Whatever ALONG CAME JONES lacks in comic pacing is more than compensated by Gary Cooper's delicious romp of a performance as Melody Jones, a cowboy who can't shoot or fight. Cooper produced this himself -- he was the first star to form his own company -- and clearly knew what he had in the role of Melody Jones. This is also a film far ahead of its time in the role reversal plot, in which Loretta Young can outshoot Cooper. It is Loretta Young, not Coop, who faces down villain Dan Duryea in the climactic gunfight. Highly recommended for Cooper's tour-de-force performance.

LEGEND OF THE LOST is a total wipe-out. Not a single redeemable sequence in this absurd tale of buried treasure out in the desert. What were Wayne and Sophia Loren thinking, signing on for this tripe? And director Henry Hathaway had been around for decades, couldn't he see the train wreck this was? Even the unintentional howlers aren't enough to keep you awake. Simply dreadful!

Even the combined star-power of Rock Hudson and John Wayne can't save this tired rehash of far better similar westerns. The Yankee-in-Mexico plot has served as the basis for several classic westerns -- VERA CRUZ, THE PROFESSIONALS, THE WILD BUNCH -- but this comes up woefully short. The politics and conflicts are muddled to the point that it is hard to know just which side you're supposed to be rooting for. The above cited classics made it crystal-clear which side was in the right, even if it seemed the Yankee heros weren't sure themselves. Steer wide of this, even if you're part of the Duke cult.

DISTANT DRUMS is weak Gary Cooper, indeed. Another example of how Warner Bros. had no idea how to use Cooper during his six picture deal from the late forties to the early fifties. This is notable mostly for some terrific location work in the Everglades and a fine score from Max Steiner. One sidebar: This is one of several westerns in the fifties in which Cooper was a parent. No other star played a father as often as Cooper, especially in westerns.

John Wayne as Ambassador Townsend Harris. Now wouldn't it have been fun to be a fly on the wall at the meeting when the studio suits first suggested this casting? This film is a laugh riot, an endless series of increasingly ludicrous scenes. An absolute disaster, from beginning to end. The Duke is an 800 pound gorilla in 19th century Japan. He has to be seen to be believed.

CAHILL--U. S. MARSHAL is another Duke turkey. One of a seemingly unending stream he cranked out in the late sixties through the mid-seventies. On top of which, it is violent and downright cruel. The original script was a modern-day urban cop story. Duke had it rewritten as an oater. Better he should have passed.

BLUEBEARD'S EIGHTH WIFE is a near-miss screwball farce. Claudette Colbert's undoing of her playboy husband Gary Cooper has some wonderfully humorous moments. But the parts are greater than the whole. However, if you watch this as a forerunner to the Cooper/Wilder masterpiece, LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON, made 20 years later, it is an extremely fascinating film. Wilder made LOVE IN THE AFTERNOON as a tribute to his idol, Ernst Lubitsch, who directed this. Cooper's jaded, aging roue works far better in AFTERNOON than here in BLUEBEARD, perhaps because screwball farce wasn't the right style for the plotline. That said, it is very much worth watching. It just isn't top-drawer, that's all.

RIO BRAVO is sad, in that it shows Howard Hawks long past his prime. Hawks had his golden period from TWENTIETH CENTURY through RED RIVER. His later films, including this poorly structured, tritely written and clumsily acted (especially in its degrading treatment of its Mexican characters) western, are cardboard cutouts compared to his earlier films. If it's John Wayne and Dean Martin you want at the top of their games, check out SONS OF KATIE ELDER, one of the best of all westerns. Of course, its director, Henry Hathaway, isn't looked on with favor by the auteurist clique, thus it isn't given its due. But watch RIO BRAVO and SONS OF KATIE ELDER back-to-back, and decide for yourself which film is the better.

This 1932 version of A FAREWELL TO ARMS was one which Hemingway very vociferously hated. From his perspective, since it placed the romance between Frederick Henry and Catherine Barkley over his depiction of the brutality of war, he was right. However, director Frank Borzage was after something else -- a luscious, doomed wartime romance. And in this, he succeeds, brilliantly. Aided in no small part by the beautiful teaming of Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes. Hemingway later became very good friends with Cooper, whom he hand-picked to star in FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS. They were in the process of forming a company to make ACROSS THE RIVER AND INTO THE TREES and THE NICK ADAMS STORIES -- Cooper to topline both -- when they died a mere seven weeks apart in 1961.

BALL OF FIRE is one of the classic screwball farces. With a wonderful script from Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett, smart, spot-on direction from Howard Hawks, great B&W cinematography from Gregg Toland, elegant set design from William Cameron Menzies (wait'll you see the wonderful Manhattan town house!) BALL OF FIRE turns Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs on its head. Here, the seven dwarfs -- led by a terrific Gary Cooper -- are taught the ways of the world by Snow White -- an equally terrific Barbara Stanwyck. This is sheer, unadulterated fun, from beginning to end. Has any actor in the history of film had a year like Cooper had in 1941? Besides BALL OF FIRE, he also starred in two other critical and box office smashes -- Capra's very disturbing MEET JOHN DOE, and a second Hawks film, SERGEANT YORK, for which Cooper won his first Academy Award. Not bad for an actor whom some have claimed was wooden and only played himself! Buy this, most definitely.