I've mentioned before that when Carol Burnett did a piece for TCM on Lucille Ball for Ball's turn as Star of the Month many years ago, Burnett suggested that the studio (RKO) just didn't know what to do with her. Like a lot of other people who weren't necessarily suited to the genre, she even got cast in a western, Valley of the Sun.
Ball is the female lead here, although we don't see her for several minutes. Instead, we see action at a US Army fort in what is now Tucson, AZ, in 1868. Male lead James Craig plays Jonathan Ware, a scout for the Army who has gotten himself in trouble with the army because he's been soft on some of the Indians who have long been causing a problem for the settlers moving west into the Arizona Territory as well as the Army. Ware, however, knows that the people the Bureau of Indian Affairs have been sending from Washington are corrupt and robbing the Indians blind, which is a big part of why they're attacking. Still, Ware gets court-martialed and sentenced to five years, although one of the soldiers informs him of how to get a horse and escape.
Escape Jonathan does, winding up for a while on the underside of a coach heading to the town of Desert Center. Two men are on the coach: James Sawyer (Dean Jagger), and a justice of the peace. James is heading out to Desert Center to meet up with Christine Larson (Lucille Ball). Christine runs the local watering hole, at least for now, with some help from dimwitted Willie (Peter Whitney). But she's planning on getting married to Sawyer, which is why he's on his way to Desert Center. Sawyer is none too happy to see this stowaway on the coach, and the two men become fast enemies.
Willie may not be smart in the traditional sense, but he knows people well enough to know that Sawyer isn't right for Christine. And, of course, we can guess that Jonathan is right since James Craig and Lucille Ball are the two leads. Granted, meeting up with Christine while he's taking a barrel bath isn't exactly the most auspicious start for Jonathan. Willie, of course, being a good judge of character, figures out that Jonathan might be better for Christine, and that the two of them need to do something to stop the wedding from going forward. Or, repeated somethings.
And then there's the fact that Jonathan is still a fugitive from justice, having escaped from military court. There's more comedy and action to come until the movie reaches the inevitable conclusion of justice being meted out to the people who are actually breaking the law, and the good guy getting the girl.
Valley of the Sun mixes a good dose of comedy in with the western themes, although interestingly enough it's mostly not Lucille Ball who gets to be zany here the way she would be on I Love Lucy a decade later. In RKO's defense, Lucy hadn't developed that zany persona yet. Ball does OK, although the movie is really more interesting for being offbeat than it is for actually being a notably good western. I think viewers will like it even if it's certainly not great.
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