Strange Lady in Town (1955)

Good concept, poorly executed.

Admirable film.

Absolutely Brilliant!

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

First off, someone took the easy way out on the naming the title of this movie. They must have left it for last or someone in corporate said hey call it strange lady in town. What? Okay, let's move on. Dana Andrews plays his part as does Greer and what's not to like in a Western. The West of the 1880's was full of never ending stories all from different perspectives and here is one of them. Lady doctor and a man doctor in one small town? Add some horses, festivals, gun-play, good and bad guys, love interests, poor Mexican village, a padre and little ranches and we giddiyup! I will say that the story could have been more developed but the point is that they got together and knocked this out. It entertains and I recommend a sandwich with a tasty drink while watching with a snack on standby. Mount-up and let's ride!

First off it's Garson's last film. And secondly it features a very distinct difference in acting styles. Garson displays her grand style in use of language and presentation as if she were back on the stage. Andrews displays the man from "The Best Years of Our Lives" years on who opted to not so much act as be present. And then there's the new kid, Lois Smith. Her very contemporary (for 1955) Brandoesque inhabiting of "Spurs" puts all of this together in the strangest way imaginable. I think SHE was the "Strange Lady in Town" or at least this movie. There is also the reality of how women Hollywood films seem to be retired once the aging process makes them too old for leading ladies. Garson isn't the best representative for this argument because her acting style was of another era. But she should have been able to continue on were she not so much a star. That comes through here loud and clear.

Western with Greer Garson is very uneven. She almost has a love-hate relationship with fellow doctor, Dana Andrews. He is miscast here.She plays the western doctor who left Massachusetts because of the hatred there of men of women becoming doctors. She comes to Sante Fe, New Mexico since her brother Cameron Mitchell is in the army there. He is quite a rogue.The unevenness of the film can be shown that after a blow-up between the Garson and Andrews' character, in the next scene he has arranged a surprise birthday party for her.There are so many sub-stories in the film that would have played better-the blind boy whose sight is restored by Garson and the battered young woman; instead, they are merely skirted over.

There are few actresses of the caliber of Greer Garson, and it's difficult to believe that she only made a couple of dozen pictures. This was her first after leaving MGM, and it was 5 years before her next film in which she played Eleanor Roosevelt. This was not one of her best films, but she's that rare actor that one almost always marvels at her performance, even when the script is not the best.That's not to say that this is a bad film. It's pretty decent. Her co-star is Dana Andrews, a fine actor. His role here is not very positive -- he's playing a fellow doctor (Garson, a female doctor) who doesn't believe in female doctors and thinks women belong under a man's thumb. Of course they fall in love, though Andrews' role was over-done...I'd blame the director...and his constant switch between love and anger is rather tedious. Along the way there are a number of sub-plots: Garson's brother is a raffish soldier in love with Andrew's daughter...and eventually he's a bank robber who gets shot. Oh yes, and there's a guest appearance (so to speak) by Billy The Kid (played by Nick Adams).The daughter of Andrews is played by Lois Smith, who mellowed nicely in her later years, and is pretty decent here, also. Cameron Mitchell plays her romantic interest / solider, and I have little more use for him here than I do in most any other film he appears in. Walter Hampden is good as the old priest. The remaining cast do their jobs, but little more.Ironically, the film begins on a dusty wagon road into Santa Fe, and although actually filmed in Arizona, the area does look a lot like the land around the Forked Lightning Ranch where Greer Garson eventually lived and retired with her third husband in 1967...on the way to Santa Fe.This is hardly a classic western, or even a classic Greer Garson film. But it's pretty good. And Garson is as beautiful, and sassy, and that intriguing blend of refined and spicy that made her so alluring.It's well worth watching, though probably only once.