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Ford's Revolutionary America: "Drums Along the Mohawk"
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tell us more about the critic than the artist. Perhaps it reflects the fact that the critic lives by pulling things apart, whereas the job of the artist is to put them together.
Are Gil and Lana really more shallow than the Ringo Kid in Stagecoach or Ethan in
The Searchers? Or, are they the model for a more mature heroism? Lana’s move from Albany to the frontier requires real courage. It requires that she overcome her fears, and more important, that she learns to take a large measure of responsibility for the survival and success of her new home. Lana is the true heir to Mrs. MacKlennar’s pioneer independence, but her choice of a husband may also indicate her greater maturity. Barney was always either off fighting or dead. And even when Mrs. MacKlennar looks for a substitute for Barney, she turns to Adam who is described by Gil as a man who won’t settle down. Lana is not satisfied by a relationship marked primarily by romantic longing, she wants a man who thinks primarily of her.
Gil is also a more mature version of Adam. He will not grow old alone on the
frontier, lamenting that the world has passed him by. He will build a home and family, like Lana, knowing that it cannot go on forever, but sustained in the belief that it something can be accomplished. The Indians will attack, children will die, but there is always the possibility of rebuilding, if not for him, then for the next generation. And perhaps, as Lana says at the beginning of the film, the fact that one has to build for oneself will make the product more valuable.
John Ford was an alcoholic, subject to frequent bouts of depression. He felt a great
affinity for the alienated outsiders he portrayed on film. But his grandson reports that Drums Along the Mohawk was “an exceptionally difficult picture to make.”
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Part of the
problem was the remote location in Utah’s Wasatch Mountains, part was the fact that it was Ford’s third picture of the year. But it might also have been difficult for Ford to make a picture in which the parts fit together so well. Perhaps we should not be too quick to dismiss art that is produced by hard work and culminates in a picture that cannot last, but while it does, is almost too good to be true.
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Ford, p. 139.
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tell us more about the critic than the artist. Perhaps it reflects the fact that the critic lives by
pulling things apart, whereas the job of the artist is to put them together.
Are Gil and Lana really more shallow than the Ringo Kid in Stagecoach or Ethan in
The Searchers? Or, are they the model for a more mature heroism? Lana’s move from
Albany to the frontier requires real courage. It requires that she overcome her fears, and
more important, that she learns to take a large measure of responsibility for the survival and
success of her new home. Lana is the true heir to Mrs. MacKlennar’s pioneer
independence, but her choice of a husband may also indicate her greater maturity. Barney
was always either off fighting or dead. And even when Mrs. MacKlennar looks for a
substitute for Barney, she turns to Adam who is described by Gil as a man who won’t settle
down. Lana is not satisfied by a relationship marked primarily by romantic longing, she
wants a man who thinks primarily of her.
Gil is also a more mature version of Adam. He will not grow old alone on the
frontier, lamenting that the world has passed him by. He will build a home and family, like
Lana, knowing that it cannot go on forever, but sustained in the belief that it something can
be accomplished. The Indians will attack, children will die, but there is always the
possibility of rebuilding, if not for him, then for the next generation. And perhaps, as Lana
says at the beginning of the film, the fact that one has to build for oneself will make the
product more valuable.
John Ford was an alcoholic, subject to frequent bouts of depression. He felt a great
affinity for the alienated outsiders he portrayed on film. But his grandson reports that
Drums Along the Mohawk was “an exceptionally difficult picture to make.”
problem was the remote location in Utah’s Wasatch Mountains, part was the fact that it was
Ford’s third picture of the year. But it might also have been difficult for Ford to make a
picture in which the parts fit together so well. Perhaps we should not be too quick to
dismiss art that is produced by hard work and culminates in a picture that cannot last, but
while it does, is almost too good to be true.
12
Ford, p. 139.
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