In Old Arizona

In Old Arizona is a film from 1929 that is historically interesting for two reasons: it was the first "talkie" Western, and Warner Baxter won the Oscar for Best Actor for it, only the second one given. Other than that, it's not a very good film by today's standards, even if it was nominated for four other Oscars, including Best Picture.

Baxter plays The Cisco Kid, a bandit created by O. Henry (the character would later be a staple of 1950s TV). He wears a brocaded caballero outfit and has a pencil-thin mustache, but thankfully this Columbus Ohio-born actor does not lay it on thick with the Mexican stereotypes (actually, according to the film, Cisco was born in Portugal).

The film begins with Cisco holding up a stage coach, but not robbing the passengers. He does take a pin from a lady, but pays her for it. He takes the gold box, though. The army sends a bumptious sergeant (Edmund Lowe) after him, and there's a comic scene in which the two meet in a barbershop and strike up a friendship, as Lowe has no idea who he is.

Later, Lowe will seduce Cisco's girl (Dorothy Burgess, in a dreadful performance). She is extremely fickle, especially when there's a $5,000 reward at stake. After a light comic touch for the entire film, In Old Arizona ends with a dark twist.

Although it was the first Western talkie, with scenes shot outside (microphones were stationary, as the boom mike hadn't been invented yet), almost all of the film is shot indoors, in long, pointless scenes. We get one where Cisco is back with Burgess, and wants ham and eggs. Then Burgess visits the saloon and she and Lowe exchange insults in a long scene (Lowe acts in a laconic style that one might think influenced John Wayne). I kept waiting for Western action, and there's only a few seconds of it, when cattle rustlers try to kill Cisco but he gets them instead. This scene is shot at a great distance.

As I said, at least the film doesn't pile on ethnic insensitivity. We get an Italian barber who speaks-a like-a this, and a quick shot of Chinese launderers chattering, but there's nothing about the film that is offensive. Well, maybe the treatment of the lead female, who is a minx that seems to care about nothing but herself. But that hasn't changed much in the eighty-plus years since then.

In Old Arizona was co-directed by Raoul Walsh and Irving Cummings. Walsh was supposed to star, as well, but before filming he was in an auto accident (a jackrabbit jumped through his windshield) and he lost an eye. He still went on to have a great Hollywood career, making films like High Sierra and White Heat.