The Trail of Broken Men

 COWBOY (1958)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

I sort of ran into this film by pure accident. I am lover of westerns and have enjoyed many from the 1950's and beyond so a western starring Glenn Ford and Jack Lemmon gave me goosebumps. It is a solidly fine western, a more realistic look at what it was really like being part of a cattle drive. "Cowboy" has got much to recommend though some of the characters are shopworn  - you may not mind it because a specific look and feel of the life of a cowboy is still splendidly told. 

When the name Reece is announced at a Chicago hotel, all the hotel employees do what they can to accommodate the cattle rustler (this includes changing rooms for the guests who have already settled in). The hotel desk clerk Frank (Jack Lemmon, in a curiously understated performance) is miffed that guests have to be relocated especially the highly regarded cattle baron Señor Vidal, and his daughter Maria (Anna Kashfi, severely underused) whom Frank is in love with. Naturally El Señor Vidal disapproves. But what about this Reece (Glenn Ford, in a typically forceful performance) and why all the fussiness over this man and his cattle hands? I can't say except he is a regular visitor though apparently he is not a very good poker player - he loses his winnings which he needs for the next cattle drive. Guess who wants to finance his next cattle drive and come along! Why none other than Frank himself who might know how to mount a horse but has no skills against handling horned cattle.

"Cowboy" shows the arduousness of the frontier west and the dangers one encounters like poisonous rattlesnakes. It also deals with the tough decisions to bury those who die on the trail due to snake bites or other factors and to move on because a job needs to be done. When Reece shows a coldness and remove from the death of a cattle hand, Frank is taken aback. Later we learn through Glenn Ford's extraordinarily subtle performance that his actions and emotional reserve need to change when Frank is slowly becoming as indifferent as Reece. 

Based on Frank Harris's semi-autobiographical novel "My Reminiscences as a Cowboy," "Cowboy" is often stirring and surefooted in its style, not excluding how beautifully shot it is from what looks like mostly outdoor shots (very few rear screen projection shots). One amazingly tantalizing shot in particular is when Frank meets Maria at a Guadalupe church shown in silhouette near dawn - John Ford would've killed for shots like that. Less successful is the inclusion of Reece trying to place a ring on a bull's horn as he rides his horse - this sequence goes on forever. Jack Lemmon would also not have been my first choice to play Frank - he is too modern an actor to play that role. A very fine western overall and watching Ford and Lemmon go at each other's necks is often riveting entertainment.