A Review of the Western "The Violent Men" (1955)

Glenn Ford in "The Violent Men" (1955)

Glenn Ford is former cavalry captain John Parrish, who has settled down temporarily in a western valley to recover from his war-wounds. He has promised to go back East with his girlfriend when he has recovered.

When the story opens, he is on his way to see the doctor. On the street he almost gets run over by a gang of baddies - the hired hands from the Anchor-ranch led by Lew Wilkinson (Edward G. Robinson). Lew wants to own the entire valley and has for many years been using very ruthless means to achieve this goal. This way of doing things has got him crippled, though, and he is now set on a more gentle approach. Unfortunately, his crippled physics and his new softness - comparatively speaking - has made his wife, Martha (Barbara Stanwyck) despise him. In fact, it was always his brother Cole she loved - but Lew was the successful one, so her ambition led her to choose him. After Lew's accident she has manipulated him to bring back Cole to help them run the Anchor-ranch. Without Lew's knowing Martha and Cole resume their old relationship and run the Anchor-ranch as ruthlessly as Lew ever did.


Lew Wilkinson (Edward G. Robinson) with pretty but fierce daughter Judith (Diane Foster) and John Parrish (Glenn Ford)

One of Cole's most important "tools" in running Anchor is his right hand, Wade Matlock - a very brutal gunman. It's Wade and other hired hands from Anchor that gallop down the main street as we meet John Parrish on his way to the doctor. As expected, the doctor tells Parrish that he is now completely recovered and wishes him a happy honeymoon-trip to the East. When the doctor learns that Parrish is going away for good and that he intent to sell his ranch to Wilkinson, he gets very disappointed. He thinks Parrish should stay and help the farmers of the valley resist the dominance of Anchor. Parrish' reply is the classic "hardened loner"-one: "What happens in this valley is no concern of mine!" We know that we are in for yet another version of a classic western-formula.

Sure enough: when Parrish gets back on the street he arrives just in time to see the friendly - and righteous - old sheriff being gunned down by Wade Matlock when he tries to stop Matlock and the rest of the Anchor-men from harassing a farmer who has been complaining about the low price Wilkinson paid him for his farm. Watching this event without interfering gives Parrish greats qualms about selling his place to Wilkinson - and he tells his fiancée Caroline (May Wynn) and her family so. This upsets Caroline a lot as she is *very* eager to leave the town. In fact, a little later Caroline tries to brush off another suitor by saying that he will never be able to take her out of town - to which he replies: "What do you want? A man or a railroad ticket?” Thus we learn that Caroline is a pretty ruthless girl who does not have any qualms about using other people as means to reach her goals. We are never told why she wants to get out so badly, but it is made very obvious that her reasons are severely selfish - and this makes her *very* different from Grace Kelly's character in "High Noon". "I want to get out of here - and nothing is going to stop me" she says - and persuades Parrish to sell to Wilkinson after all. This earns Parrish the utter contempt of the other farmers in the valley. Of course, Parrish is not one to bother about what other people think of him - so he goes to see Wilkinson about the deal. To his surprise this also earns him the scorn of Wilkinson's daughter, Judith (Dianne Forster). She is well aware of what is going on between her mother and Cole and how they run the Anchor-ranch. Parrish gets a very low offer for his ranch and 24 hours to think about it - indicating that he will be forced to sell when the time is up.


Caroline (May Wynn) nagging the poor John Parrish (Glenn Ford)

Nonetheless, Parrish is still determined to keep his promise to Caroline - until he learns of the brutal killing by the Anchor-people of one of his loyal men. When it becomes obvious that the new sheriff is controlled by the Anchor and nothing is going to be done about the murder, Parrish decides to take up the fight. The rest of the movie shows us how he does that using the skills he learned in the army. This "cleverness-against-force"-theme is played out with great strength and is probably what will attract modern viewers most about the movie.

Of course, the theme of ruthless people using other people to reach their goals will also be very familiar to modern viewers - but this is certainly one of the greatest problems of this movie: although played by great actors such as Edward G. Robinson and Barbara Stanwyck, the ruthless characters are all highly unconvincing. Just as in - say - "Dynasty" or "Dallas" (or other soap-operas) they are two-dimensional people used to propel a lot of action. It's all incredibly smoothly done with lots of great vistas and an absolutely wonderful score by Max Steiner - but the emotional conflicts in this movie is not very likely to engage anyone. It's an action-flick disguised as a morality-play.

Still, even though it is not as great as "Jubal" (1956) or the masterly "3:10 to Yuma", this is definitely a worthwhile Glenn Ford-western.