High Lonesome (1950)

hyped garbage

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

This movie displays Drew Barrymore daddy's talent.He was working to be a star of Hollywood motion pictures.Now I don't know who was his mother.Dolores Costello ? The novel writer he was married too.The actress who took advantage of his name and used him? His career as a big star never developed.I don't know why.He plays young man who ran way from his father who had abused him.He took his 7 dollars that the had earned that his abusive father kept holding back.This come from the same company that did the Technicolor ,Trip to the moon, Eagle Lion.They did no use the very cheap Cinecolor that most smaller companies would use just to save pennies,but , expensive bulky Technicolor.Well Cooncat finds himself in some one ranch eating food.He is caught by the ranch Hands.He tries to tell them what happened.But when he tells the story and then he tries to show them the evidence .Strange that it's all the opposite.No one will believe him.Basil Ruysdale plays Davis ,now and older physically handicapped Ranch owner. Lois Butler plays his Older daughter Meagan and Kristine Miller plays Abbey,the youngest.John Archer portrays the next door neighbor rancher Pat.Meagan and Pat are engaged.Pat live in a ranch which was originally owned by the the Davis enemies.In which they had feud ,which resulted in The Davis winning but all their cattle getting killed.Character actor Jack Elam plays Smiling man and Davis Kashner plays Roper.Two of the men that took advantage of Cooncat.Frank Cordell ,i think portrays Frank the alleged store clerk,who tricks Coon into saving his money for him.Stealing it.Frank starts to denies that he has any money of his.Coon tries to get it from him but some one hits him and when he wakes you fines the store clerk dead.So he takes off Rancher Davis decide to keep him for a while to see if his story is true cause they think he mentally ill.Cause the building is abandon.Eventually Abbey believes him when she witness both crooks ,In which the rancher cook ,played by Chill Wills, claim that he saw the same crooks died during the feud.Well during the engagement party .Cooncat and Abey try to look for the crooks ,cause he sees them again.All of a sudden Pats parent are mysteriously murder and Coon is binge blamed and being accuse of being a member of that family.Well Abbey and Coon find the part of the old place where it was sealed off for some evidence.Things are straightened out and everyone believes him.Coon has a girl friend now.this was a very unusual western. 03/5/13

Purportedly High Lonesome was shot in color for the transoceanic company Eagle Lion Pictures. But all I saw was a pretty bad black and white print rented on Amazon. John Drew Barrymore who with his sister Diana carried the most famous thespian name in America stars in this film playing a youthful loner type whom we just know as 'Cooncat'. In a part that Steve McQueen would have probably phoned in with a good performance, Barrymore plays a troubled youth who is a runaway from an abusive home in Texas. Unfortunately in his travels he walks into an area where a whole lot of unsolved murders are taking place and he gets good and tagged for them.Not believing him, but taking him in anyway the better to keep an eye on him is rancher Basil Ruysdael with two pretty daughters, Lois Butler and Kristine Miller. Only Miller believes in Barrymore. In the end all is revealed as that Belgian sleuth was wont to say.Poor Barrymore like Diana he did some unmemorable films for the most part, the pressure of the name a bit much to handle. High Lonesome is one of those films. Maybe the color might have helped, but I have to judge on the print available.

John Barrymore Jr. brings a Sean Penn-like quality to the portrayal of his character Cooncat in "High Lonesome", although that probably has more to do with his similar looks than in acting ability. This was Barrymore's second appearance in a leading role following "The Sundowners" which came out the same year. In my review of that picture, I opined that it's doubtful daughter Drew ever saw him in that film; my suspicion is that it's probably true here as well.When the picture was all over, I found myself scratching my head. What started out as something of an off-beat mystery Western, this wound up being a story that didn't make much sense. No reason was ever offered as to why the characters of the Smiling Man (Jack Elam) and Roper (Dave Kashner) ever hung around following the murder of Jim Shell in the abandoned trading post. Stealing Cooncat's money was one thing, but why all the other intrigue of lurking in the shadows; the disappearing duo gimmick got a little tired after a while. And what about all the men killed on both sides of the 'Jessup' fence when the Davis crew went out to tear it down? Are we just supposed to forget about all of that like it never happened? And by the way, who killed Pat Farrell's (John Archer) parents? They were dead a whole week before their bodies were discovered, and the idea was that 'maybe' Cooncat was responsible. Well, he wasn't. So who was? Oh, never mind. See what I mean - story elements were brought in and then discarded as if no one was bothering to pay attention.One thing I did like though - this was the only time I've ever seen Jack Elam's lazy eye referenced in a story. As he describes the men who instigated him to go after Jim Shell, Barrymoore's character states - "He had a cast in his eye so you couldn't tell which eye was pointin' where". I just wish they had taken a great line like that and gone somewhere meaningful with it.One last thing in the 'it doesn't make sense' department. Remember the finale? - Smiling Man and Roper have rancher Davis pinned down with gunfire after shooting Cooncat. So what does Davis do? He manages to swing around and just walk into the bad guy cabin through the back door! What??!! How did he do that? I don't know, and you won't either.

Filmed by Eagle-Lion right after THE SUNDOWNERS (1950) near some of the same Amarillo locations and with returning cast members Chill Wills, Jack Elam and the 'star', gawky teenager John Drew Barrymore. No Robert Preston to give some weight to the film, this time.Story boils down to a boy, "Cooncat" (Barrymore) running away from an abusive home and witnessing a murder committed by Elam and Dave Kashner. Only the local ranch owner Horse Davis (Basil Ruysdael) and his family don't believe him. They think Cooncat's seeing ghosts because Cooncat's describing some men that were killed during a range war 15 years previously. Of course there are no ghosts. Cooncat actually did see the murder. I won't give away the ending but lets just say it too is as anti-climatic as the THE SUNDOWNERS was.This also suffers from some of the same disjointed editing that that earlier film had suffered from, as well as Barrymore doing his silly facial grimaces while he overacts his part. And the way John Archer treats his bride-to-be Kristine Miller, needs to be seen to be believed. He spanks her on the bottom for shooting down a pan off the wall in order to prove a point. Then they kiss and make up like nothing happened. UN-REAL. Obviously some of the details in the script weren't worked out for the audience ahead of time.Also filmed in Technicolor with nice scenic West Texas locations, it's worth a look but it's not a keeper, in my opinion.4 out of 10