Frontier settlers could take heart if Robert Mitchum strolled onto their homestead, singing and playing guitar. He forms one part of a love triangle in 1948's Rachel and the Stranger, the other nodes being William Holden and Loretta Young. It's not an earth-shattering masterpiece but a quite competently made, pleasant hour and nineteen minute diversion.
I tried figuring out when it's set. The round brimmed hats and lack of belt loops suggest pre-Civil War but no-one's wearing knee-breeches. So my bet is around 1840. William Holden plays David Harvey, a stoic man with a farm, a little boy (Gary Gray), and a recently deceased wife. Mitchum plays Jim, a wanderer and professional hunter and friend of the family who stays with them on occasion.
David reaches the practical conclusion that his boy needs a mother to school him while David's out tending crops and livestock. So he saddles his horse and sets out for town to get a new wife, just like that.
Lucky for him, the local Parson and his wife are just as pragmatic as David and they suggest a local bondwoman, Rachel (Young).
David effectively buys her and marries her and then the three of them go home. You can guess how things go from there.
It all plays out with decent subtlety and all the actors show why they were stars. David is forced to reluctantly acknowledge things and doesn't seem to notice when he constantly interrupts Rachel before she can make suggestions or tell him about her skills. Yet Holden never gives the impression of a tyrant, just a clueless guy. Mitchum strolls along and starts singing with Rachel and the tension begins.
Rachel and the Stranger is available on the Criterion Channel.
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