Review of Red River (2011) by Ben S — 01 Apr 2017
A hard-nosed rancher (John Wayne) grabs a hunk of Texas for his spread then, after the civil war, starts a massive cattle drive to stave off bankruptcy. His choice of destination for the drive is Missouri but his adopted son (Montgomery Clift) favours Abilene, which leads to a feud and eventually mutiny.
For most of the way this is a tense and brilliant western but it is let down badly by the ending, which is a real cop-out. Perhaps studios dictated there must be a happy endings even back then. John Wayne is terrific and Montgomery Clift, surprisingly, is no slouch as a cowboy, although he did keep reminding me of Ricky Nelson in Rio Bravo (not the other way around as I had seen Rio Bravo first).
This review of Red River (2011) was written by Ben S on 01 Apr 2017.
Red River has generally received positive reviews.
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