Night Passage (1957)

Nice effects though.

Good concept, poorly executed.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

There are a few of very necessary things to remember when creating a Western especially back when Westerns were a thriving genre. There are A LOT of them and some of them are spectacular and fans of Westerns are a very particular sort and if you don't give us what we want...we'll hate it. Night Passage in general has a potentially decent story but it gets bogged down in poor production decision, bad casting and (if the rumours are true) there was a lot of tense clashing on the set and that hurts a film and often comes through in the final product. Night Passage feels like missed potential. It feels like they rushed certain parts, and they weren't sure whether they were going for a thriller, a heist movie or...oh yah a Western. It just quite often felt like it was often missing its heart and soul somewhere in there and I think it boils down to not feeling the chemistry and energy from the cast. Still, the landscape, scenery and scenes aboard the tops of trains are truly outstanding. There is just some jaw dropping moments of scenery that they would have to create without the aid of computers like they do now.Since I became a MASSIVE James Stewart fan in the last year or so, I am piling through his Westerns. I will say that Night Passage is the first Western of his I've seen where he isn't the angry, volatile, rough cowboy as he is in some of the other ones. He has a much softer side but not too soft in his performance. He does well but rumour has it that he took this role so that he could play his accordion and sing (both of which he does quite well) BUT it feels forced into the story and seems silly in context. I had heard of Audie Murphy before but I'm fairly certain this is the first time I've seen him in action. Another rumour is that original director Anthony Mann left the project because he felt (among other things) that Murphy was wrong for the role...well Mann should rest easy because he was right. Murphy is too soft, too short, looks ridiculous and completely unbelievable as this legendary evil criminal. I don't know if he is like this in every role but this was not a good one for him and the chemistry between he and Stewart is non-existent. Dan Duryea was actually the far superior villain and instead he is reduced to a sidekick for Murphy and that's ludicrous. However, Duryea still makes a good villain and saves that aspect of the film. Everyone else is decent in their perspective roles. Brandon DeWilde does a decent job as the kid that latches onto Stewart's cowboy. He's a little irritating and overused but he's alright. The women in the film are so underused and out of place and too much emphasis is put onto the bizarre love triangles and former flames going on.On the surface a Western is sort of like a horror film...reeeeally easy to make and please fans. There are a few key ingredients that have to be in place to make a good Western and Night Passage seems to have some brawls, bad guys, good guys, train robberies and dusty towns but none of it comes together just right. It was okay but when you're swimming in a sea of westerns you have to be better than just okay. Director James Neilson is someone who comes from mostly television and perhaps he didn't have the chops or experience to make this work quite right. Night Passage (as far as I know) isn't considered a classic and you will find out why though I am sure it has its solid fans. I look forward to moving on and getting back to high quality Westerns. This one is forgettable at best. 5.5/10

Grant McLaine (James Stewart) is a fired railroad worker who is playing the accordion for scraps. Recent train robberies by Whitey Harbin and his men force the boss to rehire him to carry the payroll cash to the workers. When his train is held up, he hides the money in a boy's shoebox. The boy turns out to be The Utica Kid (Audie Murphy).The start is very slow. We don't get to the train for awhile. This part of the story definitely needs more tension. Once the train robbery happens, a more proper amount of pace is injected into the movie. But even here, the dialog is hokey and the movie is every bit a run of the mill western. This is definitely missing a more adventurous style. Overall, I wouldn't recommend this for more than a James Stewart fan or a Sunday afternoon filler.

This is a good western, though it lacks the atmosphere and pace Anthony Mann (originally slated to direct) would have brought to it. Then again, there was a reason he didn't direct it. (He walked at the 11th hour, causing a rift between him and Stewart, who was getting a percentage of the profits.)The film, to me, has a kind of deadness at the center. I don't think it really has a stylistic concept, a way of telling this particular story that would make it intriguing. Even with a flawed concept, the original director might have given it all a unity, purpose, or vision. This is just filmed in a workmanlike fashion. We seem never to get inside the story.In a way, this is the Stewart-Mann-Borden Chase formula re-worked one too many times. There are elements here from all the previous westerns, and it had to get tired, eventually. James Stewart is beginning to look old and wiry, rather than the young-middle-aged leading man. That's okay but it's not in keeping with the plot. Dan Duryea is here, playing almost the same psycho he played in Winchester 73. The good brother/bad brother theme is back, too. Supposedly, one of the attractions of the film for James Stewart was that he got to play the accordion and sing; in a rather unbelievable story point, he plays a man who entertains the railroad people. The cast is quite good, overall, and it must have seemed a good idea to Universal, at the time, to have not merely a James Stewart western, or an Audie Murphy western, but a Stewart-Murphy western. Shame it was just okay, not great.I enjoyed Olive Carey in her scenes with Stewart, and the location.

With "Night Passage", you get Jimmy Stewart uncharacteristically playing an accordion and singing a few songs, and Audie Murphy in another one of his baby face villain roles. You also have Dan Duryea in a co-starring effort, but you have to wonder if he might have been hard of hearing during filming. He shouts every single one of his lines except one, as I was so curious about his over the top manner that I started to keep track. It actually distracted me at times because I kept wondering why he was yelling all the time.I also had to wonder why Jimmy Stewart appeared to be out of breath after his first encounter with villain Concho (Robert J. Wilke) while saving young Joey (Brandon De Wilde) from a thrashing. At fifty one, perhaps he wasn't in as good shape as he should have been to be riding horses and chasing down bad guys.As for the story, it's fairly formulaic with Stewart and Murphy as brothers on opposite sides of the law, a theme done countless times in Westerns. There's not much new to add here either, and as I've noted earlier, Murphy doesn't have the face to be taken seriously as a villain, the same being true for his portrayal as gunman Gant in the 1959 film "No Name On The Bullet". Try picturing Roy Rogers as a bad guy. See, it just doesn't work.It was cool to see veteran Jack Elam as part of the Whitey Harbin gang, and whenever I see Hugh Beaumont in a non-Ward Cleaver role I have to wonder what the 'Beav' is up to. Not a bad film, with some great Colorado scenery on display, but truthfully, the most emotion this got out of me was seeing Grant McLaine's (Stewart) accordion go up in flames. That was hard for this Polish boy.Say, here's something to wonder about. As Miss Charlotte (Dianne Foster) pines for The Utica Kid (Murphy) throughout the film, and she finally gets to hear that he wants to marry her, why isn't she all torn up with the way the gun battle plays out? And brother Grant just moves right in?Ready for another good brother/bad brother match up with a railroad theme? Try 1949's "The Last Bandit" with Wild Bill Elliott and Forrest Tucker. No accordions in that one though, you'll have to hum.