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The Fluries (1950)

Monday, April 13, 2009

The Fluries. Feature film. (1950, 109 mins) IMDB

...a marvellous performance by Walter ...

I

watched this film for the first time this evening and I'm not sure I understand what happened or why.

It's the 1870s in the west. A western. T.C. Jeffords owns a vast track of land he calls The Furies. It's a ranch where he raises cattle, but mostly resides over it like a king. His hero is Napoleon. Both rose from nothing and both conquered land. TC even has his own money printed which he uses to pay people with--provided they'll accept it and as the story progresses, they don't want it. TC is larger than life.

His daughter is full of spirit. She'll inherit the ranch provided she marries the right person. She appears to be in love with a Spanish man and a sworn enemy of her father. Ouch. But this film isn't a love story. It's not about her and her suitors. It's all about her and her father.

Her father wants to prove to her that Rip, her other suitor, is only interested in money and the father makes a deal with him. He tells him he has two options. If you love my daughter, you can marry her, but she'll be cut off. She won't see anything from his estate. The other option is to take $50,000 in cash, but no daughter. He takes the money and destroys the relationship between everyone.

Later in the film, the father, a widower, returns from San Francisco with his own gold digger. She manages to get money from him without even marrying.

Having written that I'm not even sure that's what happened.

She also appears to be in love with a Spanish man, but is she? I'm not sure. She acts to protect him and his extended family and when her father hangs him for stealing a horse, well that seems to tear her up to get revenge on her father by taking away the ranch which was hers to begin with. See. I don't quite get it.

Posted 2009/04/13 at 17h56ET in Movie Commentary.

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