plot twist (SPOILER) that in the end Eleanor was never married to a McDade brother and was there all along trying to steal the gold. She knew all the brothers were dead the whole time, which is so cruddy of her. These other three women are sitting around there for two years, just in case their husband is the one that comes home, and there Eleanor is, sitting with them, all the while knowing they’re all dead and the women could be off leading their own lives instead of being imprisoned by Ma McDade.

The “bad guys” win in the end on this one too, as Clark and Eleanor ride off into the sunset with their stolen money and the other three girls are stuck being smacked around by Ma. I guess they could have left after discovering the gold was stolen—but they still would never know that all four boys are dead.

The most notable thing about this film is it is the one and only film Clark Gable produced. Eager to branch out after his separation from MGM, Clark decided to try his hand out as a producer and formed a production company with Jane Russell’s husband, Bob Waterfield. After casting, location scouting, editing and tending to all the minute details of the film in addition to starring in it, he found being a producer too stressful, so this begun and ended his tenure as producer.

Nutshell review is here

Clark Gable followed up with another color picture. This time he returned to the Civil War era in Band of Angels (1957).

Yvonne De Carlo is Amantha Starr, a Kentucky belle who has lived a life of privilege on her father’s plantation. While she is away at finishing school, her father dies. When she returns for his funeral, she learns that her father was deep in debt and all his assets are being sold. She is shocked when, as the debt collectors round up his slaves for auction, she is told that she too will be on the auction block. She was never told that her mother, long deceased, was an African American slave. She is immediately put on a boat for New Orleans to be part of a slave auction. Wealthy Hamish Bond (Gable) shows up and wins her for $5,000. At first, she is very unhappy and disagreeable towards Hamish, but soon she grows great affection for him. She turns down his offer for her to be sent to Cincinnati to be free and joins him instead on his plantation in southern Louisiana. But their romance is doomed when Amantha learns the truth about Hamish’s past.

At this point in his career, Clark, like most of his contemporaries, was paired romantically onscreen with actresses young enough to be his daughter. Yvonne, while gorgeous, generates no spark with Clark here. Nor does she pass for being half-black, which is of course the point–that nobody ever knew she was half-black. Still rather far fetched.

The whole concept of buying a woman at a slave auction, taking her home and putting her in pretty dresses and then expecting that, of course, she’ll sleep with you is creepy and gross. I don’t think the film gives a good enough explanation as to what makes Yvonne change her mind from being outraged at the idea of sleeping with him to being like “well, okay.”

Are we to believe that Clark could only get a girl to sleep with him by paying for her?

Some of the better scenes are of Clark facing off with Sidney Poitier’s character, a slave owned by Clark whom he treats “like a son.” Young Sidney is bursting out the gate showing us his full potential here.

The film was a complete flop and was critically panned. It was inevitably compared to Gone with the Wind and critics found the chemistry between Clark and Yvonne de Carlo “absurd.” Although Parnell is usually mentioned as being Clark’s worst film, technically Band of Angels lost more money and received far worse reviews. Being compared to GWTW certainly did it no favors, and apparently it strayed from the novel quite a bit. I’ve been told the novel is much better.

This film is in my bottom five of Gable movies for sure. It tries to be a poor man’s GWTW, there’s no chemistry with Yvonne, his character is a creep. He looks handsome in it. There’s that.