Tonight's Movie: Thunderhoof (1948)

THUNDERHOOF (1948) is a three-character Western drama directed by Phil Karlson.

One of my faves, Preston Foster, has a good lead role in this as rancher Scotty Mason, who dreams of capturing a beautiful wild stallion. Foster, incidentally, would also work with director Karlson on THE BIG CAT (1949) and KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL (1952).

Scotty, his wife Margarita (Mary Stuart), and "The Kid" (William Bishop), a young man Scotty has mentored, are in the desert in search of the stallion who will be the foundation of Scotty's ranch.

Despite Scotty's best efforts, the Kid is neither stable nor appreciative of what Scotty's done for him, and he's also got his eye on Margarita, whom he knew in her previous life as a cantina singer. The Kid and Scotty brawl badly but then unite to capture the horse; they're successful but it unfortunately results in Scotty breaking his leg.

The trio struggle towards home with the horse, at one point taking refuge in a house where the owners seem to have left in a hurry, a bit of mystery which pays off nicely. Eventually Scotty and the Kid have another confrontation, and this time the Kid means to leave Scotty in the desert for dead. Margarita will never know what the Kid did, and he can have her too...

This was an interesting, if unexpectedly dark, film thanks to the actors, particularly Foster and Stuart. Despite the spare screenplay, written by Hal Smith (THE DEFIANT ONES) with Kenneth Gamet, the two actors manage to quickly convey their characters' affection for one another along with a brief back story.

Apparently Scotty has had a habit of picking up "strays"; the Kid was one, and Margarita was the other. She has, as she puts it, "grown up" and seems happy in a secure relationship with her doting, if older, husband.

The Kid briefly entices her with thoughts of bright lights and a more exciting life in town, but fate steps in and quickly reminds her of who is the better man.

Besides my interest in Preston Foster, who is excellent here, I was particularly interested to see Mary Stuart in a leading role. The early scenes between Foster and Stuart are charming; she plays a fairly tough gal Scotty feels comfortable teasing that the Kid is dead (he's actually "dead drunk"), but then she's rapturous when presented with a pair of silk stockings. Her joy in this moment is beautifully played, and Foster is equally good as the man proud to have made her so happy.

I recently wrote a bit about Stuart's career in a post on the film THE CARIBOO TRAIL (1950) for Classic Movie Hub. It's a very interesting performance, much more complex than her second female lead in THE CARIBOO TRAIL, and I would have liked seeing more of her on the big screen; as I wrote at Classic Movie Hub, shortly after THE CARIBOO TRAIL she left for New York and what turned out to be a decades-long career on SEARCH FOR TOMORROW.

Bishop's someone I can take or leave; he's an okay actor but I don't find him particularly charismatic. Since I'm not a particular fan I suppose it worked out well that he was the villain of the piece. I wondered a bit about why the Kid was so resentful of the man who had taken him in but decided he was simply a broken person who couldn't be fixed, even when given friendship and a home, and at this stage of things he was rather like an overgrown problem child...a child capable of great destruction.

The film reminded me a bit of the later INFERNO (1953), another film about a love triangle and a broken leg in the desert. THUNDERHOOF has a good sense of mood and moves along at a nice clip, over and done in 77 minutes.

Karlson and cinematographer Henry Freulich did a good job giving the film its rough, gritty look; I couldn't tell for sure where it was filmed but various scenes looked like they could have been shot at Iverson Ranch, Vasquez Rocks, or possibly Lone Pine, and the familiar-looking dugout house I'm pretty sure was at Corriganville.

The night scenes were probably done in a soundstage, yet were so well done I wasn't completely sure.

THUNDERHOOF, originally released theatrically by Columbia Pictures, became available on DVD-R from the Sony Choice Collection a few years ago. Amazon's listing says the print was newly remastered; there's nothing to that effect on the box, but the print does look quite good.

For more on this film, check out Ivan Shreve's review for ClassicFlix and Steve's post at Mystery File.