Blogging By Cinema-light: Don't Make a Scene: Stagecoach (1939)

The Story: Nothing changes.

Stagecoach was made by John Ford in 1939, but the opinions of banker Ellsworth Henry Gatewood could be uttered without alteration today. In fact, they are being uttered today. And they will be uttered more this year because it is an election year.

Hard to know where John Ford's politics lay (although writer Joseph McBride attempted to in a 2001 article in the Lose Angeles Times). He obviously thought this banker—an embezzler—was the worst of the bunch on the stagecoach. Ford's directorial sympathies lay with the "little guys" and outcasts and not with the big-wigs. He hated the studio brass, and would do a lot of his location work, starting with this film, in Monument Valley because he knew that none of them would show up in such a desolate location far away from Hollywood amenities. And he hated bullies, despite acting like a tyrannical autocrat on-set. He liked to act like a big-shot and being a big-shot while secretly hating the behavior he employed when others did it. Ford was a complicated artist and full of contradictions, just like his characters.

Yes, he was a Nixon supporter late in life, but that's because the turbulent '60's cast aspirations on his beloved military and he didn't like the youth movement, seeing it as anarchic and undisciplined. But, I would bet he voted for Kennedy rather than Nixon in 1960. Irish, you see. In 1937, he declared to his brother in a letter that he was a "socialist democrat—always left." Indeed in those days, he supported unionization in Hollywood and was considered a "fellow traveler" by the FBI's files on him. He vacillated depending on what winds blew against him. In another interview, he called himself a "state of Maine Republican."

He hated to pin himself down and professed to labeling others (although he was prone to do so): “I object to calling names. Right and left and center of the road. There is no such thing if we live up to the context of our Constitution. I mean we’re all liberals, because it’s a liberal Constitution. Thomas Jefferson was probably the greatest of all liberals, and he was considered a leftist at that time.”

Must have sounded good at the time. So, give Ford his due. Great director. Flawed man, idiosyncratic, hypocritical sometimes, contradictory, as prone to changing winds as his beloved 106 ft. ketch, the Araner.

The Set-Up: There's a stiff, dusty wind blowing into the stagecoach bound for Lourdsburg, and not all of it is coming from Monument Valley. All of the passengers are not what one would say are "model citizens," not even the woman in "a delicate position." Unfortunately, she's seated next to a lot of hot air—Gatewood, the banker, who, although he puts up a blustering façade of rectitude, he's an embezzler (hence his speedy retreat out of town). And having just been rebuffed by a cavalry officer, he wants everyone to know how affronted he is. The idea! Do you disagree, sir? The idea!

Action!

Inside the stagecoach, the passengers are seated in the same positions as during the morning. The heat is stifling and dust drifts in through the open windows. The coach jolts and bounces as it whirls along at fourteen miles an hour. Gatewood, seen in medium close-up with Dallas beside him, is playing the indignant man-of-affairs.

GATEWOOD (blustering) I can't get over the impertinence of that young lieutenant! I'll make it warm for that shavetail!
Doc Boone, again with the sample bag in his lap, is very thoughtfully attempting to rearrange Peacock's scarf round his neck. The wind is blowing it about so much that it is a futile exercise.

GATEWOOD (off) I'll report him to Washington! We pay taxes to the government and what do we get? Not even protection from the Army!
Peacock is now seen in close-up with Doc Boone just in shot, his hand rearranging the scarf so that it practically covers Peacock's face. While Gatewood continues to hold forth, Doc Boone cleans the dust from Peacock's face.

GATEWOOD (off) I don't know what the government's coming to! Instead of protecting businessmen, it's poking its nose into business.
Cut back to the same shot of Dallas and Gatewood.

GATEWOOD Why, they're talking now about having bank examiners... (he snorts) ...as if we didn't know how to run our own banks.
The stagecoach is going really fast and a stiff breeze is coming through the windows. Dallas desperately tries to rearrange her hat, which is being blown about.
Cut back to Peacock and Doc Boone, who pulls a bottle from the sample-case and holds it up to Peacock ingratiatingly. Peacock does not protest. So Doc Boone takes a large swallow.

GATEWOOD (off) I actually had a letter, from some popinjay official...

GATEWOOD (off) ...saying they were going to inspect my books!

GATEWOOD (off) I have a programme, gentlemen, that should be blazoned on every newspaper in the country.
Gatewood now addresses his remarks to Lucy, as the most worthy of attention.

GATEWOOD America for Americans! Don't let the government meddle with business! Reduce taxes! Our national debt is shocking...
Lucy leans against the side of the coach, as far away from him as possible. Doc Boone is staring lovingly into Peacock's face.