The Outlaw

TCM ran The Outlaw last month. Not having blogged about it before, I DVRed it so that I could re-watch to do a post. The movie has a reputation that precedes itself, but as for the actual movie? Well, that's as interesting as its reputation, but for different reasons.

The movie opens with Doc Holliday (Walter Huston) showing up in the town of Lincoln in the New Mexico Territory. His horse has been stolen, as he tells his old friend who's now the sheriff, Pat Garrett (Thomas Mitchell). Who should show up with a horse that looks suspiciously like Holliday's? Why, it's William Bonney (Jack Beutel), better known as Billy the Kid. He claims to have bought the horse legitimately, although Doc isn't so sure.

Billy the Kid is known around the Southwest for being a gunfighter, which makes the sheriff none too happy, and he'd like to get Billy out of town immediately, even though there's no stage until the next morning. And sure enough, Billy gets involved in gunfights, first with one other guy and then with a bunch of men the sheriff sends to deal with Billy. Since somebody ultimately dies, Billy and Doc have to head out.

Doc has a lady friend in young Rio (Jane Russell), who lives with Guadalupe (Mimi Aguglia). So Doc takes the wonded Billy there in hopes that he can recover. Guadalupe isn't thrilled to have Billy around, and is frankly hoping he'll die, but Rio finds this young man hot in spite of his near-death situation. However, Doc seems to think she should be his girlfriend, so he's not very pleased with her treatment of Billy.

Eventually, Billy recovers, and he and Doc have to head out to safety so that the sheriff and his men won't chase. But there's the unresolved issue of Rio, as well as the dispute over the horse. Further complicating matters is that some of the Indians decide to attack, leaving all the white folk running for their lives....

The Outlaw is a bizarre little movie that has no bearing in reality. Although the three male characters are all based on real people, as far as I could tell none of them had relationships like the ones depicted in the movie. Indeed, there's an undercurrent throughout the movie that could easily lead you to believe that Doc and Billy are gay lovers like Bert and Ernie. But, at the same time, it's made fairly clear that Rio has been sleeping with Billy. It's a really strange plot.

Then there's the direction, which was handled by Howard Hughes after Howard Hawks left the project. I found the direction risibly bad, looking like a bad Saturday matinee western with characters standing around declaiming their lines. Hughes obviously intended the movie as a vehicle for his two new stars, particularly Russell, whose ample assets are on as full display as the production code would permit. And then there was the score. Large portions of it were lifted straight from Tchaikovsky, and didn't fit the action on screen at all. Other portions were bad derivatives of B movie cues. I usually only tend to notice a score if it's jarringly bad, and this one certainly fits that description.

The Outlaw is a movie that should be seen for its place in Hollywood history. But it's really not very good.