I loved this movie. I thought the banter between Holden and Mitchum were subtly hilarious. The facial expressions were spot on from Holden. Young was formidable in this part as well. I think it takes a strong cast to make a movie that revolves around four sole characters. It was a great romantic comedy.

I liked the chemistry between Mitchum and Young on screen. I also thought that Gary Gray added the right amount of drama/comedy to the whole show. I loved the scenes in the woods with Mitchum and Holden bickering and making their pleas to Young. All in all, I think this is a good movie, and definitely worth the time of watching.

Great Cast
 
Author: Michael_Elliott from Louisville, KY
13 March 2008
 
Highly entertaining western/comedy/drama has a man (William Holden) losing his wife but buying a slave woman (Loretta Young) and marrying her so that she can school his kid. Things get complicated when he doesn't pay her too much attention and his friend (Robert Mitchum) comes back from the hunting season. For the most part this is your typical love triangle but the incredible performances from the three leads makes this incredibly hard not to love.
*
You've just gotta love a movie that opens with Mitchum walking through the woods singing and playing a guitar. Young and Mitchum also do a duet later in the film that is quite nice. The chemistry between the three stars makes this film work a lot better than it probably should have. There's some nice laughs at the end when the two men finally fight over her as well as suspense during an Indian attack.*** 1/2 (out of 4)

 

 

This is an all time favorite, with endearing characters that take on issues such as the plight of women in the 1800s, bond servants, in essence a summary of a way of pioneer life, showing the reliance on one another in order to survive. In a lighter mode, there is humor, music, danger and intrigue and a growing love between a man and woman who come together out of necessity. I cannot understand why it isn't on home video!? This is a USA made movie, and it's only available on DVD in Spanish with English subtitles from Spain.(!!??) I give this movie an excellent rating because it captures not only a way of life, but also great acting by well-known celebrities whose characterizations bring the story a sense of reality. I highly recommend this movie to any one who enjoys a dramatic love story, conveying all the emotions without today's graphic gore as a backdrop.

Two Grown Men Fighting Like a Couple of Wild Indians!

 

Author: wes-connors from Earth

28 August 2007

 

Loretta Young (she's Rachel) stars as a "bond woman" (white slave) who is sold for $18.00 to William Holden (he's Big Davey). Mr. Holden buys Ms. Young because he feels his son Gary Gray (he's Little Davey) needs a mother to grow up right. Robert Mitchum (he's Big Jim) plays Holden's pal and frequent overnight guest. By the way, Mr. Mitchum is a singing cowboy (and better than you may be thinking). Holden shows no sexual interest in wife Young, but with Mitchum around… 

 

Interesting premise, performed ably by the stars. The stronger scenes, I thought, occurred when several of the four players appeared in scenes with only one other actor For example, Young and Mitchum, Young and Gray, etc. The songs are done well. The drama doesn't really reach full potential, though. It's difficult to accept the exquisitely made-up Hollywood beauty Loretta Young as a 25-year-old slave woman. The script could have been re-written to fix that, and some other points. Some scenes between the principals would have been improved with re-takes.

 

Young Mr. Gray holds his own among the "Big" stars. He plays very naturally, and lifts the movie considerably. As the film nears its climax, he disappears (it is explained); which makes the film suffer. The ending would have been more exciting with a little boy, and the family element could have been highlighted. There is some excitement in the ending, but it would have been better if more tension was built.

 

Loretta Young's character says, at one point, "Two grown men fighting like a couple of wild Indians!" that's a good, brief description of the movie.

 

 

RACHEL AND THE STRANGER has the kind of quiet charm that LORETTA YOUNG always possessed and benefits from the more rugged screen presence of its leading men--WILLIAM HOLDEN and ROBERT MITCHUM. Loretta is an indentured servant who becomes the wife of William Holden and must prove herself worthy of the affections of Holden and his young son.

 

There really is very little in the story that is original and the outcome can be predicted from scene one. It's clear that Loretta, as Holden's second wife, will have a hard time replacing his winsome wife who was a woman of modest talents and dearly loved by husband and son (GARY GRAY). Not unexpectedly, they both warm to her and so does Holden's "stranger" friend, ROBERT MITCHUM, who does a nice job raising his voice in song accompanied by guitar.

Mitchum gives his usual laid back performance, nicely understated. The story may be a little too slow moving for some tastes since it's more of a character study of a widower and his new wife than it is a western.There's no real excitement to the story until the Indian attack which comes late in the story, but the film depends on the central performances of Young, Holden and Mitchum to hold interest as the three of them have some amusing interactions throughout the story.

 

Nicely photographed in outdoor settings photographed in crisp B&W, it's a film full of simple charm without anything pretentious about it.Only drawback: Overuse of the phrase "I reckon" to give the dialog a bucolic flavor. Its use is way overdone and actually becomes irritating when the script has the phrase repeated every few seconds by everyone in the cast.

The viewer and the strange one.

 

Author: dbdumonteil

24 November 2001

 

The IMDb recommends "the sound of music" if you like this one,and it is a very smart choice.While Young ,Mitchum and the boy are strumming the guitar and the spinet,in front of a grumpy Holden,I can't help thinking of Maria/Andrews ,her baron and brats singing a little song in front of the bored rigid baroness Parker(She mumbles something like:"I wish I could have brought my harmonica! ").Songs play a prominent part in this movie:Mitchum's tunes depict the life of the people he's watching.

 

Arguably a low-budget movie,"Rachel and the stranger" is nevertheless more than a poor man's "sound of music".Actually it's a strange work,which cannot be categorized.Apparently a western ,but western afficionados won't be satisfied because the plot is pared to the essential:even the Indians who -hardly- appear are symbolic:the house had to be distroyed anyway -as "Rebecca" 's house as an user cleverly remarked-.This is a perfect example of a faux western (Don Siegel's "beguiled"(1971)is another one).

 

Some details are intriguing and foretells other stories:outside "the sound of music " (which is -few people know it- a remake of a German movie "die Trapp Familie"(1957) besides),Mitchum's clothes sometimes look like the ones he will wear in "night of the hunter" (1955),the spinet lends a baroque touch as Lilian Gish's piano will do in Huston's "the unforgiven" (1960).

*

At the beginning of the movie,Young is nothing more than some kind of slave,she is sold as Giuseppina (Giulietta Masina) in Fellini's "la strada" (1954).As for the house,it makes me think of a "little house (in the prairie)" in black and white!