Along Came Jones (1945)

Really Surprised!

i must have seen a different film!!

Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Everybody mistakes a fumble-fingered, song-warbling, saddle tramp for a dastardly desperado in director Stuart Heisler's satirical horse opera "Along Came Jones," toplining "Virginian" star Gary Cooper as the eponymous protagonist, Loretta Young as his sharp-shooting love interest, and Dan Duryea as the notorious bandit. "Jesse James" scenarist Nunnally Johnson derived this send-up of sagebrushers from "The Searchers" author Alan Le May's novel, and "Along Came Jones" was Cooper's first and only independent production. This easy-going, sentimental oater features several low-key but heartfelt performances, especially from Cooper as the incompetent cowpoke who couldn't hit the side of a barn with his six-shooter even if he threw it at it. William Demarest plays his comical sidekick who has more sense than the hero. The production values of this modest Independent Pictures production reflect the restrictions imposed by the government on Hollywood during World War II. No movie could boast more than $5-thousand dollars worth of new production materials. Consequently, everything appears just as plain and generic as you can imagine. Nobody has more than a couple of costume changes, and the performers often act in front of back projected landscapes when they hit the trail. This is one of those westerns where you never see a train, the U.S. Calvary, a nation of war whooping Native Americans, or scenic Monument Valley landscapes. In other words, white Anglo-Saxon American Protestants swap bullets with each other over the course of its unhurried 90 minutes. Nevertheless, Cooper's amiable performance and Heisler's restrained helming make "Along Came Jones" a pleasure to watch. Interesting, "Along Came Jones" anticipated John Ford's last great western "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance." Loretta Young does for Cooper in "Along Came Jones" what John Wayne did for James Stewart in "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.""Along Came Jones" opens with a one-of-its-kind stagecoach hold-up. Monty Jarrad (Dan Duryea of "Ball of Fire") waits in ambush with his Winchester rifle as a six-horse stagecoach trundles along the river road and shoots the coach tongue that holds the horses in harness. The coachman loses control of the vehicle, and the rear wheel smashes into the rocks at the side of the trail. Monty wounds the guard, armed with a Winchester instead of a shotgun, and the guy plunges off the swiftly-moving vehicle and falls into a tree. The Wells Fargo coach careens to a halt into the side of the mountain, and Monty rides up to it, snatches the money bag from the driver, Ira Waggoner (Walter Sand), and hightails it off down the trail. The guard recovers himself sufficiently to hit the fleeing outlaw, and Monty drops his rifle on the road. In a close-up, we can see his name: Monty Jarrad etched onto the long gun. The next shot shows a lawman posting a $1-thousand dollar reward dodger for Jarrad.Song-warbling Melody Jones (Gary Cooper of "Sergeant York") and his sidekick George Fury (William Demarest of "All Through the Night") are riding along when they spot the town of Payneville in the distance (bogus looking back projection again), and Melody realizes that they took a wrong turn at the fork in the road some 400 to 500 miles back. George shakes his head. "Well, it don't surprise me none, I can you tell you that a cowhand that goes in for breaking horses by the time he's your size, he's been hit in the seat of the pants so many times he ain't got any brains anymore-just a kind of yellow oatmeal in his head." Our heroes mosey into Payneville, and the First Chance Saloon barkeeper notices the initials MJ on Melody's chaps and assumes Melody is Monty Jarrad. Melody spots pretty looking Cherry de Longpre (Loretta Young of "Ladies Courageous") prancing down the board. He follows her while George enters a saloon. George doesn't understand why everybody refers to him as Uncle Roscoe. Meanwhile, Melody eavesdrops on Ira who observes how "very nice" Cherry walks, and Melody slugs him. Before Ira can pull his six-gun, another citizen points to the chaps on Melody's horse with the M.J. initials. Everybody thinks Melody is actually Monty. Melody has never commanded such respect from anybody. All the time this is happening, Melody has no clue why the citizenry are treating him with such latitude. George is infuriated his reception in the saloon. He hates being called Uncle Roscoe, Monty's sidekick. When he rejoins Melody, he complains about the town. Melody explains how to cast a big shadow. "You got to look like you're somebody and act like you're somebody, like you can take care of yourself no matter what happens, and then pretty soon you're somebody."Eventually, Cherry saves Melody from getting ambushed in town, and they ride out to her ranch. The real Monty Jarrad isn't so sure about Cherry's plan to make everybody believe that Melody is him. She explains that she has fixed them up, so that the posse will be riding south after Melody while Monty can ride north. In the course of events, Cherry changes her mind about mean-spirited Monty, to the extent that she helps Melody out of several tight scrapes. She leads him to the shack where Monty has stashed the stolen loot, and they find themselves up to their necks in one perilous predicament after another. Heisler keeps the action moving along fast enough so this hokum never stalls out. "Along Came Jones" turned out to be a genuine crowd pleaser. Everybody who made it seems like they were having a ball. Nunnally Johnson provides some choice lines for everybody, and the final shoot-out is a blast. More than enough twists and turns make "Along Came Jones" more than just an ordinary western.

Along Came Jones (1945) ** 1/2 (out of 4) Gary Cooper plays a shy and timid cowboy who gets mistaken for a notorious murderer after getting involved with the man's girlfriend (Loretta Young). This film is a spoof of the Western genre and it comes off cute and charming but I must admit that I didn't laugh very much. The film tries to be funny but it never really worked with me because I thought the laughs were too slow and in fact I thought they were pretty lazy. The film tries going for wilder laughs but this goes against the type of acting Cooper is doing so I think this is the main reason the laughs didn't work. However, as I said, the movie is very charming with Cooper and Young turning in fine performances and the two work very well together. William Demarest steals the film as Cooper's silly sidekick. The most memorable thing about this film are the various kisses between Cooper and Young, which are certainly a lot different than what was being done at the time. The best one has to be the very first where Cooper, acting like a touch guy, just grabs her behind the neck and pulls her to him.'

Poor Melody Jones, a simple soul, a good cowboy who has never really developed skill with firearms, gets himself mistaken for notorious western badman Monty Jarrad. Same general build, same initials and both are known to hang around with a cantankerous old timer. A recipe for trouble?For Melody yes, but for the viewer it's a recipe for one of the best comic westerns ever made. Gary Cooper who produced as well as starred in this film, seems to be having a grand old time spoofing all the western heroes that people like he have played for years.Quite a few stock western types are here. Loretta Young is the killer's girlfriend, a Calamity Jane type who's pretty accurate with a rifle fortunately. William Demarest is the cantankerous old timer sidekick, he could have had a great career portraying those had he stuck to westerns. And Dan Duryea is just fine as the real Monty Jarrad who's coming back to his hometown to get the loot he's stashed there.Cooper as Melody gets in one fix after another at almost a dizzying pace. His final showdown with Dan Duryea must have influenced John Ford when he made The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Though this is a comedy and Ford's film was deadly serious, the showdown between Cooper and Duryea is quite serious.I'm also sure that Mel Brooks was influenced by Along Came Jones when he created his classic Blazing Saddles. Thank you to director Stuart Heisler and writer Nunnally Johnson for creating a fabulously funny film.

I liked it a lot. A movie that didn't get the recognition it deserves. Typical Gary Cooper, terse and insightful in the fashion of the times. I will never forget the song he sang that goes on and on. I was a kid when I saw this and memorized about 20 verses of "Old Joe Clark" back then. Loretta played a good part and her role should be emulated by the fairer gender today. Dan Durey played his usual tough guy role, but did a credible job. I would like to see it come out again or perhaps a remake, however, I don't know anyone in Hollywood that can imitate Cooper. Just for grins this was the movie we watched in Denver when we were inducted in the Army. Black and white is a medium that should live forever.