Wyoming (1940)

Wallace Beery is Reb Harkness, who has a falling out with his partner after a botched bank robbery.

The result: He finds himself afoot with a cavalry detail on his trail. And he’s a long, long way away from his destination of California.

Fortunately for Reb, he comes across another former Confederate, David Kincaid, who offers him a ride aboard his donkey as far as the Sweet River Valley, Wyoming.

They’re about an hour away from Kincaid ranch there when Reb’s orneriness surfaces again.

He steals his traveling companion’s horse, donkey and belongings, including David Kincaid’s gun.

And that means David Kincaid is defenseless when he finds rustlers stealing his cattle. He’s gunned down.

Feeling partly to blame, Reb sticks around a while to help Kincaid’s children, pretty Lucy Kincaid (Ann Rutherford) and her much younger son Jimmy (Bobs Watson).

But helping lands him in the middle of a range war because land-hungry John Buckley is determined to run the small ranchers like Kincaid off their land or make them work for him.

That range war eventually includes George Armstrong Custer and Sitting Bull as well.

Wallace Beery as Reb Harkness, catching up with killers and feeling ornery in Wyoming (1940)

Marjorie Main as Mehitabel Belle, falling for Reb’s charm in Wyoming (1940)

Review:

It’s a Wallace Beery Western, so you know what to expect — his oafish routine as a loveable bandit, usually with a child and Marjorie Main somewhere in the plot.

Here, the child is 9-year-old Bobs Watson, whose screen death in 1939’s “Dodge City” convinced Errol Flynn it was time to clean up the town.

As for Marjorie Main, she plays a blacksmith’s sister, capable of shoeing a horse all on her own, knowing Buckley for the snake he is, yet susceptible to Reb’s charm.

There’s a well-filmed Indian attack on the Kincaid ranch with most of the principal characters trapped inside. And a sorta cute ending. Otherwise, this is standard Beery fare.

He and Main wound up in seven films together. This was their first. The others included a trio of Westerns — “Jackass Mail” (1942), “Bad Bascomb” (1946) and “Big Jack” (1949).

Bobs Watson as JImmy Kincaid, the young boy who adopts Reb Harkness as his uncle in Wyoming (1940)

Ann Rutherford as Lucy Kincaid, thanking Reb Harkness for all of his help in Wyoming (1940)

Directed by:
Richard Thorpe

Cast:
Wallace Beery … Reb Harkness
Leo Carrillo … Pete Marillo
Ann Rutherford … Lucy Kincaid
Lee Bowman … Lt. Connally
Marjorie Main … Mehitabel Belle
Joseph Calleia … John Buckley
Bobs Watson … Jimmy Kincaid
Paul Kelly … General Custer
Henry Travers … Sheriff
Chief Thundercloud … Lightfoot

Runtime: 88 min.

aka:
Bad Man of Wyoming

Joseph Calleia as John Buckley, the man who wants to turn Sweet Water Valley into his personal cattle empire in Wyoming (1940)

Leo Carrillo as Pete Marillo, complaining about his a partnership with Reb where he does all the work and gets less than half the loot in Wyoming (1940)

Memorable lines:

Sheriff: “Just because I got a soft place in my heart’s no reason to take advantage of it.”
Mehitabel Belle: “Soft place? There’s only one thing soft about you and that’s your backbone.”

Reb Harkness, recovering after being knocked out: “Where’s all them men I was fighting with.”
Mehitabel Belle: “I’m them.”
Reb: “All of ’em?”

Reb Harkness: “You must be loco? How’d you ever get to live to be as old as you are?”
Mehitable Belle: “By having twice as much sense as jackasses like you.”

Reb Harkness: “That’s sorta dangerous talk you’re a aimin’ at me.”

Jimmy Kincaid, reaching the bathing hole with Reb Harkness: “Why can’t we go in together?”
Reb Harkness: “Well, because the dirt on me is from Missouri and the dirt on you is from Wyomin’.”
Jimmy: “What does that hurt?”
Reb: “You know what happened between the north and the south, don’t ya?”

Paul Kelley as George Custer, questioning Buckley about missing rifles in Wyoming (1940)

Henry Travers as the sheriff working mainly for Buckley in Wyoming (1940)

Lee Bowman as Lt. Connally, the cavalry officer who falls for pretty Lucy Kincaid in Wyoming (1940)

Stanley Fields as Curly, lead henchman for John Buckley in Wyoming (1940)

Addison Richards as Dave Kincaid, finding a stranger trying to steal his horse in Wyoming (1940)

Wallace Beery as Reb Harkness, ready to send a Sioux warrior to his happy hunting ground as Jimmy Kincaid (Bobs Watson) looks on in Wyoming (1940)