Return of the Texan *** (1952, Dale Robertson, Walter Brennan, Richard Boone, Joanne Dru) – Classic Movie Review 12,905

Delmer Daves’s modest but pleasing 1952 Western film Return of the Texan stars Dale Robertson, Walter Brennan, Richard Boone, and Joanne Dru. The screenplay is by the expert Dudley Nichols. 

Director Delmer Daves’s modest but pleasing 1952 Western film Return of the Texan stars Dale Robertson, Walter Brennan, Richard Boone, and Joanne Dru. The screenplay by the expert Dudley Nichols is based on the novel The Home Place by Fred Gipson.

Dale Robertson gives his usual amiable and attractive performance as widowed Sam Crockett, who returns to Texas with his grandpappy (Walter Brennan) and sons (Lonnie Thomas, Dennis Ross), in this soapy and too-cosy but well-written, tautly directed and nicely crafted Western, with Texas looking gorgeously gleaming in the distinguished photography by Lucien Ballard.

The estimable Richard Boone plays Robertson’s difficult neighbour, Rod Murray, with a sister-in-law, Ann Marshall (Joanne Dru), whom Robertson courts.

Return of the Texan stars may be a minor Western but it is quietly impressive and worthy of respect, motoring on Dudley Nichols’s appealing screenplay and Delmer Daves’s capable direction, and elevated by Lucien Ballard’s cinematography and Sol Kaplan’s score. However, it is shot in black and white when colour would be welcome. And some of it is not Texas at all, instead some of it is shot Springerville, Arizona; Northridge, California; and the 20th Century Fox Movie Ranch, Los Angeles County, California.

The cast are Dale Robertson as Sam Crockett, Joanne Dru as Ann Marshall, Walter Brennan as Grandpa Firth Crockett, Richard Boone as Rod Murray, Tom Tully as Stud Spiller, Robert Horton as Dr Jim Harris, Helen Westcott as Averill Murray, Lonnie Thomas as Yo-Yo Crockett, Dennis Ross as Steve Crockett, Willis Bouchey as Isham Gilder, Robert Adler, Kathryn Sheldon, Aileen Carlyle, Linda Green, and Brad Morrow.

Return of the Texan is directed by Delmer Daves, runs 88 minutes, is made and released by 20th Century-Fox, is written Dudley Nichols, based on the novel The Home Place by Fred Gipson, is shot by Lucien Ballard, is produced by Frank P Rosenberg, is scored by Sol Kaplan, and is designed by Lyle R Wheeler and Albert Hogsett.

Release date: February 13, 1952.

Dudley Nichols is the 1936 winner of the Oscar for Best Writing, Screenplay for The Informer.(1936). He refused to accept the Oscar because of the antagonism between industry guilds and the Academy over union matters. It is the first time an Academy Award was declined but Academy records show he had an Oscar statuette by 1949. He worked on 13 scripts for John Ford.

© Derek Winnert 2024 – Classic Movie Review 12,905

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