The Wonderful Country

source: The Wonderful Country

I love watching Robert Mitchum films....the guy, despite his protests to the contrary, was a genius at making acting look so simple. Because of this, I always try to watch his movies....including "The Wonderful Country". Sadly, however, this isn't a particular noteworthy....not a bad film but certainly among Mitchum's lesser roles. The story is mildly interesting...but there is A LOT of plot...probably too much for one film. Mitchum plays a man who's lived in Mexico a long time and works with one of the 'generals' who fought over Mexican territory in the late 19th century. He's sent on a mission to retrieve guns for the general...but ends up breaking his leg in the States. It's a compound fracture and his mission is a loss. Then, while in the States you learn his backstory--most importantly why he ran off to Mexico in the first place. Now there IS a lot more plot...including an unlikely and poorly fleshed out romance, an angry Mexican general, a plot to kill Mitchum's character, marauding Apache Indians in Mexico and more. None of it seemed especially compelling. Overall, a mildly interesting tale...at best. Not bad but the writing sure could have been better. By the way, watch carefully if you watch it. Late in the film, one of the greatest pitchers in history is in a small role. Larry 'Satchel' Paige plays a Cavalry sergeant...and it's nice that the film acknowledges the contribution of black soldiers/cavalry....as in real life, about a third of them were black Americans...though you rarely see them represented in films.

The Wonderful Country finds Robert Mitchum as a gunslinger, a pistolero working for the local Mexican governor Pedro Armendariz. He had to flee Texas years ago after a shooting and Armendariz gave him shelter and work. Despite that Mitchum is sent across the border on a gun buying trip. Unfortunately he takes a bad fall from a horse and winds up with a broken leg. While on the mend in that bordertown and after, Mitchum finds himself in a series of situations that call him to question what he's been doing and just where he can call home. One of those situations is Julie London, wife of army major Gary Merrill who's got a bit of a past herself. She throws quite a few complications in Mitchum's past. The Wonderful Country is a nicely put together western shot on location in Durango. It was one of the first westerns to use that town in Mexico, a whole lot more in the sixties would follow. Besides those already mentioned the performances to watch for in this film are those of Charles McGraw as the frontier doctor and that of Satchel Paige as the cavalry sergeant. A year later John Ford would come out with Sergeant Rutledge about a black cavalry sergeant and the men around him, but I do believe that baseball immortal Satchel Paige was the first in Hollywood to portray a black cavalry man in a major motion picture. McGraw is something else. He's the doctor who tends to Mitchum's broken leg and befriends him, but then gets one big pang of jealousy about Julie London that leads to tragedy. In real life McGraw was as much the hellraiser as he is in the film. The Wonderful Country had the good fortune to be partially scripted by Tom Lea so his vision of the characters in his own novel remained pretty much intact. This was the only one of two novels by that writer/artist to be filmed. That's as good a reason as any to see a very fine western.

So many times the title of the movie misleads the viewer. Not in this case. The title "Wonderful Country" perfectly describes this movie. The desert photography and imagery of frontier Texas and Old Mexico is almost overwhelming. With a few exceptions, I have never been a Robert Mitchum fan, but this role brings out those qualities in him that have always attracted the fans. When commenting on his acting ability, he once said, "I only know two ways to act. With or without a horse." This is a great example of how to act with a horse. As a matter of fact, one of his co-stars in this movie IS his horse. The story somewhat routine. Mitchum flees across the Rio Grande as a youngster after killing the man who killed his father. There he becomes a pistolero in the employ of a couple of corrupt brothers who control that part of Mexico. On a gun buying trip north across the border, he is thrown by his horse and is unable to return to Mexico. While in Texas he meets and falls for the wife of the military governor played by Julie London, in probably her only significant role. As he recovers, he is involved in another shooting and finally escapes back to Mexico, where he is falls out of favor with his patrons for losing the guns. It isn't the story that makes this movie. It's the photography. It's the musical score and Mariachi orchestration. It's the touching performances of all the principal players. It is a BIG movie. The dusty majesty and corruption of Old Mexico along with the personal imagery of everyday life is riviting. In my opinion, this movie rates right up there with other Western giants like: Shane, The Searchers, Stagecoach, and a half dozen others. This is a movie that would be best seen on the big screen. Do it - if you ever get the chance.

I admit to a bias here as the great Robert Mitchum was and is my idol,but this film is another illustration of how a great actor can not only ennoble a role,but single-handed can lift a good-average story into a very credit worthy film. The plot is a good one and the other actors played their part well. This is one of my favourite movies of Mitchum and ofcourse the Mex-american accent was no problem for him. I can quote several lines of dialogue verbatim and not only have the video but the excellent film music score as well. I hope this film will rise in the estimation of Bob Mitchum fans,also film buffs who admire a great actor at his craft (Supreme in an understated way)

An understated and underseen little character-driven western, The Wonderful Country has a touching melancholy soul, but has a serious, nagging nagging problem with pacing that leaves it feeling undercooked. The film deals with a man, Martin Brady (Robert Mitchum), who is a native Texan, but long ago fled to Mexico after killing his father's murderer. There, he got in with a dangerous criminal gang led by the Castro brothers, and as the film starts, he is escorting an illegitimate shipment of gold and guns into the small Texas town of Puerto. There, his horse, Legrimas (Spanish for "tears") gets spooked by some tumbleweed and he ends up breaking his leg, not only losing his shipment but becoming stranded in Puerto, where he makes friends and enemies all around town: in the former, German apprentice "Chico" (Max Slaten) and the Major's wife (Julie London, who has a giant face). But when the angry drunk town doctor (Charles McGraw) ends up fatally wounding Chico and Martin has to kill him in self defense, he and Legrimas must flee again, adrift in the emptiness, without a home. Much of the film's glories hang on the mug of Robert Mitchum, and his performance is virtuoso. In addition to being saddled with a thick faux-Mexican accent (that always threatens to become a distraction but is kept in check), he gets a damaged character that almost wholly internalizes his emotions, and manages to make him understandable. The rest of the supporting cast is a combination of random 'name' actors and forgettable role players, with Pedro Armendariz and Satchel Paige (!) showing up unexpectedly, and Julie London and Gary Merrill giving clipped, underfed performances for likewise roles. That ends up being the biggest problem with the film: everything feels clipped, rushed, undercooked. In the opening third where he is forced to stay in town, he not only recovers from an apparently serious broken leg in about a dozen minutes of screen time, and when he begins some sort of vague "love affair" with Major Colton's wife, it ends up meaning almost nothing. The summation of their 'relationship' ends up being a couple scenes where she makes eyes at him, then he leaves, then they meet again later, and lay this insane guilt trip on each other and talk about all these bad things that they "did", and...unless I passed out and missed several scenes, talk and glare is all that they did. The film also gives short shrift to pretty much every character supporting Mitchum. Characters float in, do something, usually one single thing, maybe slightly pivotal, and that action sends Mitchum somewhere else, and then disappears. Even the main relationship they intend to develop (between Brady and his "horse named Tears") gets most of its traction from allusion and assumption that I had to infer myself than any direct action, physical or mental). The general idea, the subtext the film wants to put forth is the wandering sadness of its protagonist, the 'wonderful country' is meant somewhat sarcastically since, while it is undeniably beautiful, Martin has no home, no place of residence within that wonderful country, and he keeps getting ousted from every comfortable place. The problem is, while he goes back and forth between Mexico and the US several times, each sequence is so short and ends so suddenly that none of them end up having much impact, and had Robert Parrish given his film some time to breath and stretch its dramatic legs, it might have been as memorable and emotional as its tone wanted to be, but at a scant hour and thirty-eight minutes, the film's memory diminishes by the minute, fading from view like a passing highway sign. {Grade: 6/10 (C+) / #22 (of 33) of 1959}

Nursed back to health from a broken leg by the residents of a small US town, an American-born illegal arms dealer becomes torn between whether to return to Mexico, where he has lived most of his life, or stay on in America in this Technicolor western starring Robert Mitchum. As it turns out, Mitchum has quite some history, residing in Mexico to avoid being arrested for avenging his father's murder, yet with so many welcoming him with open arms, offering him jobs and declaring that he should stay "this side of the river... where you belong", Mitchum soon finds himself in quite a dilemma. The title is intentionally ambiguous; it is never clear whether the USA or Mexico is meant to be the wonderful place. The plot is not really helped though by the inclusion of Julie London as a love interest in the town. She is married and it is hard to root for Mitchum when he convinces her that she must not really love her husband on account of a few glances. London is pretty dull too, and then as a self-defense incident forces Mitchum to make up his mind between the US and Mexico, it feels a case of too much being thrown on the plate here. The film's best moments are the quieter ones in which Mitchum sits and genuinely ponders over which side to join. There are enough of these moments to keep the film chugging along, but it is a little hard to enthusiastically recommend it.

I give this movie an E for effort - Mitchum plays an American who had escaped to Mexico in his youth after a violent episode and has grown up working for the local bandits controlling that part of the country. When sent to a US border town to negotiate a weapons deal, he breaks his leg and spends enough time in he US to realize he could make a life for himself with a brighter future - of course things go wrong. Based on a novel by Tom Lea, a forgotten writer of westerns, and staring along with Robert Mitchum in the romantic triangle is Gary Merrill as the local cavalry boss and Julie London as his unhappy wife. What makes it all interesting is the fact that the movie never quite "jells"- Mitchum tries his best against a cast of grade B actors and his performance mostly works. The worst performance is from Julie London who not only is dressed incongruously but looks and acts like a robot. The scenery is spectacular and is the winner in this movie. Add the use of over the top music, and this movie presages the Spaghetti Western.

Hi. I remember watching this movie (The Wonderful Country) when I was a young man. I have always wanted to buy it on DVD or VHS. It's like it never existed. Has anybody seen this movie anywhere? Robert Mitchum was great. The movie was filmed in Mexico and the scenery was fantastic. The music soundtrack is very good. If you have not seen it, you should. I am not sure who directed the movie, but it was well done. Good acting through out the movie. This movie must have been forgotten by everybody, since I cannot find anybody who knows about it. Robert Mitchum was one of the great actors who made many great movies. This one has been left out for DVD or VHS. Come on.

Getting near the end of the TV shows/films I had gathered up to view from Christmas,I decided to check what titles had been added to Netflix UK. Enjoying the breezy Western Rachel and the Stranger a few months ago,I was pleased to find a Western starring "Big Bob" Mitchum had been added to the site,which led to getting set to find out how wonderful this country could be. The plot: After killing the murderer who killed his dad, Martin Brady has been living in exile in Mexico. Crossing paths with the Castro brothers,Brady is hired to go undercover and get weapons in the US. Traveling undercover,Brady is stopped in his tracks by a broken leg. Treated by the weapons sellers,Brady is introduced to Major Colton,who wants to set a deal that will cross boarders that will have the Castro brothers on the same front. View on the film: Looking surprisingly fresh faced, Mitchum gives a charming performance as Brady,whose exiled state allows Mitchum to give Brady rugged heroics, which is lassoed with a troubling sense of doubt over Brady ever getting the chance to return to the wonderful country. Riding into the sunset with Mitchum, Gary Merrill gives a great performance as Colton,who is given by Merrill a striking feeling of being unable to find light in the dark clouds above. Traveling the country from Tom Lea's (who has a cameo) novel,the screenplay by Robert Ardrey & Walter Bernstein leaves the barroom fights to draw a thoughtful Folk tale Western. Running from the US after getting revenge for the killing of his dad,the writers do very well at making each of the separate groups Brady becomes entangled in ones that drive his desire to walk back into the country of his family. Gathering the bullets for Brady,director Robert Parrish gives Brady's exiled state an elegant sun dried appearance,burning with dry reds hit by Apaches,as Brady tries to get back to the wonderful country.