South of St. Louis (1949)

Kip Davis (Joel McCrea), Charlie Burns (Zachary Scott) and Lee Price (Douglas Kennedy) are best friends and partners in the Three-Bell Ranch. In fact, the three partners all wear bells on their spurs to signify their camaraderie.

Then the Civil War breaks out and their home is destroyed by Union raiders led by Luke Cottrell. Kip tracks down Cottrell in the local saloon and beats him. It won’t be their last meeting.

But with the Three-Bell ranch gone, the partners split up. Lee marches off to become an officer in the Confederate army. At the urging of saloon singer Rouge de Lisle (Alexis Smith), Kip agrees to drive a freight wagon filled with furniture to a town south of the border.

He suspects the wagon doesn’t contain furniture, and he’s correct. It holds arms, intended for sale to the Rebel army. He’s captured, freed by Rouge and then joined by Charlie in the gun-running business.

And a profitable business it is. Kip just wants to get enough money to restart the Three-Bell Ranch. Charlie is more interested in the money than the ranch. Lee winds up being more interested in Deborah Miller (Dorothy Malone) – the girl Kip planned to marry — than a renewed partnership with his two friends.

Turns out the close bond between the Three-Bell partners is going to be severely tested, during the war and after.

Review:

If you can get over the bells on the spurs of the three lead characters — they’re featured prominently early and late in the film — this is a decent McCrea Western.

Alexis Smith plays Rouge — so named because she grew up in Baton Rouge. “You wouldn’t call a girl Bat, would you?” she asks Davis. Ah, yes, she takes an early interest in our hero, but he has to get over Deborah before he’ll consider her anything more than a temptress, a sometimes drunken temptress.

Victor Jory gets the role of Luke Cottrell, a Northern version of William Quantrill. And this marked one of two Westerns that McCrea and Malone appeared in together in 1949; “Colorado Territory” was the other.

Directed by:
Ray Enright

Cast:
Joel McCrea … Kip Davis
Alexis Smith … Rouge de Lisle
Zachary Scott … Charlie Burns
Dorothy Malone … Deborah Miller
Douglas Kennedy … Lee Price
Alan Hale … Jake Evarts
Victor Jory … Luke Cottrell
Bob Steele … Slim Hansen
Art Smith … Bronco
Monte Blue … Capt. Jeffrey
Nacho Galindo … Manuel

Runtime: 88 min.

Memorable lines:

Union blockade guard: “What are you carrying?”
Sarcastic southern farmer: “Contraband, cannonballs and used rifle bullets. I grow them on my ranch when nobody’s lookin’ at me.”

Cottrell: “You figure on makin’ me draw first, don’t ya?”
Davis: “Maybe.”
Cottrell, looking at the other two members of the Three-Bell outfit: “Then the three of you start pumpin’ lead.”
Davis: “No, they’re patient boys. They’ll wait their turn. If you get past me.”

Rouge: “I’ve been wondering about you. What does a cowboy do when he runs out of cows?”
Davis: “I’ve been wondering the same thing myself.”

Davis, finding Cottrell in Matamoras, a gun-running town: “You don’t care which side you’re on, do you?”
Cottrell: “I like it here. Better than having the army around making rules about how you’re supposed to kill a man.”

Davis: “But I’m no good to you, Deb, to myself or anyone else until I get back on that ranch again.”
Deborah: “It wasn’t the ranch I wanted to marry.”

Rouge de Lisle: “Where does a cowboy go when he’s on the move?”
Charlie: “Don’t be a fool? He (Davis) ain’t got nothing but the clothes on his back.”
Rouge: “It’s how you wear them, Charlie. It’s all in how you wear them.”