THE GREAT MAN’S LADY

(1942) Even as Joel McCrea’s statue is being dedicated in the city he built in the West, reporters stampede to interview widow — or is she? — Barbara Stanwyck, and the flashbacks to 1848 begin, with Stanwyck aging from 16 to 108, while beating Brian Donlevy at cards, recognizing a silver strike, and battling a flash flood.
2:45, 6:15, 9:45

BUFFALO BILL

(1944) Joel McCrea’s William Cody rescues Senator’s daughter Maureen O’Hara, and keeps the peace with his Cheyenne friend, Anthony Quinn’s Yellow Hand — but then there’s a spectacular battle with horses splashing through a shallow river. Highly fictionalized, sentimentalized, and Technicolored account of the Western hero, but also a scathing portrait of White chicanery.
1:00, 4:30, 8:00

REVIEWS

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THE GREAT MAN’S LADY
“Ripe for rediscovery. Its inventive lighting effects, tragicomic tone, and sly cynicism about the foundations of history recall Citizen Kane, albeit on a more modest scale.”
– Noel Murray, The A.V. Club

“Casts a jaundiced eye on the ‘pioneer spirit' that built America and reveals the sense of personal loss that accompanies the forging of new trails… Stanwyck’s Hannah Semplar is the very epitome of the Wellman heroine.”
– John Andrew Gallagher & Frank Thompson