By Linda Winsh-Bolard
Sheriff Preston Biggs (Kevin Sorbo) was once a determined defender of the law, an upstanding citizen protecting people and property. It has changed when, during a robbery, he refused to let go a gunman who said: "nobody has to die, it’s only money, and it ain't worth it." The robber was holding a gun to Briggs’ wife’s head. After she died, Briggs resigned his commission and became a drunk, tormented by nightmares, unwelcome in Clearwater.
He was drinking when he observed an attractive woman, Olivia, cheating at the poker game with her partner. Profitable business, if not an honest one. In the issuing bar skirmish Briggs finds out just how grateful the people of Clearwater are to him. He gets saddled with carting away two crazy women.
The town’s pastor runs a small business on the side: mail order brides. Seventeen came in, and two are going back because they suffer from “prairie fever”; the town's people think they are mad.
The strangle-happy Lettie (Jillian Armenante) is so dangerous that she has to be tied up, Abigail (Dominique Swain) so terrified that she gets hysterical when she sees the sky. The journey to a train in Carson City takes a week, not a week Briggs looks forward to, but he needs the money. Before he takes off, Blue (Felicia Day), who became constantly preaching dragon, is dumped on him as well. Her husband pays him additional $50.
In a meantime Olivia (Jamie Anne Allman) had tied her husband to his bed in Clearwater, took her share of their gambling money, bought the fastest horse available and left the town, as well as Monte James (Lance Henriksen), behind. Unfortunately, her horse threw her off and when Briggs’ wagon comes along Olivia asks for help. She has a “calming effect” on the other women and so Briggs takes her, grudgingly, on.
It is not a comfortable journey, nor a safe one. Yet during the journey one thing becomes clear: the women are not mad, they were abused. The abuses vary but the indifference shown to them does not.
As far as I know, this is the only western showing the wide spread abuse of women during19th century. Women, who were sold like cattle, raped, worked to death, had no recourse. Women had no rights, often could not even inherit (it was the son who would inherit) and simply became a possession of their male relatives to do with as they pleased.
When Briggs finds out that Olivia is married to Monte, he leaves her, and Olivia helplessly watches. She knows that customs and law allow her husband to use her, and accepts that nobody would stand up for her. It is a short, yet poignant scene.
All the women have their talents; none is silly, stupid or shallow. Given the opportunity, they blossom into compassionate human beings. But the opportunity is rare and, if it comes at all, it comes through another woman. Olivia, while not better off than the others, is tougher, more selfish, trained con-woman, as well as gunfighter, and understands that decent life is only possible if you have money and independence.
The film is shot so scantily that it could have been a segment in a TV show. That is a pity because the main actors are talented and perfectly able to perform complicated changes in their characters, the directors and cameraman know how to use the picture to forward the story, and the editing, while truly cutting down the length, could have sustain longer film. It is the kind of story that suffers from being skimped on.
The film was shot Golden Oaks Ranch, the Disney Studio's movie ranch in the Placerita Canyon area of the Santa Clarita Valley, and in surrounding locations.
Directors: Stephen Bridgewater & David S. Cass Sr.,Written by: Steven H. Berman, Camera: Al Lopez, Edited by: Jennifer Jean Cacavas, Cast: Kevin Sorbo Jillian Armenante Dominique Swain, Felicia Day, Lance Henriksen.
