Bucking Broadway

John Ford (known as Jack Ford until 1923 in his credits), made this one from later on in 1917. The same year as his first film, Straight Shooting (1917). This film is a little bit better, probably because the film takes a different turn away from the western scenario and takes it to a more urban-city environment. A typical story of love, romance, betrayal, scorn and abandonment.

Boy meets girl. Girl leaves guy for New York with rich guy. Girl finds out rich guy is a jerk. The cowboy hero and his buddies race to New York to get her back. Eye-Candy shots of open-prairie and the beautiful west are in the film too, with some gun-slinging and bar brawling that every cowboy loves to see, inter-spliced, in-between.

There is the required Ford "front-door" shot in this, as we see Ford's career moving forward. Too bad the censorship board made him fix a bunch of shots/scenes. Too many low-cut dresses on the ladies and too much fake violence for 1917, I guess. I still think it was a little bit better than Straight Shooting (1917), in design and execution. Ford's early career was fast and cheap, but the greatness is not far off.

7.8 (B- MyGrade) = 8 IMDB