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IMDbPro

Blood on the Moon

  • 19481948
  • PassedPassed
  • 1h 28m
IMDb RATING
6.9/10
3K
YOUR RATING
Robert Mitchum and Barbara Bel Geddes in Blood on the Moon (1948)
Watch Trailer
Play trailer1:53
1 Video
40 Photos
RomanceWestern
Unemployed cowhand Jim Garry is hired by his dishonest friend Tate Riling as muscle in a dispute between homesteaders and cattleman John Lufton.Unemployed cowhand Jim Garry is hired by his dishonest friend Tate Riling as muscle in a dispute between homesteaders and cattleman John Lufton.Unemployed cowhand Jim Garry is hired by his dishonest friend Tate Riling as muscle in a dispute between homesteaders and cattleman John Lufton.
IMDb RATING
6.9/10
3K
YOUR RATING
    • Robert Wise
    • Lillie Hayward(screenplay)
    • Harold Shumate(adaptation)
    • Luke Short(adaptation)
  • Stars
    • Robert Mitchum
    • Barbara Bel Geddes
    • Robert Preston
    • Robert Wise
    • Lillie Hayward(screenplay)
    • Harold Shumate(adaptation)
    • Luke Short(adaptation)
  • Stars
    • Robert Mitchum
    • Barbara Bel Geddes
    • Robert Preston
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 50User reviews
    • 27Critic reviews
  • See more at IMDbPro
  • Videos1

    Trailer
    Trailer 1:53
    Watch Trailer

    Photos40

    Robert Mitchum in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Phyllis Thaxter in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Robert Mitchum in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Walter Brennan in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Frank Faylen and Robert Preston in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Robert Mitchum and Barbara Bel Geddes in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Robert Mitchum and Barbara Bel Geddes in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Robert Mitchum in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Robert Mitchum and Barbara Bel Geddes in Blood on the Moon (1948)
    Iron Eyes Cody in Blood on the Moon (1948)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Robert Mitchum
    Robert Mitchum
    • Jim Garry
    Barbara Bel Geddes
    Barbara Bel Geddes
    • Amy Lufton
    Robert Preston
    Robert Preston
    • Tate Riling
    Walter Brennan
    Walter Brennan
    • Kris Barden
    Phyllis Thaxter
    Phyllis Thaxter
    • Carol Lufton
    Frank Faylen
    Frank Faylen
    • Jake Pindalest
    Tom Tully
    Tom Tully
    • John Lufton
    Charles McGraw
    Charles McGraw
    • Milo Sweet
    Clifton Young
    Clifton Young
    • Joe Shotten
    Tom Tyler
    Tom Tyler
    • Frank Reardon
    George Cooper
    George Cooper
    • Fred Barden
    Tom Keene
    Tom Keene
    • Ted Elser
    • (as Richard Powers)
    Bud Osborne
    Bud Osborne
    • Cap Willis
    Zon Murray
    Zon Murray
    • Nels Titterton
    Robert Bray
    Robert Bray
    • Bart Daniels
    Erville Alderson
    Erville Alderson
    • Sethmier - the Liveryman
    • (uncredited)
    Carl Andre
    • Cowboy
    • (uncredited)
    Ruth Brennan
    • Townswoman
    • (uncredited)
      • Robert Wise
      • Lillie Hayward(screenplay)
      • Harold Shumate(adaptation)
      • Luke Short(adaptation) (from the Saturday Evening Post serial storyl by)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

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    Did you know

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    • Trivia
      Shortly after this movie was made, the new boss of RKO, Howard Hughes, terminated Barbara Bel Geddes' contract, saying she wasn't sexy enough. She would go on to become most famous for her role of Miss Ellie Ewing on the long-running nighttime soap opera Dallas (1978).
    • Quotes

      Jim Garry: I've seen dogs that wouldn't claim you for a son, Tate.

    • Alternate versions
      Exists in computer-colored version.
    • Connections
      Featured in 100 Years of the Hollywood Western (1994)

    User reviews50

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    8/10
    Somber and beautiful western starring the original noir cowboy
    The concept of the "noir western" is unthinkable without Robert Mitchum. Mitchum, who started his career as a heavy in B westerns and went on to be hailed as the "soul of film noir" for his world-weary cynicism and cool, doomed aura, defined the hybrid genre in 1947 with PURSUED, then followed with BLOOD ON THE MOON. The plot is essential noir: a man down on his luck is summoned by an old partner and cut in on a big deal; when he finds out that the deal is crooked and his friend is an irredeemable louse, he has to decide whether to accept his slide into corruption or fight to maintain his honor. The scheme just happens to involve cheating a man out of his cattle herd instead of some urban racket. The cinematography is literal noir; at least half the scenes take place at night, in a murk that rather obviously symbolizes the difficulty of seeing anyone's true nature.

    None of the western clichés are here: there are no rowdy dance-halls or rip-snorting brawls or comical drunks, no steely sheriffs or white-hatted good guys. The mood is somber, tense and ambiguous, but the film does satisfy the requirements for a western: there are cattle stampedes, a savage fight, a gun battle and beautiful sweeping landscapes, including stunning scenes in a snow-bound pass, the white drifts sliced by the tracks of men and horses. All of the performances are restrained and natural. Barbara Bel Geddes and Phyllis Thaxter, as the daughters of the cattle baron targeted by the scheme, both avoid the glossy glamour that so often makes actresses look out of place in westerns. Bel Geddes is appealingly fresh, and does a good job with a character who starts out as a hostile spitfire in pants (she and Mitchum "meet cute" by shooting at each other) and then morphs into a gentle healer in a dress. Robert Preston is perfect as Riling, a smirking cad with an oily face and a plaid jacket; his former partner Jim Garry (Mitchum) sums him up with the classic line, "I've seen dogs that wouldn't claim you for a son." Walter Brennan adds seasoning as usual, this time poignant rather than comic.

    Mitchum makes a beautiful cowboy with his long hair and elegantly rugged attire, at once authentic (on seeing Mitch in costume Walter Brennan reportedly declared, "That is the goddamnedest realest cowboy I've ever seen!") and romantic. In one scene he confronts a gunman on a wide, dusty street and walks towards him—that's all he has to do, just walk towards him and the guy knows he's outclassed. (Mitchum's panther walk is one of the glories of cinema—I would love to watch a whole movie of nothing but Mitchum walking.) I don't think Jim Garry smiles once (though he comes close in a gentle scene where the heroine, tending to his injured hand, asks about his fight with Riling, and he answers, "It was a pleasure.") He conveys a profound inchoate sadness, but as always he uses dry humor to keep emotion at bay. He's contained, laconic, defended. Not merely stoic, he's strangely passive, willing to let things go; his strength is tinged with melancholy because he can "take it," but he also feels it. Lee Marvin (Mitchum's one-time co-star) said it well: "The beauty of that man. He's so still. He's moving. And yet he's not moving."

    Mitchum is mesmerizing because you sense so much going on behind the cool, impassive facade. It's partly his film-style acting, which happens under the surface, not on the surface. But under-acting can't fully account for his mystery. There's something fundamentally inaccessible, unknowable about Mitchum's characters, and this is what makes them so real. You never feel they are underwritten or inconsistent; instead you feel he's a whole and complex person who can never be fully explained. Despite his much publicized contempt for most of his work, Mitchum brings this tremendous gift to the slightest and shallowest of movies. BLOOD ON THE MOON, however, is worthy of him.
    helpful•38
    3
    • imogensara_smith
    • Jan 19, 2007

    Details

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    • Release date
      • November 21, 1948 (United States)
      • United States
      • English
    • Also known as
    • Filming locations
      • Sedona, Arizona, USA
    • Production company
      • RKO Radio Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

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    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

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    • 1 hour 28 minutes
      • Black and White

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