The Plainsman

Cecil B. DeMille sentimentalizes the American West but still fills the screen with excitement and high adventure as he relates the story of Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickok. Of course, DeMille's version of the story has little to do with the facts, but such incidental details never bothered the great showman, who felt it was his right to reshape history any way he wished. Cooper is the quick-drawing plainsman Hickok, and Arthur is the wisecracking, whip-snapping Calamity Jane. (Although the real Jane was an odorous drunk and ugly as sin, DeMille allows Arthur to play her glamorously, with coiffured hair, eye make-up, and lipstick perfectly fixed to her small mout...