CANDADIAN PACIFIC (1949)

There are several Westerns that have dealt with the railroad's progress to the West Coast during the nineteenth century. Few center on Canada's railroad venture, however. This, then, is the film's only unique element. It opens with current footage of a Canadian Pacific train and voiceover narration about what is to unfold with the findings of a surveyor. Told in flashback, the ninety-five-minute film is directed by Edwin Marin and produced by the prolific Western genre producer, Nat Holt Productions, of film and television fame. Jack DeWitt and Kenneth Gamet wrote the screenplay. The unmistakable sound of small cannon shots when revolvers are fired could only come from 20th Century Fox. The great Dimitri Tiomkin was snagged for the music score, but it nearly vanishes during the film. Expect gunfire, explosions, a fist-fight or two, greedy villains, and a provoked Indian attack. And a lot of green color. In the end, justice prevails for a happy ending to an otherwise routine Western.

If there is a single disappointing element concerning this film, it is the two-color processing known as Cinecolor, a less expensive alternative to Technicolor for independent producers, like Holt. The slightly fuzzy appearance is perhaps the result of the color being "out of register."  The majestic Canadian Rockies never looked more pathetic. The waffling of green and brown outdoors, albeit with hints of orange and faded blue sky, assaults your eyes. Blacks and grays are nonexistent. The color of most interior scenes is reasonably accurate. It appears to be the worst black-and-white colorization attempt until the more recent, cheap digital app conversions. Cinecolor was used superbly for Albuquerque (1948), another Western with Randolph Scott, produced by the successful team of Pine-Thomas Productions. See the notes below.

The film's lead is a no-nonsense, dependable surveyor, Scott. He is again provided a script with a few witty and charming quips and comebacks. Totally removed from his stoic persona, particularly funny is his hilarious, scooped greeting surprise from a top bunk, “Hey… looo,” to a passing Jane Wyatt below, one of two railroad crew doctors. Though she is on the same page romantically, her unyielding pacifist beliefs—choosing negotiation over bullets—are not the “railroad ties” that bind. She refuses to understand that evil must be eliminated, and it usually does not provide opportunities for negotiation. Launching her film debut is Nancy Olson, Scott's first love. She accounts for herself vividly in her film debut at the start of a busy “under-the-radar” career.

A bit bizarre is the real-life thirty-year age difference between Scott and Olsen. A sizable age gap was typical during Hollywood's Golden Age, but this film may have set some sort of record. There is no attempt to suggest she is older than twenty-one. The lead's other love interest, Wyatt, is just under forty, making her the more logical match for growing old in sync.

Scott's nemesis is a myopic villain, Victor Jory, whose saboteurs cause numerous construction delays and the deaths of workers. In true Jory fashion, he delights in his destructive plans. Scott's long-time friend and the railroad's dynamite expert for clearing land is J. Carroll Naish. In a gravitating role, he is a bit over-the-top with his "old man" character and has his share of humorous lines. 

Notes: In 1948, Eastman and Ansco/Agfa introduced improved color film stocks in America, allowing Cinecolor to refine its limited two-component system and achieve more realistic color reproduction. The Albuquerque film benefited from careful studio and costume design that compensated for these limitations, resulting in a "technicolor-like" palette than that of this film. They worked in a lot of orange and turquoise in sets and costumes, colors Cinecolor was known to enhance anyway.

Several scenes were filmed in the studio with a blurred background scenery projection. The filming in the red rocks of Sedona, Arizona, also worked well with the color process. The dull, brownish tones of this film may be the result of the producer, Holt, finding it difficult to handle the overwhelming full color spectrum of Canada's natural scenery. 

Speaking of bizarre, to facilitate Naish's escape from a few attacking Indians, he offers each "dynamite cigars," knowing their cliched craving for tobacco. The preoccupied Indians, inhaling the unlit ends of the sticks, do not see him ride off, but the explosions verify a gruesome outcome. Not that this was ever a reality, the filming faux pas is certain to anger those without any common sense. The scene would have been written out of the script if the producer understood that absurdity has no place in any turn-of-the-century Western tale.