An interesting premise for a film trails off in its later reels leaving the drama rather inert and unsatisfying in Stuart Millar’s When the Legends Die. Featuring a wonderfully undemonstrative film debut and a superb star character actor flexing his muscles in a juicy leading role, When the Legends Die is still worth watching, but the promise of something really great here gets rather infuriatingly shortchanged as the film comes to a close.
Studio: Fox
Distributed By: N/A
Video Resolution and Encode: 480I/MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audio: English 2.0 DD
Subtitles: None
Rating: PG
Run Time: 1 Hr. 45 Min.
Package Includes: DVD
Amaray caseDisc Type: DVD-R
Region: 1
Release Date: 07/15/2015
MSRP: $19.98
The Production Rating: 3/5
Brought out of the forest and forced into a governmentally sanctioned school for Ute Indians on their reservation, young Tom Black Bull (Tillman Box) grows into a sullen and very private young man (Frederic Forrest). When retired rodeo cowboy Red Dillon (Richard Widmark) sees how well Tom can handle broncos, he signs the underaged Tom’s guardianship papers and takes him under his wing teaching him everything he knows about bronco busting. When Tom is entered in minor rodeo circuits and starts winning, Red begins rigging the bets so that he can direct Tom to lose or win and make a killing. Trouble is, Red subsequently makes a habit of either gambling, drinking, or whoring away the winnings so that Tom feels helpless and exploited. He wants to quit, but Red reminds him that until he turns 21, Red is running the show, and he’ll use the talented rider any way he wants.
For a good two-thirds of the film, Robert Dozier’s screenplay based on the novel by Hal Borland is a honey enveloping us into the messy and frustrating web that is Tom Black Bull’s young adult life. Yoked to a man who fools him (and us) into thinking he cares and is a friend, he subsequently shows his true colors later as a cruel and insensitive bigot and tyrant. Director Stuart Millar does a fine job ushering us into and through the various worlds that Tom traverses: the Ute school where the children are taught English by diagramming sentences, the rodeo circuits both small time and large scale with the adoring crowds and the lonely, grubby motels that become home for many months of the year, the temptations of booze and women that come with the fame and fortune. But the script stumbles in the last third when the storytelling gets choppy and emotions aren’t conveyed well enough to help viewers understand motivations and decisions that come about. Tom’s journey is such a fascinating one that we feel cheated when shortcuts are taken that rob us of vital character information (we don’t get to see what’s in a note written to Mary (Luana Anders) who obviously loves him, we aren’t clued into his decisions about returning to Red or to his immolation of the shack (which wasn’t his to burn). There are some great rodeo clips of impressive riding feats (and the inserts with co-star Frederic Forrest are reasonably well done), and Millar and his editor Louis San Anders have assembled a couple of striking montages: one showing Tom paying his dues and learning the hard way about the quirky natures of bucking horses and later as Tom advances up the ladder becoming a top rodeo star and champion.
It’s a meaty leading role for Richard Widmark who shows both gruff kindness and downright villainous prejudice as the erratic Red Dillon. While his descent into alcoholism seems more abrupt than it needed to be, he certainly commands the screen whenever the spotlight is on him. Frederic Forrest makes an outstanding debut as the cowboy who comes to be known as Killer Tom Black. Using facial expressions and body language far more than words, Forrest is impressive as the casual nature of everyday prejudice around him begins to weigh on him (how hard it is to watch a succession of people refer to his character not by his name but with words like “Chief” and “Geronimo.” Impossible to believe folks were ever so thoughtless and insensitive). Vito Scotti as Red’s cook Meo plays a much less demonstrative character this time out, but he’s just as effective as always in portraying a man with much heart and a genuine interest in Red’s young charge. John Gruber as Tom’s rival at bronco riding Tex Walker is very good at being bad, but Luana Anders as Tom’s love interest Mary seems inexperienced and tentative in her few scenes with Forrest.
Video Rating: 2.5/5 3D Rating: NA
Fox has trotted out one of their old open matte television transfers to slap onto this made-on-demand disc so we get a 1.33:1 image instead of the 1.85:1 theatrical aspect ratio. The image offers above average sharpness, but without any anamorphic enhancement, there are lots of examples of line twitter and aliasing to be seen. Color often looks dated and rather flat though flesh tones aren’t unimpressive. The image looks brownish overall, and one doesn’t know whether that’s the proper color timing or simply the results of an aging element on display. Contrast has been consistently applied though black levels are only average. There are only random dust specks, however, so the transfer is relatively clean. The film has been divided into chapters every ten minutes so there are 11 chapters present.
Audio Rating: 4/5
The Dolby Digital 2.0 sound mix is decoded by Dolby Prologic into the center channel. Volume levels have been set correctly with this disc (a problem with earlier releases in the Fox Cinema Archive line-up), and dialogue, sound effects, and the music score by Glenn Paxton all share the track comfortably. There are admirably no age-related artifacts like hiss or crackle to mar the listening experience, and fidelity is actually more impressive than one might expect for a film of this period.
Special Features Rating: 1/5
Theatrical Trailer (3:09)
Overall Rating: 3/5
When the Legends Die is a fine drama with two very strong leading performances, but it unfortunately has only been given a mediocre DVD release on this Fox Cinema Archive presentation.
Reviewed By: Matt Hough
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