Glenn Ford is Ben Jones; Henry Fonda is Howdy Lewis. They’re a pair of bronc busters, busting their bodies getting thrown from horses, living pay day to pay day only to head to Senora and blow their earnings in exchange for a few wild nights on the town.
They’ve just been hired by cheapskate rancher Jim Ed Love (Chill Wills) to break in a new batch of horses for $7 per head. He claims the job will be easy. Naturally, it isn’t.
This herd includes a particularly troublesome roan who refuses to be ridden, has a penchant for damaging property and loves getting drunk by eating sour mash.
Ben begins plotting ways to get rid of the roan, from giving him a way to dumping him off at a soap factory. And the roan has Ben dreaming of buying a boat and sailing to somewhere where there is no grass and, hence, no horses.
Then he and his partner stumble upon a plan to cash in on the horse’s ornery nature by betting the cowboys in Senora that Old Fooler can’t be ridden.
Review:
An entertaining comedy Western that certainly benefits from having Ford and Fonda as the leads. But it’s Old Fooler who provides some of the biggest laughs.
Edgar Buchanan shows up as a rancher with a knack for making whiskey and a pair of daughters who would love to lasso Ben and Howdy, permanent like.
So do Sue Ane Langdon and Hope Holiday as sisters and aspiring Vegas showgirls. They’re rescued by Ben and Howdy when their car breaks down, leading to a bit of risqué humor that comes across as a bit too forced.
Henry Fonda’s son Peter Fonda and Glenn Ford’s son Peter Ford have uncredited bit roles. Henry Fonda would later reprise basically the same character, tagging along with James Stewart when he inherits a whorehouse in 1970’s even better “Cheyenne Social Club.”
Henry Fond as Howdy Lewis, Hope Holiday, Sue Ane Langdon and Glenn Ford as Ben Jones in The Rounders (1965)
Directed by:
Burt Kennedy
Cast:
Glenn Ford … Ben Jones
Henry Fonda … Howdy Lewis
Sue Ane Langdon … Mary
Hope Holiday … Sister
Chill Wills … Jim Ed Love
Edgar Buchanan … Vince Moore
Kathleen Freeman … Agatha Moore
Joan Freeman … Meg Moore
Denver Pyle … Bull
Barton MacLane … Tanner
Doodles Weaver … Arlee
Allegra Varron … Mrs. Norson
Casey Tibbs … Rafe
Warren Oates … Harley Williams
Runtime: 85 min.
Glenn Ford as Ben Jones, Hope Holliday, Sue Ane Langdon and Henry Fonda as Howdy Lewis in The Rounders. That’s Old Fooler in the truck.
Memorable lines:
Howdy Lewis: “How do you feel?”
Ben Jones: “Like I’d like to take an axe and hit that roan right between the eyes.”
Howdy: “Ruin the axe.”
Howdy Lewis: “Ben, tell me again why you hire on, year after year, with Jim Ed Love.”
Ben Jones: “Because one day I’m going to save up enough money to buy myself a boat. And then I’m going to find myself where they ain’t no grass. Because if there ain’t no grass, there ain’t no damn horses.”
Ben Jones, as he prepares to run over a troublesome roan with his truck: “There’s more than one way to break a horse.”
Ben Jones, after Jim Ed Love talks them into accepting another job: “Howdy, it comes to me that we ain’t exactly the smartest cowboys that ever lived.”
Howdy Lewis: “You could say that.”
Howdy Lewis: “Whatever suits you just tickles me plumb to death.”
Glenn Ford as Ben Jones and Henry Fonda as Howdy Lewis catch Harley Williams (Warren Oates) up to no good in The Rounders (1965)
Vince Moore: “How come you have the name of Howdy?”
Howdy Lewis: “Made it up.”
Vince: “You did? Why”
Howdy: “Marion.
Vince: “Marion?”
Howdy: “That was my given name: Marion Lewis. Man can’t ride buckin’ horses for a livin’ with a name like that, so I changed it. Even had it drawn up and sworn at to make it legal. Now no matter where I go or who I meet, first thing they see me, they say ‘Howdy.’ Makes me feel right off they know me.”
(Note: John Wayne given first name was Marion.)
Vince: “Always said you had a friendly streak in you, Howdy.”
Ben Jones: “Come spring, I am going to buy this no-good animal from Jim Ed Love.”
Howdy Lewis: “Buy him?”
Ben: “Yeah, and then I’m going to load him on my truck over there, and I’m going to take him to town and I’m going to sell him to a soap factory. And then I’m going to buy the first cake of soap made out of him, I’m going to find myself one great big manure pile and I’m going to wallow around in it for about a week. And then I’m going to take a bath with him. And then, every time after that when I wash my hands, I’m going to laugh like hell.”
Howdy Lewis, looking at the roan collapsed in the middle of the barn: “Is he dead, Ben?”
Ben Jones: “He’s drunk.”
Ben Jones: “I’m going to sell him to a dog factory. Then I’m going to buy the first can of dog food made out of him. Then I’m going to buy me the mangiest hound dog I can find and feed it to him.”
Sister stripper: “We call our act the snakes of love.”
Mary: “We get into two baskets. When the curtain goes up, the clarinet plays this real weird music.”
Sister: “And we kind of uncoil.”
Mary: “And instead of bumps and grinds, we hiss and strike at each other.”
Sister: “And when we shed our skin, it brings the house down.”
Ben Jones: “I bet it does.”
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