Directed: Wesley Ruggles

Year: 1931

Nominated: Best Film, Best Director – Wesley Ruggles, Best Actor – Richard Dix, Best Actress – Irene Dunning

Won: Best Film

Plot in 25 Words: Epic film spanning 30 years, two generations and the creation of cities. A fortune seeker drags and abandons his family all over the wild west.

In My Opinion: Wow. Just wow. What an epic! I mean, obviously in relation to the times. This film doesn’t stand up to modern day epics and it was never going to but the sheer scope of the film amazed me. It covered years and years, involved aging the main characters but it was done well, not in a slapstick fashion.

Sure it had some racist and anti-Semitic content but what film from the 30s doesn’t?

And yes, it had an incredibly sexist male lead who controls his wife and walks all over her, but look at the sets!

And I guess it does have a lot of abusive content regarding Native Americans and the sole black character, but look at how well controlled the horses are.

I need to not think about how many were injured/shot during the making of this film.

Or the West.

I enjoyed the grandness of this film. The sheer scale was incredible. Lots of big sets, lots of extras and animals. Lots of costumes and makeup. Very impressive. I suppose the quality of the film hides how good a job they did of aging the actors but I thought they looked good.

Richard Dix as Yancey Cravet was dashing, brave and bold. Perfect as the cross-country adventurer. Taking his family on a wild land rush and being a town ‘statesman’ of sorts. Sadly the flip side to his personality was to be a twat to his wife. Apparently if you’re the head of a household it’s perfectly acceptable to disappear for 7 years at a time and just walk in and treat your wife terribly, like nothing happened.

But on the bright side, by the end it had taken great strides towards reducing racism (to Native Americans, they still hate other races) and can accept a female leader.

Star Performer: Eugene Jackson as Isaiah. He acted the shit out of his death scene. Glorious!

Overall: I loved the premise and the execution. Very cool to see an epic of this sort so early in cinema history.