Two men – young Jeff Jimson (William Campbell) and the more experienced Dempsey Rae (Kirk Douglas) – witness a murder while freighthopping, and almost get arrested for the crime. Once cleared, both take employment at a Wyoming open range cattle ranch. Dempsey is first surprised to find the owner Reed Bowman (Jeanne Crain) is a woman, and then by the extent of her commercial ambition. As the county moves perilously close to a full-blown range war, and the rival farmers begin putting up barbed wire fences, Dempsey is forced to fight a war with no right and wrong – and likely no winners.

King Vidor is regarded as one of American cinema’s great early auteurs, directing films from the silent era all of the way through to his final work in 1980. Man Without a Star represents one of his later works. This 1955 western keeps its head above the pack with a combination of attractive landscapes, charismatic acting, a strong screenplay, and a well-developed allegorical backbone. I have decided to watch as many westerns from 1955 as I can, to get a sort of ‘snapshot’ view of the genre in that decade. This is the fifth 1955 western that I have watched so far; it is the best so far.

There is an extremely competent blending of tone and genre to Man Without a Star. When it wants to amuse, it is genuinely funny. When it wants to make a serious point, it is dramatic and intelligent. In its key moments of violence it is actively flinch-worthy: in Vidor’s hands, the Old West is a painful world of cuts, wounds, and scars. When a man is beaten by a mob, or thrown into barbed wire, the viewer’s going to feel it.

Kirk Douglas navigates this ambivalence beautifully. As Dempsey Rae he shifts gamely from light to dark, playing a range from clown to romantic suitor to sex symbol and stone-cold killer. He forms an arresting presence, all-but overpowering the rest of the cast. There are some clear exceptions: Richard Boone makes for a great emerging villain during the film’s second half, while Jeanne Crain matches Douglas perfectly as the sexualised, powerful Reed Bowman. The character is a perfect fit for the film. She commands authority, expresses a strong sexuality without victimisation or gratuitousness, and is enabled to make good and bad choices with depth and smarts.  Goodness knows how innovative her character is in historical context, but it is certainly a more developed and powerful female lead than most.

The putting up of barbed wire across the territory acts as a powerful metaphor for the growing divisions between the people. Open range farming, where each owner’s cattle is free to roam the countryside, only works if everyone shares the land fairly. When Bowman deliberately floods the land with her own stock, threatening the livelihoods of the other ranchers, it sets up conflict and distrust. The wire fences reflect the people forced to erect them: division hurts. It leaves scars. It is canny reflection of the film’s narrative that really lifts its game above its contemporaries.

1955 West is a review project to watch as many western features from 1955 as possible, in order to gain a ‘snapshot’ view of the genre at its height. According to Letterboxd, there were 72 westerns released that year. You can see all of FictionMachine’s reviews of them to date by clicking here.