Out west with Gloria Grahame

Gloria Grahame was TCM's Star of the Month some months back, which gave me the chance to record a couple of her movies that I hadn't seen before. Now, Grahame isn't the sort of person you'd think of when you think westerns; she seems a bit too glamorous for the genre. But in the studio era they put their stars in all sorts of stuff, so it's unsurprising that Grahame got cast in at least one western: Roughshod.

We don't see Grahame right away. Instead, even before the opening credits we see a couple of men in the sort of striped shirt that makes it obvious that they're escaped convicts. They're led by a man named Lednov (John Ireland); coming upon a band of cowboys, they murder the cowboys for the cowboys' clothes since those clothes wouldn't identify their wearer as prisoners. It's only in the next scene that we meet Grahame. She plays Mary Wells, who ran one of those houses of ill repute, at least until the people in the town where she was working decided they wanted to be respectable. So they too are headed to California.

At the next town, Clay stops, where he's informed by the sheriff that Lednov has escaped prison. That's important because Clay was instrumental in getting Lednov put behind bars in the first place. Everybody naturally thinks that Lednov is going to be out looking for Clay to gain revenge. Meanwhile, when Clay and Steve get back out on the road, they run into Mary and her companions. The women's wagon has broken a wheel, so they're in need of assistance. Not that Clay is all that interested in taking on a group of women since it's going to be difficult enough as it is to get those horses through the mountain pass. Still, Clay offers to take them to the next ranch, where they can figure out what to do next.

Mary is hoping to get to Sonora, which just so happens to be the same place Clay is headed for. But the ranch where he plans of dropping the women off is owned by the Wyatts, who as it turns out are the parents of one of the women from the house of ill repute. Mary is insistent on not being left behind, and eventually she and another of the women continue on with Clay and Steve. Mary starts teaching Steve how to read and write, since Clay has thought a cowboy doesn't really need it. But as you can also guess, a romantic attracting is going to develop between Clay and Mary.

You can also guess that the other story line, with the escaped convicts, is going to cross paths with Clay and Mary, leading to the climax.

Roughshod is one of those competently produced westerns from a time when Hollywood was making a lot of such movies. There's nothing particularly special about it either in terms of plot or scenery, but there's nothing particularly wrong with it either. If you like westerns, I think you'll like Roughshod. At the same time, if I were looking to introduce people to any of the actors involved with this movie, Roughshod isn't the first thing I'd think to pick.