Santa Fe (1951)

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Better Late Then Never

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

B. I just watched the movie last night and it is one of Scott's best. Another poster compared him to the stoic never make a mistake type of character that was often played by a later in his career Joel McCrea ( like he was with Scott in 'Ride The High Country'), but the fact that Scott ( like his character Britt Canfield was from Virginia) spoilers ahead: What Britt is above all is a leader, which is why Dave Baxter ( Warner Anderson), hires him to work on his railroad, and eventually makes him his right hand man. The problem that Canfield ( and his brothers), face is how despised southerners were treated after the Civil War. Carpetbaggers stealing the family farm, disrespect from soldiers which is why that soldier ended up getting killed by one of the Canfield brothers, even the women he likes Judith Chandler ( Janis Carter) cannot stand him because he led a battle in which her husband died. His biggest problem was he could not get his brothers to follow him and work for the railroad, and they became outlaws. He holds himself responsible for that. As he says to his Sister In Law, Ella. "As the oldest, it's my responsibility to keep the family together."at the end he has to join a posse and try and bring them to justice. ( and hopefully save them from dying ( which does not happen))the final two scenes of the movie were interesting and neither had Scott. Dave was explaining how the Railroad would open up an Empire and how Canfield was responsible for getting it built. Then some of the men ( such as the engineers) who worked with him told Judith ( and Ella) to send him a message that they are coming to work for him. Judith says "That is a message I will deliver in person." So it ends up that even though he could not get his brothers to follow him ( because of all the hate they had inside), he ended up with people who will follow him ( because of who he was). One character I love is Ella. Normally Hollywood would make her the love interest instead of a Sister In Law. There is a scene at the end where the brothers commit a robbery and Scott goes to her home looking for them she tells Scott "I would rather have him in jail, then living an outlaw life." Then the law ( and Dave ) come in and are going to arrest She says he is innocent . They asked him where they are? He will not tell ( he wants to bring them in), she tells the Law. Her loyalty was with Britt and doing the right thing over her husband. My single favorite scene is with the Indian Chief driving the train and the smile on his face. It is rare when you see an Indian as actually happy and not because of a battle or around a woman. I also like what Britt had someone say to the chief "Someday they will name a train after you." They did the Santa Fe Railroad "Super Chief." 10/10 stars.

I remember that rather hilarious line from "Blazing Saddles", but I think this is the first film with Mr. Scott I've ever seen.He was kind of the poor man's John Wayne.The plot here is that the Civil War is over, and while his brothers carry around a lot of anger about what happened during the war, Randolf plays a guy who goes to work helping to organize and build railroads connecting the west with the rest of the country.Some parts of the film, like the scene with the native Americans, and they remark "Some day we'll name a train after you, Chief." (Ha, ha, "Super-chief" How funny. Almost takes the sting off the genocide!) The brothers take to train robbing after gambling doesn't work out for them, and there's a bit of pathos between the good guys and bad guys and the historical Bat Matherson being dropped into the mix.

Santa Fe is directed by Irving Pichel and adapted to screenplay by Kenneth Gamet from the James Marshall novel and a story by Louis Stevens. It stars Randolph Scott, Janis Carter, Peter M. Thompson, Jerome Courtland and John Archer. A Technicolor production, it's photographed by Charles Lawton Jr. Story is set following the American Civil war and finds Scott as Britt Canfield, one of four ex-Confederate brothers heading West for a new life. While Britt finds honest employment on the Santa Fe railroad, his brothers veer towards the other side of the law.A routine Western boosted by some quality set pieces and a well crafted script. Watchable from the off, film follows a true course whilst launching off narratively from the bitterness still felt by those who were on opposite sides of the war. It pitches Scott front and centre as the stoic character fending off all sorts of challenges, challenges that come courtesy of Indians, rival companies and his own kin! The acting around Scott is pretty average, tho the comic relief from Billy House & Olin Howland is most appealing, while it would have been nice to have some more imposing scenery filling out the screen. All told it's a safe recommendation to Western fans, even if ultimately it's not a genre film to revisit often. 6/10

I have a special liking for this film because I used to admire the Santa Fe beautiful passenger trains in the fifties and I made a fantastic trip at that time on the Santa Fe from New Mexico to Chicago. This is a colorful, entertaining film which tells the story of Randolph Scott and his brothers who were confederates and after the war is finished, get in a brawl with some nasty northern soldiers. To get away from a posse they jump into a train of the Santa Fe and Scott starts working in the building of the railroad. As his brothers become outlaws, he gets uncomfortable in his position at the railroad. Scott changes his westerns outfits quite often, I suppose because at that time the movie stills were published in a lot of magazines. A great moment is when an Indian chief complains that the train is making too much noise, so Scott allows him to drive the locomotive, to feel that he is in control. From "The Iron Horse" on, the building of the railroads was always a great theme for westerns and Santa Fe tell its story with plenty of good action scenes.