Dark Command

1940 US Raoul Walsh
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John Wayne plays illiterate cowboy turned politician (Walsh seeing into America's future?) who fights corruption and Quantrill's raiders in Civil War-era Kansas. Real history is minimal. Was supposed to be Big for a B-studio, and turned out mid-sized, with good names: Walter Pidgeon, Roy Rogers, and the one I drool over, Claire Trevor, who looks glamorous, given her share of gauzy close-ups. A three-way dinner / power struggle in the third Act between Wayne, Trevor, and Pidgeon's baddie is expertly-handled, and the whole film is sleek, if not epic. An earlier, rousing chase is the remembered standout, as Wayne drives his wagon over a cliff and into the drink below: Splash! Of course, he gets the girl and the moral high ground at the end. Some nice one-liners, too.