MovieChat Forums > Psycho (1960) Discussion > Stagecoach(1966) and Psycho

Stagecoach(1966) and Psycho

posted 7 years ago by ecarle (14979)
12 replies | jump to latest

..not quite the stretch it seems.

I saw the 1966 version of Stagecoach IN 1966 when I was a kid, first run at a local theater. The opening scene finds a Cavalry squad in the beautiful Colorado woods, by a meadow and stream. A cook goes to a nearby covered wagon and opens up the flap to reach in for supplies. But there is a Sioux Indian there who instead buries his tomahawk right into the cook's face. The blood is bright red and copious. The dying cook falls face first into the stream and his blood travels downstream(shades of Marion's blood in the shower water in Psycho) where it is seen by another Army man -- who promptly receives a spear in the back.

Its a Sioux war raid, and the Cavalry men are slaughtered in Technicolor and Cinemascope. I recall thinking the bloodshed was pretty cool when I when I saw the film as a kid in '66 -- when Stagecoach '66 made it to ABC a few years later, this violent opening was cut down to nothing.

But here's the thing: I was allowed to watch this movie that opened with a man taking a hatchet to the face and spurting red blood everywhere(like Arbogast but worse) -- but I wasn't allowed to see Psycho around the same time.

Perhaps this was because Stagecoach was sold as a Western, not a "bloody shocker.". Perhaps because my family didn't realize that THIS Western would be so violent. (The opening Indian massacre is only the beginning; in the next scene two Army officers brutally fight each other and simultaneously kill each other in a saloon, as the one with a knife in his side manages to bearhug the other to death before dying himself; at the climax, a villainous outlaw smears the blood of a recent victim onto the coat of Bob Cummings, using his hand.) But the bottom line is that this is just one more example of how I personally saw a film much more violent than Psycho before I was allowed to see Psycho.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

They don't much show Stagecoach '66 anymore. As with Gus Van Sant's Psycho(yet another connection), the feeling is that the new one couldn't hold a candle to the original -- though I beg to differ on a few points, as we shall see. Likely more importantly , this is one of those movies that Marlon Brando hated...the Sioux are the bad guys, violent takers of male and female victims, merciless monsters. The movie is framed like a horror movie -- as the stagecoach takes its journey, we're just waiting for the Indians(so violently shown in the first scene) to come out and start to kill the white people on the coach.

One has to take a lot of Stagecoach '66 with a grain of salt to watch it today. It has some attributes:

Chief among them is Bing Crosby, doing an overarticulate, Shakespeare-quoting drunken doctor act with his great voice bringing forth that great "straight man cool" that served him so well with Bob Hope(odd -- Hope was better looking than Crosby, but Crosby's voice and cool got him the chicks.) The middle-aged, stubble-faced Crosby had a little of that male thing that gets you more distinguished looking when you get older; this was a great role for him, he looks good AND sounds good. And he even gets to recommend "a little toddy for the body" as if this Westerner were guesting on the Dean Martin show.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

The rest of the stagecoach travelers: Ann-Margret(dance hall hooker); Stefanie Powers(staid and pregnant military wife); Red Buttons(liquor salesman taken under Crosby's wing); Michael Connors(soon Mannix as Mike Connors; here a Southern gambler out to protect the pregnant Powers); Van Heflin(that gnarly-faced SECOND star of Shane and 310 to Yuma; here the sheriff); Bob Cummings(just odd and awful in his line-readings, as the banker with stolen cash in his satchel and nothing good to say about anybody blocking his escape); Slim Pickens(perfectly Slim Pickens-esque, two years after Strangelove, as the stagecoach driver.)

And Alex Cord as the Vince Vaughn of 1966, trying to take over for John Wayne, who so famously became a star in the original Stagecoach of '39 and who was STILL a big star in 1966. Cord -- young, wiry and very handsome -- is fine in a role where he does all he can not to act like John Wayne.

Bob Cummings as the cowardly, villainous banker kicks in several Hitchcock memories. His embezzlement and attempt to escape in the face of suspicion everywhere is very Marion Crane-ish, just done by a guy this time. And Cummings himself is a Hitchcock veteran -- TWO Hitchcock flicks!(when William Holden made none!) -- who, again, is just so strange and off-putting in his line-readings here that one wonders how he ever earned a living as an actor.

Oddly, though based on the embezzling banker of Ford's '39 original, Cummings villain also ties into the NEXT YEAR's big "Quasi-remake of Stagecoach": Martin Ritts dead-serious "Hombre," which certainly takes up the Native American as an understandable wronged hero rather than a villain and has Fredric March as a bigoted snob who has a bunch of money stolen from Indian Reservation in HIS satchel. "Hombre" has a starrier cast and greater sense of purpose than Stagecoach '66, which just looks silly by comparison

Still, there are things I like in Stagecoach '66.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

The things I like in Stagecoach '66:

ACTION: Whereas John Ford was spare and sparse in his presentation of the Stagecoach story, the '66 film(led by much-maligned but actually pretty good journeyman director Gordon Douglas) goes for big action on two big occasions: one is the big chase of the stagecoach by the Sioux(which was a big deal in the '39 one, too) and the second is Alex Cord's final shootout with the Luke Plummer gang in a saloon. Ford had condensed this down to one shot of Wayne hitting the ground and firing his rifle at unseen foes. Douglas expands that single shot into a pretty good and pretty lengthy gunbattle that ends with the saloon aflame.

The '66 stagecoach chase not only betters the Ford original...it looks forward 15 years to the big truck chase in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Color, wide-screen, big action, great stunts.

A HITCHCOCKIAN CLIFFHANGER: Mid-film, the stagecoach has to crawl along a cliffside in a storm, with a huge drop to the side if the coach falls. The sequence looks a lot like Rushmore in NXNW, right down to the blue sheen tone to the scene (its a night scene) to the matte work.

JERRY GOLDSMITH'S SCORE: Goldsmith scored the 60's and the 70's as rather a bridge from Herrmann to John Williams. His Western scores were among his best, and this is no exception to that rule. This score is a little more elegant and somber than the big muscular music Goldsmith did for Rio Conchos(also directed by Gordon Douglas), very evocative of the gorgeous terrain the stagecoach travels and the varied people on the coach.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

NORMAN ROCKWELL AND WAYNE NEWTON(?): You heard that right. At the end of the movie, we get a "cast roll call" and its ten paintings of the ten leads, painted by Norman Rockwell, while Wayne Newton warbles a short ditty about "riding a stagecoach" (the song starts slow and sad, and then explodes into action, like a runaway stagecoach, but the song is over before it starts, because this was back when end credits didn't run for ten minutes.) The Rockwell paintings were all put on the movie poster, making it kind of a work of art itself(you can see it at imdb). The Bing Crosby painting made it into Life magazine as a stand-alone. The Slim Pickens painting captures Slim in all his Slim-ness.

I would say that the Stagecoach '66 ties to Psycho lie mainly in its violence(and personally, how I was allowed to see it even as Psycho was forbidden), and how Gordon Douglas went up against ANOTHER film master(John Ford) and took his lumps for it, just like a guy named Van Sant 32 year later.

The bad guy Native Americans are cliché and obsolete now, but as Ulzana's Raid pointed out in 1972, they could be very violent. This was war. Still, I think the villain-Indian aspect of Stagecoach 66 will keep it almost out of circulation(I was surprised to find it on Encore Westerns last week.)

Another remake of Stagecoach was made, for TV, in 1986. Clever gimmick: cast four famous country-rock stars in it: Willie Nelson(the drunk, here converted into Foolproof Doc Holliday), Kris Kristofferson(the Wayne role); Waylon Jennings(the gambler); Johnny Cash(the sheriff.) The TV budget makes it lesser in scale than Stagecoach '66, but Willie's character makes sure that the Indians are defended and justified for their warlike ways. Stagecoach '86 may get played more than Stagecoach '66.

[–] telegonus (736) 7 years ago

I've never seen the Stagecoach remake, EC, though I remember that it got a lot of publicity when it was in the making and when first released. That Bing Crosby was playing (a likely Oscar bait) character part was a factor in this. Ann-Margaret's presence didn't hurt. Nor did the always likable Red Buttons. It was apparently the wrong movie for the wrong time. Remakes weren't that popular back then but Hollywood was on a nostalgia kick, maybe partly inspired by What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (a Psycho connection there, for sure), the burgeoning Bogart cult, in "art house" and college theaters especially, maybe the huge success of The Carpetbaggers a year or so earlier. Camp was in the air then, and Andy Warhol had become a cult figure, might have served as technical adviser on the Batman TV series (a tribute to Adam West there...). Also, the late shows, early shows and afternoon tea time movies were going great guns on the local TV stations and on network TV.

So somebody came up with the bright idea to remake...Stagecoach? It seems an odd choice, especially as its classic status, more so than with most old movies, was tied to its year of release (1939), its star (it kicked John Wayne into the A list) and its director, John Ford. Take away these three and what have you got? Just an old western from a long time ago. A classic, for sure, but for very specific reasons that couldn't be duplicated a generation later. For instance (another Psycho connection, sort of): John Ford deliberately shot Stagecoach39 in black and white and in a certain way so as to make it look and feel like a Republic B. It was a (self-) conscious attempt to elevate the western, which as a genre had been in the doldrums since the coming of sound a decade earlier, and he succeeded! Hitchcock, similarly, made Psycho on the cheap,--a tribute to William Castle, go figure!--and whether it was his intention or not he helped kick-start the horror revival of the Sixties.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

I've never seen the Stagecoach remake, EC,

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With the exception of the entertaining Crosby performance and the big action scenes(if you've a mind), I don't think you've missed much. On the other hand, it was a very exciting and entertaining thing to see as a boy in the 60's when I did.

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though I remember that it got a lot of publicity when it was in the making and when first released.

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Yes...I think a big deal was made of the Norman Rockwell paintings of the cast. He was quite an honorable participant in what was sort of "a high end B movie".

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That Bing Crosby was playing (a likely Oscar bait) character part

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Never thought of that. Loveable alcoholics do well with Oscar. I was reminded, watching him, that Crosby was the prototype for both Sinatra(as THE singer) and Dino(in singing style and as a "cool cat") and he demonstrated his charisma here.

The film has a wry take on its ultra-violence early on. Two soldiers are sizing each other up for what will be a vicious fight in a saloon. Crosby watches, cadging himself a free drink from a bottle on the bar. The bartender protests. Crosby says "I am a merely taking an advance on the fee for my services, which will clearly be necessary within but a few minutes." And he's right. Crosby watches the very violent fight to the death, approaches the warm corpses, checks their pulses and remarks dryly "Dead, alright." There's almost a Tarantinoesqe sense of capping a violent scene with a joke. Or is it just a tonal mistake?

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

Ann-Margaret's presence didn't hurt.

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The cast is listed alphabetically, and "Ann-Marget" comes first. Because of the A in her first name ....or...she is the star of the film. A bit of both, but I'd say, more the latter.

A-M is one of my favorite sixties sexpots. She was treated with disrespect until she did "Carnal Knowledge" for Nichols with Nicholson in '71, but she always had "it" certainly from "Bye Bye Birdie" on(that great opening number that made Janet Leigh cry when she realized she wasn't really the female lead of the picture.) She's good in this one, interacting in a "democratic" fashion with the other actors who really aren't the stars.

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Nor did the always likable Red Buttons.

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In a nice running gag, he is always mistaken for a minister, just because of his dress and manner. But he's a liquor salesman. Thomas Mitchell and Donald Meek had the Crosby and Buttons roles in the original. This time, the stars are more evenly matched -- Buttons was already an Oscar winner.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

More on this soon to telegonus here...

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

It was apparently the wrong movie for the wrong time. Remakes weren't that popular back then

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Indeed, not. We are rife with them today. And when Stagecoach 66 came out, unlike as Hitchcock with Van Sant, John Ford was still alive and presumed "active"(but he wasn't really, his last film was 7 Women in '65), and threw a few barbs the way of the remake.

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but Hollywood was on a nostalgia kick, maybe partly inspired by What Ever Happened To Baby Jane (a Psycho connection there, for sure), the burgeoning Bogart cult, in "art house" and college theaters especially, maybe the huge success of The Carpetbaggers a year or so earlier.

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Its been written that Stagecoach 66 had the misfortune of coming out when the classic cinema craze was well underway, and Ford WAS a God(as was the still-active Hitch). The new Stagecoach just seemed an "insult to the religion of film"(Van Sant's Psycho was called that...jokingly by Van Sant's friend Buck Henry, I think.)

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Camp was in the air then, and Andy Warhol had become a cult figure, might have served as technical adviser on the Batman TV series (a tribute to Adam West there...).

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Adam West. I'll have reason to talk about HIM. And his adjunct relationship to Psycho. Its tiny.

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Also, the late shows, early shows and afternoon tea time movies were going great guns on the local TV stations and on network TV.

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I think the original Stagecoach was running as a local TV staple, and Fox made a move to have it taken out of circulation in 1966 that met with great protest in cinema circles. I don't know if that happened.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

So somebody came up with the bright idea to remake...Stagecoach? It seems an odd choice, especially as its classic status, more so than with most old movies, was tied to its year of release (1939), its star (it kicked John Wayne into the A list) and its director, John Ford. Take away these three and what have you got?

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You could roughly say the same about Psycho (1960, Perkins, Hitchcock.) But things were easier in 1998. No wait, they weren't: the Van Sant was widely despised and a flop.

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Just an old western from a long time ago. A classic, for sure, but for very specific reasons that couldn't be duplicated a generation later. For instance (another Psycho connection, sort of): John Ford deliberately shot Stagecoach39 in black and white and in a certain way so as to make it look and feel like a Republic B.

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"I did not know that."

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[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

Hitchcock, similarly, made Psycho on the cheap,--a tribute to William Castle, go figure!--and whether it was his intention or not he helped kick-start the horror revival of the Sixties.

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That, most famously, and, I would suggest, the bloody aspects of Stagecoach '66. The savagery and spurting blood of the first Indian attack were things that Psycho had "allowed" in 1960, and Stagecoach '66 took full advantage. It was too "square" a production to be noticed by the cineastes, but Stagecoach '66 points the way to the ultraviolence of the spaghetti westerns and The Wild Bunch 'dead ahead." With Psycho there to inspire them all.

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But this: as I noted, I recall Stagecoach '66 ending up on the ABC Sunday night movie a few years later, and that opening massacre was heavily edited. You didn't see the cook get the hatchet in the face.

MANY violent movies of the 60s and 70s ended on broadcast TV with their gory scenes "edited for TV," and the effect was weird: the precisely edited frames took out only the offensive material, so men would be standing there and suddenly disappear , or suddenly be lying on the ground. These "violent edits" became the only way you could SEE a movie in the pre-VHS/cable era and I for one, accepted them.

I"ve mentioned before that the 1970 NBC showing of Torn Curtain cut Gromek's killing down to a struggle and then just ...he's gone. Newman and the farmer's wife rise into the frame and its clear he's been killed, but how, when?

Then in a 1973 episode of "The Men Who Made the Movies," the scene was restored in all its gory glory and I was amazed to see it "intact." (I had seen it in 1966, but my memories were weak.) But it would be many years before a VHS uncut version was available after that.

[–] ecarle (14979) 7 years ago

The battle between "sex and gore in the theatrical version" and the edited-for-TV versions was significant. The networks wanted the ratings and bucks of showing The Wild Bunch even if the movie was a shadow of itself(Peckinpah reportedly watched the "butchery" of the final shootout and got drunk.)

Eventually, HBO and VHS stepped in to give us the "real deal." A victory in some ways, but the restoration of the gore reminded us of how nasty theatricals had gotten since 1960.