Cimarron
Directed by Wesley Ruggles
Written by Howard Eastabrook from a novel by Edna Ferber
1931/US
RKO Radio Pictures
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime rental
Yancy Cravat: Why, we’ve had enough of this Wichita. We’re goin’ out to a brand new two-fisted, rip snortin’ country full of Indians, rattlesnakes, gun toters and desperados. Whoopee!
Sure did win a lot of Oscars for such a terrible movie.
Heroic editor and lawyer Yancy Cravat(Richard Dix) repeatedly abandons his steadfast wife Sabra (Irene Dunne) and family and helps to make Oklahoma great????!!!! In the end it is Sabra who holds down the family’s newspaper business and civilizes the new territory. This is basically an epic starting with the Oklahoma Land Rush and ending with the oil boom. The most impressive scenes are the land rush sequences. Otherwise, even usually reliable actors murder the overwrought dialogue.
Possibly I should cut this film some slack but I really do not feel like it. I hate movies like this one, especially when they are over two hours long and when they feature “comic” stutterers and dubious racial stereotyping etc. Instead I will nominate it for several awards: Worst Picture to Win an Oscar, Worst Performance by an Actor Nominated for an Oscar (Richard Dix), and Worst Performance by Irene Dunne in a Motion Picture.
Non-PC clip
