Red River (DVD)

Red River (1948) starring John Wayne, Montgomery Clift, Walter Brennan, Joanne Dru. Directed by Howard Hawks. Tom Dunson (Wayne) leaves wagon train and heads south to Texas, where he builds herd of 10,000 cattle. But Civil War intervenes, and there's no market for cattle in Texas or the South -- so he sets out with all the men he can muster to drive the herd north to Missouri. Movie could almost have been titled "Mutiny on the Prairie," as Matt Garth (Clift) and the men rebel halfway through the cattle drive and send Dunson packing. Dunson vows revenge as Garth leads the drovers toward their new destination -- Abilene, Kansas. Along the way, they encounter a wagon train being attacked by Injuns. In fact, this film has just about everything you could expect in an old-fashioned Western, including the love of a good woman and a big showdown at the end. The subtitles are pretty hard to the read, but closed captions are available. Grade: A-