The Outlaw [DVD] [1943]

The plot, as with most of its type, plays fast and loose with history, pitting Billy the Kid against Doc Holliday. The love triangle that forms between them and the lovely Jane Russell brings a sense of menace to the piece as one knows the two gunslingers will surely face one another off.

The contrast between impetuous but bonny Billy and the wizened Doc offers a pleasing, if predictable, platform for the film. As the two form the bonds of friendship, a tenderness for the characters and growing tension at the underlying love trysts keeps one glued to the screen. The brooding machismo is well countered by Russell's sultry mexican who sets the screen alight with sexual charisma.

Events are speeded by the town sheriff who, unusually for the time, provides the antagonist. His repeated and unreasonable attempts to apprehend Billy lead to the inevitable showdown where the Kid demonstrates his wits are as quick as his shooting irons.

The overall confection is too frothy and light to have a true impact beyond the diversional. For those who like a Western without the emotional/philosophical weights so often attached, you couldn't do better.

Hughes should have stuck with building airplanes.

THE OUTLAW may be a classic, but that doesn't prevent it from also being patently ridiculous. It brings together the outlaw/bad boy Billy the Kid (Jack Buetel), lawman Pat Garrett (Thomas Mitchell), and dentist/gambler/gunfighter Doc Holliday (Walter Huston) in New Mexico in the summer of 1881. Here, the Kid and Holliday get chummy despite quarreling over a horse and Doc's petulant girlfriend, Rio (Russell). In the meantime, Sheriff Pat becomes jealous that his heretofore good friend Holliday is spending so much time with the notorious outlaw Billy, whom Garrett would just as soon arrest or shoot dead for fame's sake. After being chased by the de rigueur band of hostile Native Americans, the four principals - six, if you count Jane's ... well, you know - gather round for a final confrontation. Here, Garrett's attempt to disarm Billy is so dopey and so awkwardly choreographed with unbelievably bad dialogue that it virtually reduces this sagebrush drama to farce. It doesn't help that Buetel's the Kid occasionally comes across as a young and sweet tempered Jimmy Stewart - someone you'd be thrilled to have your teenage daughter marry.

Hollywood never shirks from playing fast and loose with historical fact. So, while viewing THE OUTLAW, one should keep in mind that:

1. Pat Garrett did indeed gun down Billy the Kid in July 1881.
2. There's no evidence that either Garrett or Billy ever met Doc Holliday.
3. Holliday died in his bed of tuberculosis in Glenwood Springs, CO on November 8, 1887.

After seeing this film, I was amazed that Hughes managed to squeeze perhaps 30 minutes of substance into 1 hour and 58 minutes, and that Jane's ... well, you know ... caused such a scandal in shots that were positively innocuous by today's standards. At one point, after Rio falls into a pond, Hughes declined the opportunity to display Russell in full-frontal, wet T-shirt glory. I was crushed, but believe in my heart that Howard considered the option for a brief moment at least.

If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't waste my time with this nonsense. I am, however, awarding two stars - one to each of Jane's ... well, you know.