Red River (1988)

• Directed by Richard Michaels
• April 10, 1988
• CBS
• Based on Red River 1948

A rancher comes into conflict with his adopted son during a cattle drive to save his ranch.

I had no idea this version of Red River existed. Then again it’s hard for me to believe that anybody is willing to remake a classic film like they did here. I only became aware of its existence when scrolling through YouTube and there was a random clip of it available for viewing. And with a little effort found it available to watch.

Red River (1988) has much of the original film in it though being a television movie with a limited runtime it cuts certain elements out leading to a streamlined narrative in certain places and a narrative lacking depth in others.

It isn’t lost on me that James Arness takes over for John Wayne as Thomas Dunson in this version of the story. Arness costarred with Wayne in multiple films and was clearly enough of a friend that the pilot for Arness’s legendary series Gunsmoke was introduced by John Wayne himself. That may not seem like much today but John Wayne was not only a huge star at the time but he was the embodiment of the Western film genre of the era.

Arness does a fine job taking over but unfortunately much of what made you understand Dunson’s motivations and made him complex than just an angry and driven guy gets lost either at the typewriter or the cutting room floor in order to make this fit into the minutes allowed for a movie of the week.

That most likely could’ve been avoided if they had not crafted a new character that ties into a side plot about racism. Jack Byrd (Stan Shaw) is a cowhand and everybody just reacts with bigotry towards him. While I do have my issues with race swapping characters I would’ve approved of race swapping any character to add some additional materials that moved the core narrative along. As it is this new character really doesn’t factor into much of anything other than teaching a lesson to a young boy. It was a heavy bit of commentary that took away from the main story and ultimately went nowhere.

Bruce Boxleitner takes over the part of the son as Matthew Garth and his rival is Cherry Valance (Gregory Harrison) who I learned when watching the credits also produced this movie. Matt here is a former Confederate soldier who returns from the war quite broke. Not ‘broken.’ He po’ as all get out. And that’s a given considering everything he was paid came from a country that no longer exists. He has regret over fighting. Not because he was on the side of the slaveholders but because of honor and integrity and all that that he fought for. He’s not sure if it was worth fighting for that. If you’re intending on sending a message perhaps the message should’ve been guilt over fighting for the losing side and that it was in the moral wrong. I might even be able to overlook that issue but they shine a light so much on that in the narrative in one way or another that it’s hard to look past.

As a TV Western this is probably a little bit deeper than most. It’s not a fun adventure but rather makes a sincere effort at being a character driven drama that looks mostly at obsession and the father/son dynamic. Matt loves his adoptive father but realizes he is making a mistake. Dunson gets wrapped up in his desperate bid for success and can’t think outside of what he believes to be the way to achieve it. If this fails he’s broke and that is making him blind to reason and logic.

Red River (1988) is competently directed and presented well enough. It is not bad for what it is and the era in which it came out. And the general cast is pretty good. It just is stuck being compared to a great film. And it looks pretty good. More importantly while it has deeper themes and is more mature it is not some depressing revisionist Western. It is something that touches on human things.

As TV westerns go Red River (1988) is not bad but in comparison to the original it leaves a bit to be desired. As of this writing it was within hours of the being taken off of Prime Video where I watched it. If you can find it you won’t be wowed but you won’t be disappointed either.