Dodge City (1939)

My first exposure to this classic Max Steiner score came via Charles Gerhardt’s incomparable RCA recordings, in this case the album called Captain Blood – Classic Film Scores for Errol Flynn. In addition to his swashbucklers penned by Erich Wolfgang Korngold, there were also suites from a couple of his Warner Brothers’ westerns written by the great Max Steiner, They Died With Their Boots On, and my favorite, Dodge City. The later has movements from nine cues and, while only eight minutes in length, the lush orchestration and crystal clear recording is easily the best available music for the film. The most complete version of the soundtrack is available on a disc from Film Music Archives and contains thirteen cues that come from the original soundtrack. That having been said, they are a strong set of cues that good sound quality considering the source. Obviously they are nowhere near the quality of the Gerhardt RCA recording, but they are better than a lot of soundtrack recordings like The Adventures of Don Juan or Steiner’s The Fountainhead.

The title track, which Gerhardt called “The Open Prairie,” naturally begins with the Warner opening theme, which was also written by Steiner, and then the credits roll to a stately, march-like opening that segues into a lush interlude before returning to the main theme. It’s something that Steiner liked to do a lot, even late into the fifties. The next cue is a series of events, “The Buffalo Herd,” with its vague Indian motif when the film introduces Flynn and Alan Hale, followed by “The Iron Horse,” a loping melodic theme as the train nears Dodge City, and finally the frenetic “Rendezvous” as Flynn meets up with he nemesis in the film, Bruce Cabot. Cue number three underscores the naming of the city and for this Steiner returns to the main theme in “Dodge City.” Next is the somber cue for “Matt Cole’s Funeral” when John Litel is killed. “Covered Wagons” is a slow variation on the main theme as Flynn leads a wagon train north and Olivia de Havilland is introduced, while the dramatic “Stampede” accompanies the death of de Havilland’s brother, William Lundigan.

The seventh track combines three more cues once the train reaches Dodge City but they don’t occur until much further into the film. “Murder,” “Surett’s Theme” and “Necktie” party comprise some of the most chilling music in the film, and while Flynn’s charm manages to disarm the suspense onscreen, the music does more than enough to reoinforce it. Track number eight combines cues related to the regular folks in the town. It begins with an uptempo tune for the picnic and then goes into an almost Spanish-tinged tune for de Havilland’s “Abbie’s Theme,” but quickly shifts to gunfight music, followed by the death of Bobby Watson, and then the main theme again when Flynn decides to become sheriff. The following track, number ten, is a light tune where Flynn and de Havilland take a ride together and a variation on “Abbie’s Theme” when they kiss. More malevolence ensues in the following track when Frank McHugh is murdered by one of Cabot’s henchmen, Victor Jory. In the final two lengthy cues the first has Flynn sneaking Jory out of jail to keep the mob from hanging them, and second is the excitement of a fire onboard the train. The finale is a pleasant drawing room scene with Henry O’Neill asking Flynn to become sheriff of Virginia City in Nevada. And though he at first refuses, de Havilland volunteers them both which takes the film to its into the sunset ending.

This is one of Max Steiner’s most distinctive scores and it really deserves a restoration by John Morgan and William Stromberg, but in recent years those projects have been slowing to a trickle. In that context, it’s fortunate in the extreme to have so much of the isolated soundtrack available at all, and it’s definitely something to treasure. The Film Music Archives disc pairs the cues to this film with the James Cagney/Humphrey Bogart western The Oklahoma Kid, which is a good combination seeing as how Steiner wrote the score for that film just prior to working on Dodge City. It also comes with an exhaustive book of liner notes that are a boon to film score fans. The film was a Technicolor extravaganza for Warner Brothers and Steiner’s score is in keeping with the sweep and grandeur of the project. In fact, the music is a lot more grand than the story itself, which on its own is fairly thin. But there are plenty of interesting episodes that keep the plot moving, and Steiner’s score is there to support them all. Dodge City may not be one of the greatest westerns, but Max Steiner’s music is certainly one of the great scores of all time.