tieman64 An underrated western by John Ford, "Wagon Master" watches as a group of Mormons trek their way toward Utah. They're led by Travis Blue (Ben Johnson) and Sandy Owens (Harry Carey), a pair of horsemen who know the terrain well.As he does in "Drums Along the Mohawk", Ford sculpts "Master" into a giant statement on "what it means to be American". In this regard, Americans are portrayed as bands of ostracised folk who are "pushed out of town" and who must learn to "survive in the wilderness". Here a nation's endurance depends on ordinary folk learning to work together, reconcile disparate agendas, and deal tactfully with other cultures, groups and persons of an "unscrupulous disposition". For all its nods to consensus building, however, and despite its positive portrayal of American Indians (reversing the stance of Ford's "Mohawk"), the film ultimately defers to the law of the bullet; drift too far outside the community, and you will be shot.At its best, "Master" indulges in a number of beautifully relaxed, low-key sequences. These scenes watch as new communities are built, pioneering spirits mesh and different groups (Mormons, criminals, Indians, horse traders, lawmen, prostitutes and show-people) come together. As a jovial myth, the film works well, but there's something dubious about the way Ford's cohesiveness depends on "Wagon Master's" violent opening scene, in which the film's villains announce themselves as bloodthirsty bogeymen.7.5/10 - Worth one viewing.

weezeralfalfa Virtually the only John Ford western of the '40s and '50s that didn't star John Wayne nor Henry Fonda. In Ben Johnson, we have a born and bred Oklahoma cowboy and rodeo champion, who served a long apprenticeship as a Hollywood horse wrangler and cowboy stunt man before Ford included him in several Wayne-starring westerns, before starring in this low budget western. I like to hear his distinctive Oklahoma accent. He certainly comes across as genuine, good looking, very laconic, and likable. His drifter partner is played by sandy-haired Harry Carey Jr., raised on a horse ranch by his Ford-favorite father. His familiarity with the Navaho language comes in handy when a party of such shows up.Johnson and Carey were both in the Ford cavalry films "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and "Rio Grande", they being again teamed as a buddy pair in the latter, also released in '50. Ford, having previously discovered the virtues of filming in the eastern Utah landscapes, pretty much forsook his previous favorite Monument Valley in this film and the soon to be shot "Rio Grande". Ford also retreated from the Technicolor of his last 2 westerns to his favored B&W for these 2 westerns.Like "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon", and unlike "Fort Apache" and "Rio Grande", potential pitched battles with 'Indians' are diffused, thus risking the criticism that "nothing happens". As with "Rio Grande", there is more than the usual amount of background music and music sung by the principals for a Ford film, with The Sons of the Pioneers supplying much of the former.In support, we have familiar Ward Bond, as leader of the Mormons, later to star in the "Wagon Train" TV series. Jane Darwell and Russell Simpson, who costarred with Fonda a decade earlier, as Ma and Pa Joad, in Ford's "The Grapes of Wrath", are reteamed. Simpson made the perfect beady-eyed, dour, god-fearing, largely silent, rustic authority figure. Jane came across as the ideal frontier matron figure, occasionally standing out with her horn blowing. Joanne Dru returns from stardom in "Red River" and "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" to again play the saucy romantic lead. She was well cast, although her flirtation with Johnson's character didn't clearly lead anywhere. Ford even found a small part for his older brother and film directing mentor, as the base drummer.We have a wagon train of Mormons, apparently traveling from the East, set on starting a new life in the unsettled rugged dry canyonland of the San Juan River valley, in the SW Colorado-SE Utah border region, then known by only a few wanderers and Native Americans. The historic 'hole-in-the-rock' wagon train journey that this story is based upon occurred in 1879-80, in winter, not summer as implied, and was an extremely difficult mile-a-day 180 day journey EASTWARD from Escalante, Utah, not from the Eastern US nor from the bogus Crystal City in the film, much longer than the seeming couple of weeks trip in this film.We finally get a glimpse of what much of the undertaking must have been like in the last portion of the film, when they had to hack out a passage over a ridge, and the wagons are nearly wrecked on this make-shift route to present Bluff, Utah.... The several times- mentioned California Trail, as a diversion from The Oregon Trail, was nowhere near the historic nor scripted trails. Also, unlike Hollywood's fixation on speedy horses(as in this film), pioneer immigrants had a strong preference for plodding oxen or more hardy mules to pull their wagons, whatever the preferences of westerns audiences.What begins as a purely Mormon wagon train soon is complicated by the addition of several small non-Mormon groups. The first is drifters Travis(Johnson) and Sandy(Carey), who serve as their guides and wagon masters. Soon, they chance upon a quack doctor/actor and two hoochie coochie, etc., women in fancy dress, with a wagon, drunk from their whisky, their mules having run off, leaving them stranded with no water. A while later, the 5 Cleggs, who robbed the Crystal City express office, show up during an evening dance. Huge James Arness is the most sinister looking and acting, while talkative charismatic Charles Kemper is the brains of this dim-witted evil bunch. Later, further complications are provided by a small band of (real) Navajos, and then a posse looking for the Cleggs.We can soon guess the ultimate outcome. But, we may still be entertained by the intervening events, which include a number of dances and rousing background songs, specially composed by Stan Jones and sung by the Sons of the Pioneers. The most memorable are "Wagons West", "Song of the Wagon Masters" and "Chuckawalla Swing" : the latter a dance song. Unusually, the finale consists of a series of several of Ford's favorite prior scenes from the film, most including the featured background singing, and ending with the river crossing. ...As the DVD commentators point out, Ford's experience shooting silent films had a strong impact on most of his talkies, where he often lets the visuals do much of the communicating. A particularly striking example is when the Cleggs unexpectedly show up at the dance, immediately changing the mood from gaiety to sinister. Expect to see some bucking broncos, a fist fight, some shootings, racing or overturning wagons, occasional humor, and a fast-galloping Johnson fleeing Navajos, who turn out to be friendly toward Mormons: fellow outcasts from standard white society. Being of Irish decent, Ford identified with persecuted minorities.Actually, this most reminds me of "The Grapes of Wrath": fleeing from trouble, in a long trying journey, across half the continent, with hopes of a new promised land at the end.

Spikeopath Wagon Master is directed by John Ford who also wrote the story from which Patrick Ford and Frank S. Nugent adapted the screenplay. It stars Ben Johnson, Ward Bond, Harry Carey Jr. and Joanne Dru. Richard Hageman scores the music and Bert Glennon is the photographer. Plot finds Mormon Elder Wiggs (Bond) hiring Travis Blue (Johnson) and Sandy Owens (Carey) to guide his communal Mormon group across the West to the San Juan River country in southeastern Utah Territory, in 1849. Along the way they encounter a wagonload of circus folk, stuck in limbo after their mule had scarpered. Evidently all boozed up, Elder still agrees to let them join his travel party. All is going well until the arrival of the Cleggs, a family of criminals on the run from the law...Filmed in black & white, shot in under a month and made for under a million dollars, Wagon Master is a classic John Ford picture. Said to be one of his personal favourite film's, it looks on the surface to be a minor work in the great director's oeuvre. Lacking some of the star power that goes with some of his critically acclaimed movies, Wagon Master triumphs because it's kept simple, where, a tight acting circle are given a lean and literate script to work from. The thematics at play are classic Ford, a community in the West are driven by their goals, but obstacles are inevitably put in the way to alter the equilibrium. All played out with lyrical photography, on the money music and some of that knowing gentle Ford comedy.As warm as a summers day and as close to Ford's view of the West as they come, Wagon Master comes highly recommended to Western and Ford purists. 8/10

Steffi_P The Western can be divided into many sub-genres. One of the broadest divisions is that between Town Westerns and Plains Westerns. Most Westerns are a mix of both, but at one end of the spectrum you have pictures like High Noon and Rio Bravo that take place almost entirely in a settlement, seldom venturing out into the real outdoors. At the other end you have ones like Wagon Master, where there is barely a homestead on view amid the wilderness.Director John Ford normally thrived on the "bit of both" Westerns, shooting the interiors with an emphasis on their being small and confined, and then contrasting this with the wide open exteriors, which appeared both exciting and dangerous. Wagon Master has a typical Frank Nugent script, with some interplay between seasoned oldsters and green youngsters, but still it presents Ford with some fresh challenges. In this picture, the dangers do not come from the harshness of the landscape, they come from within the group in the form of the Cleggses. What's more, the absence of real interior scenes means the outdoors could lose its impact over time.However, Ford was a real maestro when it came to manipulating space. He shoots scenes of the camp or the wagons so the frame is surrounded and we get that same sense of enclosure as we would in a genuine interior. Also, compared to his other Westerns, he does not in fact open out the space too much, having the wagon trail wend its way through canyons and passes rather than cross the stark and empty plains. One of the few moments where he does throw the landscape wide open is when the Indians are spotted and there is the possibility of a threat from outside.Wagon Master features some surprisingly effective moments of comic relief, and some great contributions from the quirky cast. Harry Carey Jr. was shaping up into a fine actor like his pa, and this is one of his better early roles. Joanne Dru was disappointing in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, but she appears more at ease as a character with a bit of sass, and is actually fairly good here. Jane Darwell, who won an Oscar in the John Ford-directed Grapes of Wrath a decade earlier, appears here with sole function of performing a running gag in which she sounds a feeble old horn. Still, with her great timing and movement she makes the piece work. Francis Ford, in one of the many mute drunkard roles he played in his little brother's pictures, is at his cheeky best.And now we come to lead man Ben Johnson. Although he was by no means a bad actor, he was never going to become a big star like John Wayne. And yet, with his effortless horsemanship and easygoing drawl, he was one of the most authentically "West" players around. And this brings me onto my final point. This was apparently one of Ford's personal favourites, despite it seeming fairly unassuming. Wagon Master has no grand theme or dramatic intensity, it is simply the genre playing itself out. I think this is what Ford loved about it. It's a picture for the Ben Johnsons and the Harry Carey Jrs, not the John Waynes or the Henry Fondas. Small in scope, but worthy in its class.