Cimarron (1931) User Reviews (90)

Quantity - not quality

[MOscarbradley · 6/10 · 12 March 2006]

This gargantuan war-horse of a western epic won the Oscar as the Best Film of 1930/31 proving from the earliest days of the Academy it was quantity not quality that mattered and that big equalled best. Of course there wasn't much in the way competition, ("East Lynne", "The Front Page", "Skippy" and "Trader Horn"). Much better films like "Morocco", "The Criminal Code" and "Little Caesar" failed to make the short-list. But it is still surprisingly robust and enjoyable in the way that these kind of movies sometimes are, (it's certainly a lot less po-faced than the dire 1960 remake), and it has some really good things in it; a great church meeting sequence and a very well staged hold-up culminating in a great moment when a young black boy is killed and is ignored in the general mêlée and is a brave scene for the period, and a sequence probably deemed too contentious for the remake.

The acting, too, is a cut above the average for the time. A young, fresh-faced Irene Dunne is lovely and shows considerable promise here and Richard Dix has a kind of screen presence. It's ham and he plays to the gallery but he's very likable. Estelle Taylor is touching as the whore with the obligatory heart of gold and Edna May Oliver is very funny but in too small a role.

It runs out of steam before the end. It's top heavy in the plot department, (based, as it is, on an Edna Ferber door-stopper), and characters come and go without making much of an impression. Often listed in polls of the worst films to win the Best Picture Oscar it has vigour and a complete lack of pretension. I'll take it any day over "A Beautiful Mind".

Does not play well to a modern audience

[AlsExGal · 6/10 · 25 August 2012]

Cimarron was an early talkie that made great strides in sound, allowing natural interaction between the cast and a more natural movement of the camera, allowing the filming of some truly spectacular scenes. The shots of the Oklahoma Land Rush stampede involve ground-breaking sound and cinematography that make it one of the most realistically shot scenes up to that time. Other well filmed scenes include those of Osage's dusty streets with the camera tracking the main characters as they walk along while hundreds of extras bustle about them, showing the life of a busy boom town shortly after the land rush. Unfortunately, this is pretty much where my praise of this film ends.

This film stars Richard Dix as Yancey Cravat, a man who was born under a wandering star. Unfortunately, that didn't stop Yancey from taking a wife and having children, it just stopped him from taking any responsibility for that same wife and children. Through the years, Yancey chases one hair-brained scheme after another while his long-suffering wife Sabra (Irene Dunne) takes responsibility for the newspaper Yancey started but abandons time and again. Sometimes Yancey's adventures keep him home, other times they take him away for years at a time. The film focuses on Yancey's adventures, while the whole time I'm wondering what Sabra is up to. In modern times, her story is much more compelling and sympathetic than Yancey's.

Richard Dix's performance is quite hammy by modern standards. You'll find yourself laughing in places that were not intended to be funny by the film's creators, and in spite of your laughter, you'll still find Yancey to be completely unlikeable. He would make a great politician in the 21st century - he is very apt at doing one thing, saying another, and still finding time for splendid oratory. Unfortunately, this film was my introduction to Dix. I didn't see another one of his films for a long time and, when I did, I was surprised to find out how good he was in his smaller non-Academy recognized performances.

Remarkably, this film won the Oscar for Best Picture in 1931. Even more remarkably, Richard Dix was nominated for Best Actor for his performance in this film. Not remarkably, Irene Dunne was nominated for Best Actress for her performance, in spite of the lack of depth of the examination of her character in the film. Thus I'd say this film is worth it just to see the very good technical achievements it featured in sound and cinematography and Dunne's performance as the long suffering Sabra.

45 reviews have come before mine and I will try to write new stuff and not bore you with repeating what others have said.

[mauricebarringer · 7/10 · 4 October 2008]

In fairness to Richard Dix's overacting, Charles Bickford, one of the great character actors ever, also overacted atrociously in "Anna Christie," which was made exactly one year earlier than "Cimarron." The majority of movies didn't go from being silent to talking until 1929 and "Cimarron" was filmed in 1930, so both these films were real early talking films and the performers had not learned to down scale their performances.

The editing and cinematography were outstanding, even revolutionary for that era. The film needs to be viewed in a historic context and not compared to current films. I do agree that "Cimarron" does not hold up as well during the march of time from 1930 to 2008 as does "Public Enemy," "Little Caesar," "Scarface" but it was a complex and ambitious film adaptation of a novel by an outstanding writer, Edna Ferber.

Richard Dix's character does stand up for and vehemently support fairness to Indians and prostitutes, which was a revolutionary idea for a movie made in 1930.

I did notice that Eugene Jackson, the young black teenager, worked for 60 years in the film business, including a recurring role in "Stanford and Son," and in "Julia." Richard Dix, a major star in silent films starting in the early 1920s, peaked around the time of "Cimarron" and by the second half of the 1930s was stuck in B films but did continue his career and stared in films until his retirement in 1947.

Irene Dunne went on to super stardom for the next 20 years and made quite a few classics (check out her film list in her biography.) It is amazing!

I want to compliment the other writers who are classic film lovers but do want to state that too many readers check the not helpful box instead of the helpful box when evaluating the reviews of others. I feel that they are being too picky. After all, we are a select group of people who appreciate old films and should have support each other more as a group, unless the review is vindictive or totally uninformed.

The State of Oklahoma Gets the Red Carpet.

[tfrizzell · 11 January 2003]

The outstanding but admittedly dated "Cimarron" dazzled audiences so much that it was a runaway Best Picture Oscar winner in 1931. The film is novelist Edna Ferber's epic tale of the early American settlements of Oklahoma from 1889 and goes to the economic unrest of the Stock Market crash of 1929. Richard Dix (Oscar-nominated) immediately moves his family out to the untamed land and starts a new life. Wife Irene Dunne (Oscar-nominated) has doubts not only about the new land, but also about her husband's adventurous nature. Dix is an individualist with itchy feet and thus he comes and goes as he pleases, but always seems to come through for his family and his adopted state when the chips are down. "Cimarron" is an abbreviated history of a land which was once wild and untamed that slowly became modern by the early-20th Century. The views upon African-Americans and Native Americans is given much air time here. Ferber's equally riveting "Giant" posed similar questions towards Texas' views of women and Hispanic Americans. She was a truly gifted writer and her novels were both adapted into stunning motion picture experiences. Wesley Ruggles' (Oscar-nominated) direction is a bit prodding and the film does stall a bit due to its length, but overall "Cimarron" is an important American movie that if nothing else created the legitimate Western genre. 4.5 out of 5 stars.

A Film of Potential

[migamodious · 7/10 · 20 December 2021]

Cimarron is a western epic that spans four decades, building on not only our main characters but the nation that surrounds them. Cimarron is the first western to win the Academy Award for Best Picture and the statue won't go to another western for nearly sixty years until Dances With Wolves. It is also the first and only Best Picture winner given to RKO Pictures. The film was directed by Wesley Ruggles in 1931 and is based on the book of the same name written by Edna Ferber a year prior. It stars Richard Dix as Yancey Cravat and Irene Dunn as Sabra Cavat.

The film opens with an extraordinary scene of thousands of horses and wagons racing off to claim new land in the 1889 Oklahoma Land Rush, with Yancey and his family among them. To film this sequence, five-thousand extras and twenty-eight cameramen were used. We watch as Yancey, an editor, settles down in a small shanty town and creates a fledgling newspaper business. After four years, the business becomes well established, and Sabra believes that she and her family will stay and grow up there for the rest of their lives. Yancey, however, learns of a new land rush and leaves his family for five years without contact. Yancey returns as if nothing happens and continues his work until 1901 (three years after his return) when, without explanation, he is gone for another twenty-eight years. In the time he is gone his wife builds the newspaper business into an empire and using his profit Yancey runs for governor. Yancey is an advocate for Native American rights however we never find out how his campaign unfolds because the film cuts to another twenty years without a word of Yancey. The film continues and concludes its story with an aged Sabra and her children.

Cimarron suffers from becoming a somewhat aimless mess towards the end of the movie. In the first half, we watch as Yancey makes valid motivations for his family to move beyond to a new land and build a life for themselves, but in the latter, Yancey makes several confusing and unwarranted decisions. Even when Yancey leaves for five years it is clear why he does it, but when he leaves for an additional twenty-eight years soon after his return it is never mentioned why he does it. Cimarron also contains several character conflicts and plot lines that lead to nowhere like when Yancey, who has never shown himself to be religious, is suddenly selected to give a sermon at a church in town, and the scene is never brought up again.

What brings Cimarron out from the depths as an otherwise boring movie, is its lavish production and costume design. Over the forty-year scope of this film, we watch as the shantytown in 1889 our characters started living in, grow and expand to a bustling city in 1928. RKO Pictures purchased 89 acres of land in California to build the full-scale western town and the lot was later turned into RKO Picture's movie ranch. Even the clothes everyone wears advance with the rapid march of time in the movie, from wild west rags on the less fortunate in the film and the flamboyant clothes on the wealthy. All of these clothes change as time progresses in the film. The film's production budget for the movie was $1.4 million (nearly $26 million today) and was the most expensive RKO picture at the time. While a critical success, the film initially lost money at the box office until MGM bought the rights to the movie in 1941 to create a remake that won't happen until 1960.

While Cimarron might have several major problems with its script, its production value is a treat to the eye that anyone can appreciate. There are many less notable but just as promising aspects with the film like its cinematography and camera work and thoughtful choices in its editing. Overall, Cimarron is a professional, expansive epic that was made to wow general audiences and Academy voters into soaring it to the top of that year. Now, ninety years after its release, I can see that Cimarron is a massive film on the surface with a lot of bark, but in between the lines, it has no real bite. It is a film that leaves no real impact through its storytelling, but should by no means be ignored by lovers of the western genre.

High Rickety!

[carleeee · 7/10 · 22 August 2012]

The historical but fictional film, based on the book by Edna Ferber, presents us with a clash of cultures and attitudes. Yancey is a restless jack-of-all-trades: the new town's newspaper editor, a lawyer, fast-shooting law enforcer and even a preacher. Wanderlust gets the better of him, leaving his wife Sabra (Irene Dunn) to raise the family and run the newspaper.

Mostly set in the fictional 'Boom Town' of Osage, not to be confused with today's Osage in Oklahoma which is tiny, we see the townsfolk making do with what they have. Yancey is mainly the Editor of The Oklahoma Wigwam but at the same time he gets to use his shooting skills, act as a lawyer, and run the first church service.

The issue I had with Cimarron was that the storyline was disjointed and lost focus at times. Overall it was about the birth of a new state, though it went in different directions at different times and many sub-plots were never fully-explained. Sabra's character grew into a wise and admirable older woman, however we missed out on seeing her character actually develop. A woman in a more modern film would not have shown so much loyalty to her husband...her loyalty is to be admired even if her husband needs a clip round the ears!

On a technical note, the characters didn't always age in sync with one another. By the end of the film Sabra has aged (at least in the hair department), but not nearly as much as Yancey. Her complexion remained unrealistically youthful for a woman over 60, though her vocals were always spot-on to whichever age she was playing which is no mean feat for an actor.

The acting overall was convincing, special mention to Estelle Taylor as town prostitute Dixie Lee for her moving life story showing there is more than meets the eye when it comes to judging someone, though the town gossip Mrs Tracy Wyatt was a bit over-played by Edna May Oliver. Tracey's mannerisms and loud outfits give the impression of a cross-breed of Hyacinth Bucket and Madame Thenardier.

Some minor story lines could have been cut to speed things up where it was needed, but overall Cimarron is a great example of 1930s film, and gives a good grasp of the lives of pioneers in the late 19th Century.

A Historic But Very Dated Dunne-Dix Western

[ccthemovieman-1 · 5/10 · 10 December 2006]

This is a very dated western but so much so it makes it interesting to watch in spots. However, it's too long - 131 minutes - and I watched it on a VHS tape in which the sound quality wasn't the best, which helped make it too tough to watch in one sitting. Yet, for its uniqueness and strange-looking characters and strange scenes, it made it worthwhile to stick it through to the end. However, the first half of the film is a lot better than the second half.

This was Irene Dunne's first starring role and, frankly, I didn't recognize her. She was anything but pretty and certainly looked different. Her role was that a steady person who keeps her marriage together but has a major flaws, including a real prejudice against the local Indians. In the end, sees the error of her ways. Richard Dix plays her husband. He overacts and looks cartoonish most of the time. This movie was in the beginning of "talkies" and Dix still looked like he belonged in silent movies. He marries Dunne and quickly leaves to go wandering. He comes home briefly and leaves again....and it's okay. Strange.

The story revolves around the two leads (Yancy and Sabra Cravat") and the their town which grows from nothing into a big city by the late 1920s. Seeing that city grow was interesting.

Included in this movie was the strangest "gospel meeting" I've ever seen. It begins well-intentioned, but becomes so spiritually weak and so secular that it makes a farce out of the whole proceedings. You have to see this to believe it. I just shook my head in amazement about how Hollywood has never had a clue when it came to topics like this.

I got rid of the VHS long ago but, if given the opportunity, now that it is out on DVD, would give it another look. It's almost a curiosity piece.

an imperfect but compelling American myth (contains minor spoilers)

[Michael Bennett Cohn · 6/10 · 16 April 2000]

Yes, there is a ridiculously obsequious black character. And a tacked-on ending. But I think the characters in this film, including the white ones, are intentional stereotypes intended to suggest the character of the westward-expanding American people. In that light, the tragic (and almost unnoticed) demise of the black character is a criticism both of his obsequiousness and the white characters who take his loyalty for granted. And in the same light, the hero's sudden appearance at the end (which also takes place in 1930, the year the movie was made) suggests a hope that the unruly American energy that claimed the West is now being channeled, noticed or not, into the betterment of modern civilization.

That being said, this movie is slow by modern standards, and much of the dialog either wasn't recorded well, or didn't completely survive the transfer to video. Still, there are some memorable scenes: the Oklahoma land rush (literally a race with a starting line) and Yancey the frontiersman/preacher/reporter giving a sermon in a saloon, two guns drawn, leveled at the crowd (at hip level) as he intones "God bless this community."

Best Picture? Not Really

[FightingWesterner · 5/10 · 19 March 2010]

Despite it's awards for best picture and best adapted screenplay, this first film version of the popular soap-opera/western novel is badly dated and with plenty of overacting, though it's really a handsome-looking production. The best thing about this, is the atmospheric cinematography and the fantastic costumes and sets, particularly in the exterior scenes of the growing town of Osage.

Richard Dix certainly has great screen presence, but here he's kind of hammy, acting in a manner more suitable to silent film or the stage.

I can't help but compare this to the 1960 remake, of which this version is actually quite preferable. The remake starts out vastly superior, but squanders it's entertainment value when it turns into the cinematic equivalent of nails on a blackboard, while this version starts out as a mixed-bag and stays pretty much consistent the whole way through.

Still, much like the remake, this suffers greatly after Dix takes a hike the first time around and the picture becomes rambling, winding down to an unsatisfying conclusion.

very good in its day--doesn't translate well to the 21st century

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 24 May 2006]

This is a Western and Westerns don't usually get Best Picture Oscars, but coming out in 1931, the Academy was apparently much more willing to bestow this honor on this type of film. Unfortunately, when seen today, the film seems terribly ordinary and possessing relatively lousy sound. However, some of this can't be blamed on the picture. Poor sound was a problem with many movies from 1927-1931. Plus, a lot of the clichés you see in this Western weren't clichés when the film premiered. Still, even when you consider this, I find it really hard to imagine that this movie was indeed the best film of the year because it just doesn't seem that out of the ordinary. Sorry, but I wasn't bowled over by this story--it seems like just another early Western.

For a better Western film starring Richard Dix, try THE CONQUERORS. The sound is much better and the story is far more engaging.

Oklahoma, Okay

[wes-connors · 5/10 · 21 February 2011]

Adventuresome and scholarly Richard Dix (as Yancey Cravat) joins the 1889 Oklahoma land rush, and helps settle the territory, with loyal homesteading wife Irene Dunne (as Sabra). His oratory skills as a lawyer and work as a newspaper editor help Mr. Dix defend the downtrodden through the ensuing decades. Notably, Mr. Dix is supportive of Native American (Indian) rights. Dix also helps independent woman and presumed prostitute Estelle Taylor (as Dixie Lee). After some decades pass, we meet the title character, wild and unruly son Don Dillaway (as Cimarron "Cim" Cravat).

"Cimarron" is mostly recalled as the first western to win an "Academy Award" for best film. Some may think it should be recalled as the first time an award was given to prop up the box office of a flop. But, the red ink was due to RKO spending so much on the film; while not recouping its cost, "Cimarron" was one of the biggest box office hits of 1931. It was also a triple crown "Best Picture" award winner, with prizes from "Photoplay" and "Film Daily" included. Those awards were also the ones bestowed upon "The Covered Wagon" (1923), which was the world's previous western standard.

None of this means "Cimarron" is anything more than a swaggeringly average western, with a lot of production cost. Some of it is so dull, the "ethnic" characters emerge as most perversely entertaining. It's difficult to justify the acting nominations for Dix and Ms. Dunne. Director Wesley Ruggles manages the crowds well and adds a few artful moments, like the clever crucifying positioning of Jewish character George E. Stone (as Sol Levy), after some bullying. Edna May Oliver (as Tracy Wyatt) also makes the most of her role, employing many mannerisms seen later in Carol Burnett.

***** Cimarron (1/26/31) Wesley Ruggles ~ Richard Dix, Irene Dunne, Estelle Taylor, George E. Stone

Epic Frontier Film

[Ron Oliver · 10/10 · 13 June 2003]

A charismatic Kansas lawyer takes his bride to the Oklahoma Territory's CIMARRON Country to start a newspaper in the violent, rawboned town of Osage.

Edna Ferber's sprawling novel of frontier life comes to the big screen in a film deemed fine enough to win a few Oscars, including Best Picture. It was one of the first great epics of the Sound Era and is still very entertaining to watch. Occasionally there is a bit of overacting, perhaps, and technical difficulties with the microphones can be discerned while trying to hear the stars' voices clearly during some crowd scenes, but this in no way detracts from the enjoyment of viewing the film.

The performance of Richard Dix as pioneer & dreamer Yancey Cravat has been criticized as being too florid and overripe, but this is unfair. The popular actor had his roots in silent films when acting techniques were somewhat different, but this robust style perfectly suits the energetic wanderlust of his character. Anything less than abundant enthusiasm would look silly in a fellow called upon to deliver a sermon and shoot an outlaw almost simultaneously, vigorously champion the rights of fallen women and racial minorities and yet still blithely abandon his family for long years as he follows his own star of destiny. Call it what you may, Dix's performance can certainly never be tagged as being dull.

Irene Dunne, as Yancey's wife Sabra - his ‘Sugar' - provides the calm emotional center for the film. She is the one who holds the family and newspaper together while her husband is off bringing civilization to other frontiers. She is even able to achieve substantial business and political importance. What saves Dunne's performance from becoming too sweet is the story giving her a few personality wrinkles to deal with, most notably her determination to destroy the town's bawdy house madam (well played by Estelle Taylor) and her intense bigotry towards the local Indians. Her growth as a human being is juxtaposed with that of Oklahoma's expansion as a state.

Some fine character actors provide prime entertainment value: stuttering Roscoe Ates as the Cravats' faithful printer; George E. Stone as a gentle Jewish peddler who becomes a firm family friend; Stanley Fields as a town tough who tangles with the wrong hombre; William Collier Jr in a brief, vibrant outlaw role as The Kid; and Eugene Jackson as the young Black servant who gives the ultimate sacrifice of loyalty to the Cravats. Marvelous gossipy Edna May Oliver, replete with snooty sniffs & piercing glances, neatly tucks all her scenes as a society matron into her handbag and stalks off with them.

With production costs of 1.5 million dollars, RKO could give CIMARRON excellent production values, featuring crowds of extras and very realistic sets. A few of the scenes are classics and remain in the mind for a long time: the 1889 Land Rush sequence which opens the film; the church service in the saloon; the gun battle in the dusty street. It is very interesting to watch how the town of Osage changes during the movie, from a dangerous dirty settlement to an Oklahoma metropolis in 1930, all achieved most convincingly for the screen.

*************************

The Cimarron is a wild & unruly river that arises in New Mexico and runs for about 600 miles before becoming a tributary of the Arkansas River near Tulsa, Oklahoma. The word is Old Spanish and refers to the thickets along the River and the bighorn sheep which inhabited them

A Sprawl

[hcoursen · 6/10 · 20 August 2006]

This is a sprawl -- like Ferber's novels themselves -- and it remains unshaped, a chronicle rather than a constructed narrative. That said, the dusty scenes where the town of Osage rises effectively parallel the early efforts of Hollywood to construct a new medium. The awkwardness actually works as as kind of subtext once the family has moved from "civilized" Kansas to the territory. (Incidentally, no one has mentioned that the great 1943 musical, "Oklahoma," deals with the same history). Dix is a silent screen star -- over-acting, overly gestural, over-posturing -- caught in a new world of sound. That tension works less well, but the issue of Yancy's taking off for years at a time is simply not resolved. Where has he been when he returns after a five year absence? No one says, but, perhaps more strange, no one asks. Dunne's character grows up, shedding her prejudices, thus giving Oklahoma "permission" to join our Union, with its "liberty and justice for all." This one is worth watching for historical purposes, not so much for entertainment. Estelle Taylor, Jack Dempsey's wife, also a holdover from the silents, is good here, though seen too seldom and not given a potenitally intriguing link to Yancy. His interest is purely altruistic and that strains credulity.

Flat Western Epic that Doesn't Hold Up Well

[PartTimeCritic · 3/10 · 1 March 2023]

O Cimarron is the first Western to win the Academy Award for Best Picture and is easily the oldest one I've ever seen. I was surprised by the commitment to the large scale reconstruction of the Oklahoma Osage Boom town and throwing hundreds of extras continually bustling about in the city with period costumes, wagons, and other various props. As the movie progresses, it's fascinating to watch the city grow and modernize over a 40 or so year time period. The true standout of the film is an incredibly epic recreation of the Oklahoma land rush with thousands of settlers rushing for land. Apparently, it took weeks to film and used over 5,000 extras! Unfortunately, the narrative itself isn't that good, as it follows the kind of "Big Man" history about how the world would never be settled and civilized without the courage and vision of truly great men like the main character, Yancey Cravat here. A telling line has another character say, "They will always talk about Yancy. He's gonna be part of the history of the great Southwest. It's men like him that build the world. The rest of them, like me... why, we just come along and live in it." You'd think this would make for an exciting history, but it's actually quite flat and dated in its depictions of African Americans and Indians (all of which were of the time when it was made, but remain hard to watch today). The film is worth a view for the land rush sequence, the art direction, and a couple other little moments like an oddly written church tent meeting and an excellent shootout for 1931 standards with strong location work, firing guns, and wide shots that show the geography and angles create a nice little sequence. It's capped off by a memorable exchange between the hero Yancy Cravet talking to the outlaw he just gunned down, "I never figured we'd end up on opposite sides of the fence kid." The Outlaw Kid replies, "My fault, Yance. Didn't have an invite."

American Frontier Epic

[Lechuguilla · 31 January 2012]

Vilified in modern times as one of the weakest and/or worst Oscar Best Picture winner, and spanked as "very racist and very bad" by one author, "Cimarron" does not deserve such condemnation. It won Best Picture because the script is high concept, the type of overarching, epic story that Hollywood has always rewarded.

Its script tells the fictional tale of adventurer and pioneer Yancey Cravat (Richard Dix) who, along with his wife Sabra (Irene Dunne), takes part in the 1889 land rush into Oklahoma Territory, along with thousands of others. In the film, these pioneers stake a land claim and build a new town, called Osage, out on the prairie.

The plot spans some forty years in the Cravat's lives, filled with dreams, accomplishments, sorrow, and interaction with a variety of characters, from prim and proper Mrs. Wyatt (humorous Edna May Oliver) to town thug Lon Yountis (Stanley Fields). Along the way we encounter: gun toting outlaws; dust; a strange gospel meeting; bullies; buildings and walkways made of wood; more dust; the trial of an "immoral" young woman; politicians; and still more dust.

The plot is structured to give most of the film's runtime to the Cravat's lives during the 19th century. As we move into the 20th century, the plot speeds up; characters age a little too quickly. That is a problem I have with the script. The film's tone starts out enthusiastic and rowdy, and ends stoical and long-suffering.

B&W photography is acceptable. There are lots of wide-angle shots, as we would expect for a story set in the wide-open spaces. Prod design and costumes are elaborate and probably accurate for the era. Casting is acceptable. For a 1920s type film, acting is predictably melodramatic. But with his eyes all bugged-out, Richard Dix seriously overacts, even for that era.

In retrospect, there may have been other films as deserving, or more so, for Best Picture of 1931. But at the time, this big-budget Western was almost certainly a predictable winner. I found the story only mildly interesting. But then I'm a creature of a more modern era. And I think viewers would do well to consider "Cimarron" a valid film, one that now gives us some historical perspective, both on Hollywood cinema and on American history.

A bit dated now, but WOW what a spectacle.

[freezageeza1966 · 7/10 · 22 August 2020]

Ok, so for a movie made nearly 90 years ago, it's obviously going to look a bit dated, but that by no means takes too much away from this film now. The acting is predictably hammy or over the top, except for the great Irene Dunne, which should also be expected for a movie of it's time. I won't go into the technicalities of camera work and the like because I'm no expert on such matters. But I will say this. It looks damned spectacular. These were the days when they could make movies involving casts of thousands and make it look fantastic, especially the opening Oklahoma Land Rush scene. Truly a sight to behold and be amazed. The really, sadly, don't make 'em like this any more. Great story.Great sets.Great movie.

Not Subtle, But Entertaining

[JLRMovieReviews · 7/10 · 12 April 2011]

Richard Dix, Irene Dunne, and Edna May Oliver star in this film adaptation of Edna Ferber's novel, Cimarron, which centers on the new territory of Oklahoma. In the beginning we see a stampede of people wanting a new life on new grounds, galloping towards what is to be Oklahoma, to stake their claim. One such person is Richard Dix, who's married to Irene Dunne. He learns real quick, in order to get what he wants, he can't stop to be kind to others along the way. It's hard to pinpoint a certain plot that moves the movie along, as it's a mixture of all things. But, you can tell real quick that, what it does in telling the story is not subtle and does not mince words. With Richard Dix's over-the-top performance, certain typecasts of people, particularly blacks, and some pretty awkward direction and writing, the film, to be honest, shows its age and dates very badly and is pretty hard to watch and downright unbearable in parts. In fact, it was probably dated in just a few years after it was made. Irene Dunne, while trying to embody the sweet loyal wife, by the end of the film, seems judge-mental and hard, especially in terms of another member of the community. I may not would have watched this, if it hadn't been for her. And, Irene Dunne did earn an Oscar nomination for her work. But, Richard Dix really steals the show with his hammy performance, particularly with his courtroom antics. He and Henry Hull were the hammiest actors I've ever seen in movies. While his character of Yancey Cravat tends to be regarded as self-absorbed, by leaving home and feeling his duty anywhere but by his wife's side, he is in fact more likable and even more admirable in comparison to his wife. He always stands for the right thing to do, even when the consensus says to do the opposite, and he, most of the time, is on the side of the underdog or who's being treated badly, which leads to the ending being very fitting, in that it couldn't end any other way. For as much as I said that it's very dated and may in fact be a once-you've-seen-it,you've-seen-it film, it certainly keeps your attention and is never dull. Some may call it a so-bad-it's-good film; others may call it just plain awful with its depiction of stereotypes. But this Oscar-winning Best Picture! certainly shows another side to the early days of Oklahoma civilization.

Not as good as I had hoped

[mlevans · 5/10 · 13 May 2019]

I was personally a bit disappointed in Cimarron. I'm a big fan of 1930s movies, yet Cimarron doesn't seem to have aged as well as many. The Universal horror classics, Dracula, Frankenstein and The Mummy, as well as the Spanish Dracula, all came out that same year and were sharp and entertaining - although Browning's Dracula dragged a tad in spots. The very next year, enduring classics like Duck Soup, Grand Hotel, Dinner at Eight and the Old Dark House came out. All remain extremely entertaining.

Somehow, Cimarron reminded me of Coquette, Mary Pickford's depressing (and, for her career, disastrous) "talkie" debut. It may have been the lilting, fake accents and laconic deliveries that made me think of Pickford in Coquette and made the dialogue a bit tedious.

It was made in a different era and the stereotypical treatment of the African-American characters will rub many Generation Y & Z viewers the wrong way - especially those who cannot grasp that social mores change over time. I guess the same could be said with Native Americans, although I would counter that Irene Dunn's character is the only one who considers them "savages," and that she shows personal growth during the film, proudly claiming her full-blooded Cherokee daughter-in-law at the end. (The stuttering character is annoying, too.)

To me, though, it seems to be the dialogue and acting of Dunn & Richard Dix that make it hard to get into. That, and the early "talkies" sound still wasn't up to par on this one. Some great films were made in the early 1930s, which are still very entertaining and enjoyable. Despite its Academy Award, I cannot really put Cimarron in that category.

The Fall of a Once-Great Film

[gavin6942 · 6/10 · 18 September 2015]

A newspaper editor settles in an Oklahoma boom town with his reluctant wife at the end of the nineteenth century.

This film is something of an anomaly. Starting from an Edna Ferber novel, it was made into a western epic and was highly praised. The film received a ton of Oscar nominations, and even won Best Picture. The last western to do so until 1990's "Dances With Wolves" sixty years later. You would think it would be a massively powerful film.

And yet, it has fallen hard. As of 2015, it is the lowest rated Best Picture on IMDb, with only a 6.0 rating. The rating is fair, but it means either this is the worst Best Picture ever made, or it was up against even worse films, or something...

Not helping matters is the film's apparent rarity. It saw DVD release about a decade later than it should have, and as of 2015 still does not exist on Blu-ray. Nothing can be done for the story and acting, but it looks like the picture could be cleaned up some.

One of the duller Best Picture winners

[TheLittleSongbird · 4/10 · 16 February 2011]

Not the worst(Crash), but to be honest I found Cimarron rather dull. It pained me to say that as I am a fan of film, old and new, good and bad. It is lavishly photographed and the scenery is beautiful, Irene Dunne is good and Max Steiner's music is rousing and dramatic.

However, some parts have dated quite badly, particularly the one with the gospel meeting. The dialogue is mostly poor and heavy handed, while the story is bloated and has lots of unfocused scenes that could have been excised. The characters are clichéd,- not always a bad thing unless the component is poorly explored or acted out, which was the case with Cimarron- the film is much too long, the direction is flat and the pace drags on and on. The acting didn't do much for me either, Dunne was good though, but Richard Drix overacts and comes across as embarrassingly pompous.

Overall, a dull film, albeit with some good points and worth seeing for historical interest, and one of my least favourite Best Picture winners. 4/10 Bethany Cox

Early Bit of Oscar History

[evanston_dad · 6/10 · 11 November 2017]

The early Oscar Best Picture winners have a reputation for being some of the worst in the Academy's legacy, so maybe it's for that reason that I was pleasantly surprised by this epic that took home the prize in the Academy's fourth year.

People scratch their heads now over what the Academy saw in this adaptation of an Edna Ferber novel that they liked enough to name it Best Picture of the 1930-31 award year, but is it really that difficult to see? "Cimarron" is a big film, big in themes, big in scope. It's creaky and antiquated, but it's consistent with the kind of movies the Academy would pick for its top prize over the succeeding decades.

The first half of "Cimarron" is the best, following married couple Richard Dix and Irene Dunne as they move west as part of the land boom and establish themselves in a ramshackle town, one of hundreds that literally sprang up overnight. Dix has big dreams and isn't content to settle down for long. This conflicts with Dunne's desire to have a happy home. The land grab scene is pretty thrilling and technically accomplished for its time, and the early scenes set in the town are compelling as well, especially a scene set during church that ends with a congregant getting gunned down. Wild west indeed. The impressive set won art director Max Ree a deserved Oscar, for its sheer size alone if for nothing else.

The second half of the movie runs out of steam, especially when Dix runs off and Dunne is left to run things, including their business, on her own. A climactic scene that ends the film tragically feels more soap opera than effective drama. This part of the film suffers from an inability of the filmmakers to approximate the realistic passing of time, so it all feels rushed.

There were of course many more films that came out in the same year as "Cimarron" that are much better and more deserving of being remembered. But how often is the Best Picture Oscar winner ever the actual best film of its year? "Cimarron" is worth seeing as an early bit of Oscar history.

It should be noted that the film set an early record for number of Oscar nominations, the first to be nominated for seven. It won three, adding Best Writing (Adaptation) to its awards for Best Picture and Best Art Direction. It was also nominated for Best Director (Wesley Ruggles), Best Actor (Dix), Best Actress (Dunne), and Best Cinematography.

Grade: B

Movie Odyssey Review #050: Cimarron

[Cyke · 5/10 · 13 January 2007]

050: Cimarron (1931) - released 1/26/31; viewed 5/13/06.

Gandhi is released from prison again.

BIRTHS: Charles Nelson Reilly, James Earl Jones, Sam Cooke.

KEVIN: Cimarron, the first western to win the Academy Award for Best Picture back in 1931, is the story of Yancey Cravat, a settler in the old west who takes his family to Oklahoma where he starts a successful newspaper business and becomes an all around town hero as the film tracks the Cravat clan from the Oklahoma land rush in 1889 all the way up to the present day. After the first hour of Cimarron, I had dismissed it as a racist, misogynist fossil of a film. The Cravat family keeps a Negro slave, the wide-eyed doofus Isaiah. The main character Yancey (Richard Dix) never listens to his long-suffering wife Sabra (Irene Dunne), and is always telling her to "go to bed" when she complains to him. There's a lot of Yancey going, "Stand aside, dear. I've got to be macho." Then the second half rolled through, and I began to reconsider. The movie is still severely dated, and the things I said about the first half still stand. Yancey is never a likable human being for one second of the film. But it seems the episodic sentiments of the film evolve with the times. Their son Cim marries an Indian girl, and the father approves. Yancey (in an uneven scene) defends a local woman in court who originally stole his land, passionately standing up for the woman's poor lot in life in the ever-changing times. He also, after single-mindedly settling on Indian land for years, takes up the good fight for Indian citizenship. Sabra becomes a congresswoman later in life, and runs the household and the company while Yancey is out pursuing other adventures (what a lout.) Irene Dunne is superb and carries the film beautifully, even when all she can do is be the long-suffering wife of the hero. I always found myself on her side.

DOUG: We power on through '31 with that year's Oscar winner for Best Picture: Cimarron, also the first western to win the honor. All well and good, except for the fact that I didn't like this movie much at all. I never found Yancey (Richard Dix) particularly heroic, just a macho jerk who's more interested in settling in Indian territory and running off for adventures than in looking out for his wife and kids. When his wife Sabra tells him that she wants to go back to Wichita and doesn't want to raise her kids out here in a place where men shoot at each other without provocation, he rather condescendingly sends her to bed. Whenever she makes a valid argument about anything, he launches off on some speech about God-knows-what. Then there's the scene where Sabra has Dixie on trial, and Yancey decides to defend her; we never get a clear idea about what she's on trial for ("public nuisance" is all Sabra says), and I wasn't too pleased to see Yancey's impassioned and off-topic argument get her acquitted. And don't get me started on Isaiah, the family's dim-witted (and black) slave. If you're looking for the reason why no one talks about this particular Best Picture winner anymore, he's it. As for good points (and there are some), the second half is better than the first, with Yancey fighting the good fight for Indian citizenship. The movie does also give us some good moments about settling in the hostile territory of Oklahoma. I was rather surprised that the movie takes us all the way to the present day (or 1929, close enough), and shows Irene Dunne with some impressive old-age make-up. In the end, if we had seen this film before, we would have definitely skipped it this time and written a retrospective review.

BTW, a couple of statistics: This is the 50th full-length film we've watched on our chronological odyssey. Also, at 124 minutes, it is the longest film we're watching from 1931. Interesting how the average running time has risen over the years.

Last film: Little Caesar (1931). Next film: City Lights (1931).

Far from PC

[westerfield · 8/10 · 24 February 2013]

I'm disturbed that so many reviewers gave this film bad marks because it is not politically correct by today's standards. They should be rating the film on its effectiveness as a story. I found it compelling and believable. All of the principle actors gave one of their best performances. Certainly Stanley Fields and George Stone were never better. Irene Dunne carried off a range of impressions seldom matched on the screen. And Richard Dix did the opposite in just as admirable a way: maintaining character through numerous situations.

But what is most important is that the film was not politically correct for its time - in a brave way. It showed the intolerance for blacks as something shameful and that color didn't matter when it came to courage. Showing the black teenager as a hero was almost unprecedented for the period.

At a time when native Americans were portrayed in film merely as evil hoards, this film showed both their shameful treatment and nobility. And dared to show that marrying for love knows no racial barriers.

And finally, far from being anti-feminist, it showed that any woman raised to be prejudiced and subservient could become a fair-minded, independent leader.

The film did all of these things within the confines of the story without being preachy. That alone is a triumph of its time. Add to that the sweep of the film that didn't lose the personal stories and you get an Oscar worthy film.

epic 1930 Western

[disdressed12 · 7/10 · 20 October 2007]

Cimarron traces the early history of Oklahoma,starting with the land rush in 1899.from there it spans forty years in the development of that land into an eventual American state and the advances of technology that came with it.the story itself is an epic tale,so its focus is pretty broad.this sort of makes it a bit impersonal at times.it starts off slow,but somewhere along the lines it picks up and becomes somewhat compelling.i also found it interesting how people behaved back in that time,at least according to the movie.it does feel a bit like a silent movie at times.some of the acting feels over exaggerated.that sort of makes sense,since talking pictures had just recently replaced silent films as the movie medium.so,many of the actors would have been used to acting in silent pictures.nevertheless,i still enjoyed it,for the most part.for me,Cimarron is a 7/10

Insufferable Windbag Incorporated!

[Hitchcoc · 4/10 · 15 July 2023]

I know it was 1930 and the Academy Awards were a new creature, but this is really a weak film. It glorifies a man who claimed to be on the side of the oppressed, but selfishly deserts his family time after time. He spends his time posing and making speeches and swaying people. The positives are that he is on the side of the Osage Indians and feels they have been disenfranchised. His wife is a racist who takes a lot of years to come to an understanding. She rises in the political ranks. There is no reason for him not to do whatever it is he is doing and keep in contact with his family. The film is stunted. The acting is stiff and emotional. Even for its time is doesn't wash. Apparently, because of the beginning of the Great Depression, moviegoers liked this. I try ton to judge old films because they are old. I am a great fan of the silent era. But this one is just never gets off the ground.