Canyon Passage (1946)

Traveling businessman Dana Andrews is asked to escort his best friend’s fiancé Susan Hayward from Portland to Jacksonville, Oregon. Along the way, they visit his own girlfriend Patricia Roc who lives on the frontier with her adopted family. The best friend, played by Brian Donlevy, is a compulsive gambler, stealing from the miners who leave their gold in his safekeeping, and regularly propositioning the wife of a fellow gambler. There’s a lot going on in this film. Along with the love triangles that form, there’s an assailant stalking Andrews, a local love interest for Roc, Indian attacks, multiple killings, no canyon to be seen, and Hoagy Carmichael incessantly singing every time he appears on screen. It somehow manages to wrap it all up in a fairly short runtime through convenient coincidences. It offers pretty Technicolor vistas of Oregon forests, but I’m not sure I’ll remember much about this months from now.  

Oscar Nomination: Best Music, Original Song