Universal Home Entertainment's new DVD collection Classic Western Round-Up Volume 1 doesn't come with many bells and whistles (just trailers in addition to some of the films), but it's welcome to classic-movie fans because it offers four (well, three anyway) desirable westerns at a good price. The box cover makes a fuss over stars Dana Andrews, Audie Murphy, Rock Hudson and Fred MacMurray, but the big story here is having new-to-DVD pictures from three of Hollywood's most interesting directors: King Vidor (The Texas Rangers, 1936), Raoul Walsh (The Lawless Breed, 1952) and Jacques Tourneur (Canyon Passage, 1946). The fourth feature is Kansas Raiders (1950), directed by Ray Enright.

Canyon Passage is arguably not even really a western. It's set in an 1856 Oregon mining community and comes off more as a "frontier drama." Maybe that's one reason that this is a strange, seemingly uneven movie. From the title, setting, costumes and look of things, one expects a traditional western with a traditional plot, but Tourneur and screenwriter Ernest Pascal offer something quite a bit different. We have a morally centered hero (Dana Andrews) and a mean villain (Ward Bond), but their conflict is a mere subplot. There's a shady secondary villain (Brian Donlevy) and an Indian uprising, but these, too, are subplots. In fact, Canyon Passage is a movie filled with stories involving gambling, homesteading, a romantic triangle, and Indians, yet it doesn't feel episodic - it gives a feeling that all the stories are happening at the same time, thereby capturing a slice of life in a strongly atmospheric setting.

Essentially, Canyon Passage is the tale of Logan Stewart (Andrews), a merchant in a small Oregon town who is attracted to the girl (Susan Hayward) of his business partner (Donlevy). Donlevy has racked up serious debt through his gambling addiction, and turns to embezzlement and murder. Ward Bond is a sadistic town troublemaker who has it out for Andrews, and they fight throughout the film. Their bar fight is especially great - they seem to be seriously walloping each other. Meanwhile, the local Indians fume on the sidelines as they watch the white people build homes on land adjacent to the town. One homesteader is played warmly by Andy Devine, who has a catchphrase for every situation and whose real-life kids get special billing for playing his kids on screen. Through it all, strangely enough, wanders Hoagy Carmichael as a traveling minstrel/philosophizer/observer, belting out several smooth songs like "Ole Buttermilk Sky," a big hit of the day which was nominated for an Academy Award.

As bizarre as this concoction sounds, and as little sense as the movie seems to make at times, Canyon Passage casts a pleasantly enveloping spell, with many individual scenes extremely well written and directed. (A house-raising scene reminiscent of Witness, 1984, is a standout.) A lot of story happens off-screen, and for the most part this is a talky film with not a lot of action, but when the action does come it is horrifically brutal - downright shocking, actually - which must have been the contrast that Pascal and Tourneur were going for. Throughout the picture they give us images and characters associated with traditional westerns but do not allow us to experience them in the ways we are used to, through a traditional surface plot; the result is that, consciously or not, we reflect upon these images quite differently, and they seem to convey a level of truthfulness and accuracy that is very high indeed.

Tourneur was an impeccable stylist in his best movies like Out of the Past (1947), Night of the Demon (1957) and I Walked With a Zombie (1943), and this one isn't far behind. He frequently excelled at capturing the culture and atmosphere of his locations (think of the beautifully evocative town of Bridgeport in Out of the Past), and the imagery in Canyon Passage has strong staying power. He's helped by gorgeous location photography by Edward Cronjager and a good score from Frank Skinner.

Though perhaps not for all tastes (kids will be bored), Canyon Passage is a highly mature film that withstands multiple viewings, offering a richer understanding each time. Universal's DVD is for the most part a good transfer, but there are moments where the Technicolor seems to blur in and out of alignment. Whether this is the print or the transfer, I'm not sure, but it doesn't happen too often.

For more information about Canyon Passage, visit Universal Home Entertainment. To order Canyon Passage (available only as part of Vol. 1 of the Classic Western Round-up DVD), go to TCM Shopping.

by Jeremy Arnold