RAMROD (1947)

Made at pretty much the height of Hollywood's classic film noir period, RAMROD shares a lot of similarities with film noir: stark B&W photography filled with deep shadows, a sexy femme fatale, brutal violence and a grim story.

Veronica Lake is the daughter of a rancher (Charles Ruggles) who himself is under the thumb of an even more powerful cattleman, Preston Foster.  Her father wants her to marry Foster but she wants nothing of it.  When the film opens yet another rancher (and the man Veronica loves) is being ran out of town with his tail between his legs.  Before he leaves he signs his ranch over to Lake since he believes that she has a better chance of making it work than she does.  The first thing she does is hire local ranch hand Joel McCrea to be ranch foreman.  He knows this is the beginning of a violent range war so he only agrees if Veronica swears to play on the side of the law and make the other sides out to be the bad guys.  She agrees, but soon tires at McCreas slow pace. She starts using her feminine ways ("From now on I'm gonna make a life of my own.  And being a woman I won't have to use guns.") to speed up the process, but it only ends up creating more bloodshed.

RAMROD is a interesting western.  The story is complex.  In fact, when the film starts there's so much stuff going on it almost feels like you just walked in on the middle of the picture.  The casting is brilliant.  I especially liked the casting of the normally comedic Charles Ruggles as Lake's serious father.  The direction by Andre De Toth (who was Lake's real life husband at the time) is confident and the camerawork by Russell Harlen is very impressive and a joy to watch.  Recommended for western fans. 

My only reservation is Veronica Lake herself.  She does a fine job, but I think somebody like Barbara Stanwyck would have brought much more depth to the character.

Boom mic shadow.

Blink and you'll miss Jeff Corey as a hotel employee.

LADIES THEY TALK ABOUT (1933)

This movie was a lot of fun.  The always beautiful Barbara Stanwyck stars as member of a bank robbing gang.  During one of the robberies she's nabbed after the fact as a accomplice to the crime.  It looks like she's going to prison when a childhood friend who's now an up and coming preacher/social reformer takes a liking to her and pulls some strings to have her released...that is until, in a moment of weakness, she tells him that she actually was part of the robbery.  She refuses to rat out her gang so it's off to prison she goes.  She adapts to prison life pretty well and still gets tons of letters and visits from the preacher wanting her to change her ways.  Fat chance!

Fans of classic Hollywood will probably really like this film since they know what they're getting into, but less informed viewers will be surprised by the cheesiness of some of the scenes, especially the prison ones.  There's almost a complete lack of security and the ladies seem to have all the comforts of home including a hair salon and private rooms they can decorate however they want.  They can even have dogs!  And don't forget the crashout plot!  Holy shit!  But all of that just adds to the fun.  Another thing that made me smirk was the preacher's complete devotion to Barbara.  She could literally do about anything and he would forgive her.  It was pretty funny.  The actor (Preston Foster) did a fine job, but every time he was on screen I kept thinking how much better Ralph Bellamy would have been in that role.

Lightning-fast pace, more than one reference to lesbianism, action, new fish, references to prostitution, hatred of the police, a girl with a Joe E. Brown picture on her wall(!), strong supporting cast...LADIES THEY TALK ABOUT is a great Pre-Code movie, but best part is easily Stanwyck.  She's maybe the prettiest that I've ever seen her.  Check it out.