Cimarron (1931)
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Cimarron Movie Review
Cimarron is a 1931 western film directed by Wesley Ruggles and starring Richard Dix and Irene Dunne. It’s one of the worst Best Picture winners in the Academy’s history.
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“Wife and mother, stainless woman,
hide me… hide me in your love“
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This film was obviously based on a book, but it’s so poorly adapted that it never really becomes cinematic enough to justify its existence. It was obviously epic for the audiences of 1931, but for today’s audiences, it’s rather dated, slow, uninvolving and just plain dull. There are a couple of tragic or moving moments to be had here and of course that iconic opening scene remains powerful to this day, but other scenes, mostly in the middle, are overly stretched in runtime, too melodramatic, talkative and simply boring.
Richard Dix is quite bad here. His performance is simply mediocre and the fact that he was nominated for Best Actor just goes to show how biased toward Cimarron the Academy was. He was just not good enough to carry this film on his shoulders and it was up to Irene Dunne to save some parts and she did just that.
Yes, she is the better one clearly here. Her performance is very strong as is her character which is the best one in the film. The movie is rather feminist in its overtones, especially for its time, but unfortunately it’s racist and those scenes just don’t fly anymore. And the movie simply has too many characters, of which only the two protagonists are remotely memorable and others are all uninspired and unnecessary.
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Cimarron is exceptionally shot, there is no denying that. That opening sequences with the Oklahoma land rush of 1889 remains the finest and only great scene in the film because it truly feels epic in scope and a good history lesson. The entire movie is actually very well shot across the board with particularly memorable sets, costumes and interior designs. Visually speaking, the movie is excellent and that’s literally the only good aspect in the film apart from Irene Dunne’s obviously terrific performance.
But it isn’t all that memorable in terms of the score as the sound recording still needs some work. For a 1931 film, the movie sounds good, but otherwise not all that remarkable. And naturally the dialogue is pretty weak. There are some solid lines to be had here and some quite heartwarming scenes, but the majority of speeches are archaic and the majority of the film is excessive in its dialogue and it needed more memorable events and plot points.
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It was obviously very badly adapted so its nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay is horrible and the fact that it eventually even won is simply ludicrous. Best Art Direction is deserved as is the Cinematography nod, but the nod for Richard Dix is undeserved as he was so mediocre here. Irene Dunne deserved her nomination though, but obviously the Director and Picture noms and the win in the latter case remain baffling. The Academy obviously ate this up as it is right up their valley, but for me it was boring and dated. It remains one of a few westerns to win an Oscar and one of the weakest winners to this date.
Cimarron definitely is phenomenally shot and Irene Dunne is very good in her role, but Richard Dix is mediocre and the film is rather racist, dated, incredibly slow and boring and simply not eventful enough. The opening scene is memorable, but the rest of the movie is so tedious, uninvolving and a typically overlong historical western which did not age well at all. It is rightfully considered among the worst Best Picture winners of all time.
