Jesse James

Spectacular as well as exciting Western talks the lives of Jesse and Frank James ; featuring notorious interpretations by a popular group of known stars . This is a slight and intelligent biopic about Jesse James who ranks with Billy the Kid as the most famous of Western outlaws . Legend and folklore have cast him as a Robin Hood , a good boy forced by circumstances to follow a criminal life . The picture provides a good portrait of Jesse and his band , as they move from Civil War to there territory becoming into semi-legends . As showing his home life in Missouri, his experiences with Quantrill's raiders and his career of banditry . As Jesse (Tyrone Power) and Frank (Henry Fonda) along with cousins Cole , Bob and Jim Younger return from War to find their mommy (Jane Darwell) and family threatened by railway people . As Barshee (Brian Donlevy) was hired by the railroad company run by Mc Coy (Donald Meek) to hunt down Jesse and Frank . So James Brothers commence to robbin' banks and trains to help out the poor folks who been done wrong . In the course of their revenge , they will become the object of the biggest manhunt in the history of the Old West . Along the way , Jesse courts attractive young , Zerelda (Nancy Kelly) . As their fame grows, so will the legend of their leader, a young outlaw by the name of Jesse James . At the end , he is betrayed by the Ford brothers , Charlie and Bob (John Carradine) .

This is a sprawling and glamorous Western with excellent performances from Tyrone Power and Henry Fonda . The film gets spectacular shoot em'up , thrills , exciting horse pursuits . A glimmer Western with a wild bunch look-alike that ends up into a fateful final . Packs colorful scenarios, moving pace and slick edition . This is a decent look about the known story of the West's greatest bandit , Jesse James , along with Frank , Cole Younger and brothers with acceptable performances and compelling direction creating some good action scenes . The picture shows nice as well as spectacular frames , as when both Jesse and Frank going off the cliff on horseback , in reality the stunt was performed once and shot with two cameras. After the two horses that were blindfolded and forced to go over a cliff were killed, a new rule was enforced and later endorsed by The Humane Society of America in which strict standards were created to protect Animal Actors in which at the end of the movie and added to the credits listed as "No Animals Were Harmed or Injured in the Production of this Film" ; now all films involving any Animal Actors must have present a member representing The Humane Society of America to insure that all animals are treated humanly and given a safe environment in which to work. As originally conceived by screen writer Nunnally Johnson along with contributing writers as Curtis Kenyon , Long and Gene Fowler . Taut excitement throughout , beautifully photographed by George Barnes and W. Howard Greene . The motion picture was well realized by Henry King .

It was followed by a sequel : ¨The return of Frank James¨ (1950) by Fritz Lang with Henry Fonda . Other films about this legendary outlaw are : ¨I shot Jesse James¨ by Samuel Fuller with John Ireland as Bob Ford ; ¨Jesse James vs the Dalton (1954)¨ by William Castle with John Ireland . ¨The true story of Jesse James¨ (1957) by Nicholas Ray with Robert Wagner , Jeffrey Hunter , Hope Lange , Agnes Moorehead ; in which footage from the original 1939 production was used when Frank and Jesse go over a cliff on horseback into a river and when they crashed , on horseback, through a store window during the "Northfield Minnesota Raid" . And contemporary-style Western such as ¨Frank and Jesse¨ by Robert Boris with Rob Lowe as Jesse James , Bill Paxton as Frank James and Randy Travis as Younger ; ¨American outlaws¨ by Les Mayfield with Colin Farrell , Gabriel Macht , Terry O'Quinn , Harris Yulin and Ali Larter ; and ¨The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford¨ (2007) by Andrew Dominik with Brad Pitt , Sam Shepard , Mary Louise Parker , Casey Affleck and Sam Rockwell.

The picture lavishly produced by Darryl F Zanuck was based on actual events , these are the followings : At the war's end in 1865 , Jesse rode in to surrender and was shot and seriously wounded by a Union soldier . Jesse and his brother joined the Confederate guerrillas of Quantrill and learned to kill in ruthless company . It is believed that Jesse took part in his first robbery in 1866 when a dozen men held up the bank in Liberty , Missouri . A bank cashier was killed in the raid and a reward was offered for each of the James brothers . In 1873 Jesse and his band derailed and robbed a train on the Rock Island line . Jesse married his cousin Zerelda , who bore him two children . Pinkerton detectives were contracted to chase Jesse and Frank , the agents surrounded the home , believing they to be there , tossed a bomb and the explosion killed Jesse's young half-brother . This outrage brought much sympathy for the brothers . On 1876 Jesse and Frank in company the three Younger Brothers , attempted a bank robbery at Northfield , Minnnesota , and walked in disaster . The alerted citizens opened fire on the raiders , of the eight bandits involved , three were killed and three Younger brothers were captured .

If you go to Pineville, Missouri, where part of Jesse James was filmed, and ask about the making of the movie, everyone you meet will tell you the same thing. One of the extras became pregnant by Tyrone Power and gave the baby up for adoption.

When Power learned of this, he spent thousands upon thousands of dollars but never located his offspring. Just think, today she'd drag him into court and sell her story to People. But the times were different.

Frankly, I'm not surprised it happened. Even Power's younger daughter Taryn thinks her father was his most devastatingly handsome in Jesse James. She's right.

Darryl F. Zanuck gave his biggest star a first-class production in color no less. Not remarkable considering that Power in 1939 would hit the pinnacle of his popularity, beating Gable in the year of GWTW in box office receipts.

In this version, Jesse is a folk hero who seeks revenge on the railroad for cheating people out of their property and allowing its representatives to resort to violence against the property owners. That's one way of looking at it.

What puts this movie over is the top-notch cast, headed by Power. Critics could never see beyond his looks, and it is difficult, but his Jesse is ruthless, loving, defeated, and angry as the story demands.

Henry Fonda is perfect as Frank James, and the scene between the two men after Jesse argues with the gang is wonderful. One sees Jesse's pain and feels Frank's concern.

The rest of the cast includes Nancy Kelly, Henry Hull, Brian Donlevy, John Carradine, Jane Darwell, and Randolph Scott - all first-rate.

I'm not a particular fan of westerns, but this one held my interest. Of course, it helps when the Jesse is the stuff dreams are made on.

The first western shot in color focuses more on mythology than facts of this famous outlaw. Tyrone Power in the lead role shows acting abilities not seen in his previous movies,and delivers an intense portrayal of Jesse James. Underplaying his part as Frank James to great effect, Henry Fonda steals the movie.Although a supporting part he's missed in the scenes his not in. Randolph Scott as the marshal delivers one of his best performances. Nancy Kelly makes a beautiful love interest for Power. Henry Hull's crusading editor is fun to watch. The movie is wonderful to look at and one of the great westerns.I hope this classic western will be out on DVD soon.

This film's beauty is that it is so simple. This is by far the best version of the Jesse James story - there is not a sign of formalism as is regularly seen in later westerns, especially modern ones. When you are able to tell a story the way Henry King does, simply and clearly, then you begin to discover many other stories inside the main one. And then you know you have the original, the prototype.

Of all the films Hollywood made during the golden years, my least favorite were ones that played very fast and loose with the facts about the Old West. And, of all the Westerns, those about Jesse James as well as the gunfight at the OK Corral are the worst. Think of it from my point of view. I am an American history teacher and for some bizarre reason, I like my historical films to actually bear some semblance to what actually occurred!!

JESSE JAMES, like all these other films, is a historical nightmare from start to finish. The life of this evil killer and thief is practically impossible to discern in this silly but entertaining film from 20th Century-Fox Studios. Instead of a bad man, according to the film, he is unfairly pushed to a life of crime by an evil railroad AND he and his brother, Frank, are good boys at heart!! With such stupid revisionism, we should soon expect to see films where Hitler, Lee Harvey Oswald and Jeffrey Dahmer are heroes!! There are tons more mistakes about the characters--but simply too many to bother mentioning. In fact, what is NOT wrong would be quicker and easier to discuss!! Additionally, there are just every cliché known to Westerns, such as the shootout ("count three and fire"), Frank giving the town an ultimatum to give him back Jesse by midnight "or else", happy and intensely loyal Black servants, the Robin Hood-like quality of the gang (though at least they showed how eventually he became more of a hardened criminal), the death of Frank and Jesse's momma pushing them to crime, Henry Hull's character from start to finish as well as his comments like "Jesse played fair" and "he was one of the gol-dangedest gol-darnestest buckaroos"!

As for the non-historical aspects of the film, there is a lot to like. The film is shot in glorious Technicolor and the camera work is incredible. I especially loved the extremely difficult shot of the nighttime raid on the train--the moving external shot was NOT an easy thing to do and it looked great. Additionally, being an A-picture from the studio, the cast was spectacular--Tyrone Power (Jesse), Henry Fonda (Frank), Henry Hull (playing a role much like you might expect Walter Brennan to usually play), Randolph Scott, Jane Darwell, Donald Meek and Brian Donlevy make for an excellent cast. And, I must admit the film was fun to watch if you could care less about the facts and just want to be entertained. Unfortunately, for folks like me, it's a chore to watch even a well-made film if it's so historically inaccurate.

By the way, it should also be mentioned that according to the IMDb trivia section, this film should be remembered for its total disregard for the welfare of the horses during filming. In exciting scenes, horses actually died to make the shots look good and although I am NOT a bleeding-heart, I just can't help but be appalled with this disregard for the animals. Not surprisingly, this film led to changes in the industry to protect animals in future films.