Pursued (1947)

Brought up by a neighboring family in the 1880s, an orphan grows up haunted by nightmares of a childhood trauma in which his own family was killed.

Director:

Raoul Walsh

Writer:

Niven Busch (screenplay)

Stars:

Teresa Wright, Robert Mitchum, Judith Anderson

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Teresa Wright	...	Thor
Robert Mitchum	...	Jeb
Judith Anderson	...	Mrs. Callum
Dean Jagger	...	Grant
Alan Hale	...	Jake Dingle
John Rodney	...	Adam
Harry Carey Jr.	...	Prentice
Clifton Young	...	The Sergeant
Ernest Severn	...	Jeb, age 11
Charles Bates	...	Adam, age 11
Peggy Miller	...	Thor, age 10
Norman Jolley	...	A Callum
Lane Chandler	...	A Callum
Elmer Ellingwood	...	A Callum
Jack Montgomery	...	A Callum

Storyline

In the 1880s orphan Jeb Rand is raised by the Callum family on their horse ranch after his own family is killed. Jeb is haunted by this childhood trauma in a recurring nightmare of flashing spurs and confinement inside a trap door as his family is murdered. Widow Callum does her best to make Jeb feel loved as he is growing up, but the young man stubbornly maintains a sense of his own identity. While he has great affection for his foster-sister Thor, his relationship with her brother Adam is tenuous at best, especially when Jeb blames him for shooting the colt that he was riding. Although Mrs. Callum blames the incident on deer hunters, she is aware that the shooting was actually the attempted murder of the youngster by her brother-in-law Grant, a shadowy figure who, for vague reasons, is determined to hurt Jeb. Jeb loses a coin flip with Adam, and becomes the designated family volunteer to fight in the Spanish-American War. Jeb returns a hero, but does not find happiness. Although ...

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Plot Keywords:

childhood trauma | nightmare | colt | horse ranch | revenge | 

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Genres:

Drama | Romance | Thriller | Western

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

2 March 1947 (USA)

Also Known As:

La vallée de la peur

Filming Locations:

Gallup, New Mexico, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

United States Pictures, Warner Bros

Technical Specs

Runtime:

101 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The film Jim Morrison (lead singer of The Doors) watched on the night he died (July 3, 1971).

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Goofs

After Adam is shot, a dummy is used to show his body rolling down the hill. The incline is not great and a stuntman could easily have been used, so the obvious dummy is a jarring note.

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Quotes

Jeb: [Narrating] One day I rode up in the butte country...
[Approaching the burned out shell of a cabin]
Jeb: Came straight to this place just like I'd known the way. There was something in my life that ruined that house. That house was myself.
[Entering the charred remains]
Jeb: I'd seen it a million times before... the fireplace... the trap door...
[Walking outside again]
Jeb: Out back there was some cattle bones. All of a sudden I couldn't breathe, and then as I walked around the side, I came upon some unmarked ...

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Connections

Referenced in Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)

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Soundtracks

"The Girl I Left Behind Me"
(uncredited)
Irish folk song
Played by band during army recruitment

User Reviews

It is a psychological western black lines

Notable dramatic western Raoul Walsh (1887-1980), almost forgotten and unjustly underrated for a long time, is now considered a cult film. The script is original author and screenwriter Niven Busch (1903-1991), author of the novel "Duel in the Sun" and the script that adapts to the movies with the same title, "Duel in the Sun" (Vidor, 1946). It is shot on location in Gallup (NM) and on the set of Warner Studios (Burbank, CA). Produced by Milton Sperling for United States Pictures / WB, the dramatic action takes place in the early years of XX s in the former Rand ranch in Medora Callum's ranch in the town of Lone Horse, County Seat Area and Cuba. Jeb Rand (Mitchum) is a young orphan adopted at age four by the widow Medora Callum (Anderson), mother of a child, Adam (Rodney), and a girl, Thorley (Wright). It Is tormented by fragmented memories of his childhood that fails to complete and the feeling that someone is after you for reasons unknown. It relates to Jake Dingle (Hale), owner of Lone Horse Casino, with the young Prentice (Carey) and others. Meet Callum Grant (Jagges), fiscal Santa Fe (NM).

The film has drama, psychological drama, suspense, thriller, noir cinema, romance and western. It is essentially a psychological western black lines. The narration is provided by the protagonist, who recalls episodes from her past with the help of flashbacks, which make up a really long one flashback. The story is a drama with dark overtones of unbridled passions driven behavior that responds to pathological reasons, obsessive or transient. The reasons are jealousy, anger, envy, hatred, revenge, resentment and other primary manifestations. Changes in volatility of the feelings of some of the supports of the hero help thin the atmosphere of the film and fill it with uncertainty and threats..

The passivity of character, who takes refuge in fatalistic conceptions not to react to threats sensed and leave the supposed bad luck which pursued the course of events, brings depth to melodrama, reveals the fragility of the protagonist and increases the tension general. The dramatic crescendo is wisely managed by Walsh. The soundtrack brings howls of bats and owls and owl sounds that enhance the terrifying power of the night.

The film is related to "Outlaws" (Siodmak, 1946), with which it shares some features narrative and plot. In any case, Walsh has the merit of being one of the first makers of westerns that extends the theme of gender. The interpretation of Mitchum, adequate and convincing, it is sometimes qualified as one of the best of his films. In any case, it is one of his first roles in film. The Teresa Wright, the first wife (1942-1952) screenwriter Niven Busch, is correct and rewarding, despite being in the service of a difficult role, variable and contradictory. Ma Callum delivers a performance to live up to its reputation and the memory that is kept from her as the housekeeper of "Rebecca" (Hitchcock, 1940). Dean Jagger plays one of the best villains of the genre.

The soundtrack by Max Steiner, provides large-format orchestral score, which develops a general tone with dramatic passages threatening, oppressive and funeral. It uses deep bass, long and sometimes vibrant. It uses dissonance and distortion of sound, as added music adapts "La Veneciana" Mexicana of dance song from Poland, and "Red Chicken," a prescient and moved abusive mother melody and unpredictable character and unique savior. The fifth for the U.S. intervention in the war in Cuba, they call war against Spain, whistle the "Hymn of the 7th Cavalry."