The Big Sky is a Howard Hawks movie undistinguished enough to fly under the radar and be posted on Dailymotion. It is not really a movie I'd have ever come across and even think to watch if not for the Howard Hawks marathon.
Upon further reflection, The Big Sky does have some accolades though. Jonathan Rosenbaum, an influential film critic, listed it as one of the 100 greatest movies not including in the American Film Institute's Top 100 movies.
It also has two Oscar nominations, one for the best black-and-white cinematography and one for best supporting actor. This is notable only in the sense that Hawks' movies are notoriously shut out of the Academy Awards. Not necessarily for the acting nomination, but at the least the cinematography would suggest something.
In the end though, The Big Sky is fairly unmemorable. This is a movie that I will forget everything about in a year. I know this because I watched this last week and had to read the Wikipedia summary to remember this movie.
It's fine. It is not a movie you regret watching, but as I said, it's not particularly memorable. This is a movie with a relatively simple plot and because of that, the movie feels longer than its two hour runtime. They seek to trade with Indians who normally refuse to trade with outsiders, but they bring along the daughter of a chief who had escaped an enemy tribe as an "in."
That's the plot. They have struggles along the way. They're trying to reach the Blackfoot Indians before the Missouri Fur Company does, which was a real company founded by, among others, Lewis Clark of Lewis and Clark, although it was dissolved before the events of this movie.
Because this is a movie, various events end up putting the daughter, whose name is Teal Eyes, and the two main characters, played by Kirk Douglas and Dewey Martin, closer together. Love triangle is a bit strong, but both end up vying for her affection. This is a weakness because, well, she doesn't speak English.
One-time actress Elizabeth Threatt, who apparently had affairs with both Hawks and Douglas before this movie, was really the daughter of a Native American. So score one for casting on this one because that was extremely rare for 1952 for a leading role. Now, Threatt really is beautiful, but the whole "she can't speak English part" - it's kind of where I stop believing in any future romance between these characters. They literally can't communicate with each other and evidently fall in love.
Not to mention, I'm supposed to believe that she gets over the fact that Martin's character carries a fucking Native American scalp around with him. Or just his hair. Like I just don't think this is a thing she would get over, even though he didn't personally kill this Indian. Anyway, she works towards stealing this from him and even trying to kill him, and then it's like a light switch flips, and she's in love.
There is one very good part about this movie and it's the Oscar nominated actor. Arthur Hunnicutt is incredible in this movie. He has such an authoritative voice. Think Sam Elliot. And he is completely convincing in this movie. Well deserved nomination. He appears in a future Hawks Western and I'll hope he'll be as good in that movie as he is here.
The Big Sky is fine. It features a not all that convincing love story, but simple plot or no, the story is interesting and features a great supporting performance. I'm just sure I'll end up forgetting all about this movie.
2.5/4 stars
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