- Actors: Gary Cooper, Jean Arthur, James Ellison, Charles Bickford, Helen Burgess
- Directors: Cecil B. DeMille
- Writers: Courtney Ryley Cooper, Frank J. Wilstach, Grover Jones, Harold Lamb, Jeanie Macpherson
- Format: Colour, DVD-Video, NTSC
- Language English
- Region: Region 1 (US and Canada DVD formats.)
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3 - 1.33:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Classification: Unrated (US MPAA rating. See details.)
- Studio: Universal Studios
- DVD Release Date: 1 Jun 2004
- Run Time: 113 minutes
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
- ASIN: B0001FVDWS
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 147,316 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Product details |
Reviews
Amazon.co.uk Review
Just maybe the most shamelessly enjoyable of Cecil B. DeMille's pseudo-historical epics, this rumbustious frontier saga offers a three-for-one Western legends combo--Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill Cody, and Calamity Jane, all cutting up in the 1870s, with George Armstrong Custer and Abraham Lincoln thrown in for good measure. (Wait a minute, Lincoln was assassinated in 1865--oh, never mind.) Truth to tell, Buffalo Bill doesn't really pull his weight, since (1) he is hopelessly distracted by virtue of having recently married and (2) he's played by James Ellison, an eternal juvenile normally relegated to second-banana duty in Paramount's Hopalong Cassidy series. However, Gary Cooper's Wild Bill and Jean Arthur's Calamity supply enough star power to light up the Dakotas and parts of Missouri.
Every once in a while, DeMille and his small army of writers stumble upon an actual historical fact. Bill Cody did fight to the death with an Indian chief named Yellow Hand. George Custer and James Butler Hickok did both buy the farm in the summer of 1876. (Custer's Last Stand is handled imaginatively, if cheaply, as a vision narrated by a wandering Cheyenne warrior--none other than C.B.'s son-in-law Anthony Quinn in one of his earliest screen appearances.) Jack McCall (veteran weasel Porter Hall) did find himself in Deadwood, South Dakota, at the same time Wild Bill was drawing aces and eights in a poker game ... though McCall was not necessarily affiliated with DeMille's favourite villain, Charles Bickford, in the business of running guns to the Indians. --Richard T. Jameson
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
i suppose at the time 1936 this western would have been one on the top films of the genre and the benchmark upon which to improve . the storyline entwines the great characters and events of the wild west but not in a historically acurate order , the portrayal of the characters is done well and all the main events from the leading characters are covered , but with far less action {indian wars} than the cover leads you to expect . the film is also in black and white not coloured like the region 1 version states on the internet and the cover again leads you to believe .
Format:DVD
The Plainsman is directed by Cecil B. DeMille and written by Courtney Ryler Cooper & Frank J. Wilstach. It stars Gary Cooper, Jean Arthur, James Ellison, Charles Bickford, Helen Burgess and Paul Harvey. Music is by George Antheil and cinematography by Victor Milner. Film is a fictionalised account of the relationships involving Wild Bill Hickok (Cooper), Calamity Jane (Arthur), Buffalo Bill (Ellison) and George Custer (John Miljan).
Master of the epic DeMille crafts a big and bold Western that's finely acted, interesting in its telling and big on idealism. You obviously have to forget real time lines, this is a splicer as DeMille and Co take some of the Wild West's most famous characters and stir them into one Oater stew! Friendships and affairs of the heart form the basis of thematics, with the war against the redskin giving the characters reason for being. Gun running and politico musings drift in and out of the narrative but leave a mark, while DeMille proves classy in action construction as a number of warfare sequences raise the pulse considerably.
The flip-side...
There are no bad apples in the cast (Cooper wonderfully macho, Arthur whip-crackingly gorgeous and Bickford suitably weasel like), though Burgess doesn't quite grasp the dramatic thrust of being Buffalo Bill's good woman. The running time is a touch too long, with several passages of dialogue serving only as time filling exercises, while the back screen projection work is irritable if a little understandable given the time of production. Ultimately there are flaws that make this only a comfortable recommendation to classic era Western fans who can accept it as a 1930s dressed up bit of frontier malarkey. Casual observers, mind, are unlikely to get past the historical hodge-podge and hooray idealism. 7/10
Master of the epic DeMille crafts a big and bold Western that's finely acted, interesting in its telling and big on idealism. You obviously have to forget real time lines, this is a splicer as DeMille and Co take some of the Wild West's most famous characters and stir them into one Oater stew! Friendships and affairs of the heart form the basis of thematics, with the war against the redskin giving the characters reason for being. Gun running and politico musings drift in and out of the narrative but leave a mark, while DeMille proves classy in action construction as a number of warfare sequences raise the pulse considerably.
The flip-side...
There are no bad apples in the cast (Cooper wonderfully macho, Arthur whip-crackingly gorgeous and Bickford suitably weasel like), though Burgess doesn't quite grasp the dramatic thrust of being Buffalo Bill's good woman. The running time is a touch too long, with several passages of dialogue serving only as time filling exercises, while the back screen projection work is irritable if a little understandable given the time of production. Ultimately there are flaws that make this only a comfortable recommendation to classic era Western fans who can accept it as a 1930s dressed up bit of frontier malarkey. Casual observers, mind, are unlikely to get past the historical hodge-podge and hooray idealism. 7/10
3 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
The new handful of Westerns that Universal has just released on DVD are not among the most well-known of their genre, but it is a joyful occasion all the same, all the more actually. Three out of the seven titles that I have seen are great, 'The Spoilers', 'No Name on the Bullet' and 'The Plainsman'. Not a bad average. The only really bad one is 'When the Daltons Rode'.
Veteran epic director Cecil B. CeMille's 'The Plainsman' is a hugely mounted, dramatic and blazing Western with Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill, Calamity Jane, Lincoln and Custer in one and the same movie! And add numberless scores of exotically feathered Indians and cavalry men.
In this universe violence equals heroism, but the Sioux chief is given time to defend his people, and Jean Arthur's loveable Calamity has her own way of prevailing against the man she is seen chasing all through the film! Gary Cooper's Hickok is shy and awkward, and he is never quite made to kiss her.
The action scenes are riveting, the sets are beautiful, the humanity in the picture is convincing, and in the end, as we see Hickok place himself with his villanous hostages with his back to the saloon door, everybody with even a feeble grasp of Western mythology know what is up ...
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Begins well enough
This film begins well, with Gary C in great form and Jean Arthur not far behind plus a very capable supporting cast but the last third fizzles down a little abruptly. Read more
Published 17 months ago by Movie Fan from Portugal
Cecil B. DeMille's "The Plainsman"
This is a really good picture, if you don't take it too seriously of course. I showed it too my Grandad whose very picky and even he really enjoyed it. Read more
Published on 7 Feb 2010 by Stephen Griffin
Classic Western
Great Garry Cooper performance super western from Cecil B De-Mille. For collectors of the Genre a must
Published on 11 Jan 2010 by Mr. Paul J. Clawson
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
