I like John Wayne movies, there was a time back in the eighties when you couldn’t say that without upsetting some people (I remember in college an older vet on the GI Bill just ripped me a new one for suggesting True Grit when scheduling the campus movies for the semester, the irony was he wasn’t even a member of the film club). Emotions about The Duke run high and his acting ability is often overshadowed by his politics.
Which is a shame because he was a good actor, he wasn’t Olivier, but he wasn’t Sonny Tufts either. Like many actors he knew where his niche was and when given the opportunity could really shine, The Searchers and The Shootist being two prime examples. But every now and then, John Wayne Ultra Patriot would take over and suddenly a movie would become a ridiculous diatribe about The Duke’s beliefs (The Green Berets anyone?)
One of the craziest examples of his gung ho politics is a lesser known espionage potboiler he made in the fifties, Big Jim McClain. The plot, supposedly based on true events, detail the investigation of Communist activities in Hawaii by super spy John Wayne and his partner James Arness, trying to bring down bemused spy master, a pre-Batman Alan Napier. That’s enough to start the giggles right there.
But wait, it gets better. The film has not one, not two, but three narrarators. Harry Morgan quotes Nathanial Hawthorne to open and close the film, an unnammed narrarator details how all of this actually happened. Then The Duke makes like Mickey Spillane and narrarates the rest of the film himself. A sample of his wittiness is this gem, “Hawaiians work hard all week but when the weekend comes, watch out!”
The scenery is beautiful, which is a good thing because outside of Wayne romancing an innocent secretary of one of the Commie bigwigs, not much happens in the film except for The Duke berating the fact that he can’t even arrest those Godless Commie bastards, even when they commit kidnapping and murder, because they use our own Bill of Rights against us (Not even Jack Webb can hold a candle to The Duke when it comes to righteous indignation).
Yes this is an action extravaganza where crimes are committed and no one gets caught or prosecuted. Most of the screen time is filled with Wayne eating with his new girlfriend while discussing the case or The Duke using that fool proff investigative technique of accusing someone of being a Red and then leaving thier office or home in disgust. The movie ends with Wayne being so frustrated at being hamstrung by the very law he ironically is sworn to uphold that he goes to the head Commie’s house and beats the crap out of everyone there, which gets him arrested, then proclaims after another Harry Morgan recitiation, that Mr Hawthorne doesn’t need to worry, America is still going strong. Cue the credits.
