User reviews

A few negative comments here must be countered. This film is a little more drama than action, but it strikes a good balance between the two, pleasing surely both wives and their blue collar husbands who saw it back in 1947. Far from terrible, this story offers up some decent conflict, a couple funny moments (get outta the way, pigeons!), romance, suspense, two fisted action, explosions, and the exotic setting of the Peruvian Andes.

Not one of John Wayne's very best films, but solid and entertaining fare, a cut above many of his more regarded 40's outings such as The Spoilers and Angel and the Badman. Good performances and a bit of everything for everybody. Duke doesn't disappoint here. Deserves a higher rating.

Tycoon is a nice John Wayne film which looks splendid in color. Wayne plays a different character than usual. For the first part of the film he plays his standard All-American man, but during the second half he turns to a heel. Day looks fabulous. A negative point of this film is the dreary character of Hardwicke. The story and the exotic locale makes this an entertaining film.

"Tycoon" has a lot going for it. Unfortunately it doesn't really deliver. John Wayne plays a familiar persona, and does so very well, as always. Laraine Day, with whom I was not familiar, turned in a very good performance. The most notable of the cast, I thought, was Anthony Quinn in a supporting role. Having said all this, the film really fails to engage. I don't know why. The plot had a lot going for it, the photography was nice, the direction OK. I just can't put my finger on why this isn't a better movie. Grade: C-

MGM never had any idea what to do with its contract star, Laraine Day, other than cast her as Lew Ayres' girlfriend in the "Dr. Kildare" series. Other than that, they loaned her out. I'm not sure if she was still with MGM when "Tycoon" was filmed - I have absolutely no clue why anyone would think of her as a South American, but there she was, with black hair and her skin darkened.

I digress. "Tycoon" stars John Wayne, Day, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Anthony Quinn, and Judith Anderson in a technicolor film about the travails of a) falling in love with the boss' daughter; and b) then having the boss make sure you don't have the materials to build your railroad, tunnel, or whatever else you're building. Seems a bit self-defeating and spiteful.

Filmed in technicolor, some of the shots are gorgeous, and some are hilarious - for instance, the South American town, which is a painted backdrop.

I actually like John Wayne when he's not in a western, and here, he's handsome and tough and brings some life to the proceedings. I've always been a fan of Laraine Day, and she's lovely - but a chimpanzee could have played her part. I understand Day's husband, Leo Durocher, was on the set most of the time and was jealous of John Wayne. Judith Anderson as her duena is very good and Hardwicke is dignified. Anthony Quinn, as he often was back then, was shown to great advantage in a supporting role.

It might have been a better film if it had been shorter - there's just too much down time in "Tycoon." The script is a bore. The explosions are good.

Tycoon (1947)

An appealing role for John Wayne, rugged but not quite a western archetype. This RKO Technicolor big budget film is unusual for that studio (it was their biggest movie to date), and they snagged Wayne along with Anthony Quinn. Somehow, as good as it is in many ways, it lost a million dollars (a whole lot for the time). It's good, however, and watchable, if still a bit contrived within its wild Andes excess.

Though set in the mining roughneck edge of the mountains, this is a romance. Wayne, a savvy worker and engineer, falls in love with the mine owner's daughter. That never goes well, and it yet it goes very well at times. The love affair is sweet and innocent, due both to Wayne's scruples and to the leading woman's equally good intentions. This is Laraine Day, a good Nixon Republican who was faithfully Mormon her whole life. She's charming and truly attractive in the movie star mould of the day, and was an MGM star of some importance during these years. I think Wayne and her have an odd, believable consonance, and since they make so much of the movie, they hold it all together well.

The larger plot is about a conflict in how to manage building he railroad. This sets up the structure for the different social strata of the leading characters (Wayne and the mine owner), but it distracts somewhat from the other, deeper plot. The scenery vibrates, the music pulses, the romance is intense.

Whatever the general predictability of the plot, the story is well enough done, and warm enough (it's not a gritty tale, whatever the dirty environs), it makes you want to watch. There might be a social message in here somewhere about individualism and hard work, about true love in the face adversity, about the ruthless power of money, about the folly of building things without getting permission first (actually), and so on. But it's not convincing enough on any level to quite take it so seriously.

Why did the movie fail so miserably? For one it's a kind of grandiose movie that audiences were probably a little familiar with. For another, this was the total height of the film noir boom, which is essentially the opposite kind of film. And for another, the female star was not a particular draw, and Wayne was so completely known by this point as a cowboy, the casting might have doomed it from the start.

In the end, after fighting the elements of the hot mountain desert, the mine owner sells it all and goes, with his woman, to what he calls paradise. Where? Vermont.

Laraine Day and John Wayne are well cast, each with their share of strong moments, however these moments are too few, and in between the film is rather dull and lacking in excitement. The storyline and character relationships are predictable: it is all very typical and riding on clichés. The extreme length does not help either, but there is one aspect of this film that is certainly very good: the art direction, captured well in Technicolor, is simply beautiful. In a way it is a shame that this film flopped because it otherwise may have had the chance of an Oscar nomination in the art direction field. However, it is not very good overall and only arguably adequate viewing, so it is not quite worth watching the film just to admire the sets. Perhaps worth a look for Day or Wayne die-hard followers though.

Is this John Wayne's best movie no, but I have seen it three times now and I enjoy the movie. Yes, it's more of a drama instead of an action movie, but that's not a bad thing. I think people today are just spoiled with over the top fast paced special effects driven action movies, and this makes it hard for people to have a little patience and slow down and just relax and try to enjoy the characters and the story. Also, to try and watch the movie through the lens of the time it was created and shown instead of trying to apply today's filming styles and standards to a movie over 50 years old it's a little crazy in my opinion.

Anyway, overall I think it's a good movie and I find it enjoyable to watch especially at night when I want a more quite relaxing movie while chilling out in bed. So if it brings me joy in the end and every one else that likes the movie that's all that matters anyway.

The sort of high flying melodrama that later became a staple of TV. The acting is good, particularly by Cedric Hardwicke and an elegantly suited Judith Anderson bearing the rather severe moniker 'Miss Braithwaite', the former cast as Anthony Quinn's uncle!

John plays an engineer helping to build a bridge over a dangerous South American gorge, and Laraine Day plays the daughter of the wealthy man trying to get the bridge built. This is a tough film to wade your way through; it's over 2 hours long, and not especially exciting. Cedric Hardwicke and Judith Anderson are good, but they can't help this piece much.

"Johnny" (John Wayne) and his long-suffering partner "Pop" (James Gleason) do contract mining work and are building a tunnel for railway owner "Alexander" (Sir Cedric Hardwicke). This latter man is a bit of a pile driver and they are already arguing about safety and cost cutting at the tunnel when "Johnny" encounters his boss's daughter "Maura" (Laraine Day). Dad disapproves profoundly, but the two embark on a romance that leaves both estranged from her father - and that makes their digging even more dangerous. Can they reconcile their differences before disaster strikes? The last half hour picks up the pace quite well - loads of heavy rain and engineering peril, but the rest of this over-long melodrama spends far too long on the smoochy stuff and nowhere near enough on any adventure elements. Anthony Quinn turns up now and again, but is largely wasted as the rich man's nephew "Ricky" and Judith Anderson is likewise underused as the well meaning assistant "Miss Braithwaite" - a woman in whom "Alexander" is clearly interested but his rigid behaviour leaves little room for this to flourish. Like so many of Wayne's leading ladies, Day is a rather underwhelming actress who has a little more to get her teeth into here, in theory, but she seems content to wander around in a different frock each time pouting and pretending she can fry an egg. This is typical fayre for this star, and though it is watchable enough it's not a movie that I reckon I shall ever recall.

This movie provided little satisfaction when I watched it. No, it wasn't BAD, really, but it was certainly several notches below the quality you'd expect from one of his films. For example, while this is a color movie, every print I have seen looks very grainy and cheap--so it's very interesting that another reviewer comment on how good it looked. Maybe I just didn't get to see the right print. Also, the dialog is, at times, really crappy and riddled with clichés--like it was meant for just another B-movie and not a star whose career was definitely on the upswing as Wayne's was. And finally, the plot just didn't engage me--perhaps because there just wasn't that much action or suspense. Without the Japanese or Commies or Indians to fight, it just falls a little flat.

This is a perfect example of the kind of film Howard Hughes allowed to be made while destroying RKO Studios. Every studio made pictures sort of like this one (two guys fight over a girl while trying to do a dangerous job)but they didn't overspend like it was Gone With the Wind. This movie lost a million dollars (a lot in 1947). Hughes OK'd many mediocrities like this one, (See Son of Sindbad or the Conqueror) and had no concept of how to handle a studio budget. When he did hire good people (Sturges, Von Sternberg) he interfered, fired them and scuttled the projects, always losing money. We should stop praising or emulating boors like this (Donald Trump) before its too late. Why doesn't anyone emulate the Walter Wangers or Harry Joe Browns of this world instead of idiots with too much money?

Despite the fact that the technicolor location photography is great, John Wayne and Laraine Day have to deal with a script that is way too long (2 hrs. 8 min.) for the kind of romantic adventure seen here. One of the chief compensations for the overlong film, is seeing Laraine Day look lovelier than ever in technicolor. But other than that, the script is too long-winded and lacks enough action or drama to sustain itself over the long running time.

Let me quote from my "LARAINE DAY: All-American Girl" article that appears in the Spring 2001 issue of FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE:

"'Tycoon' is a spectacular action-romance co-starring her with John Wayne in which he carried most of the film. Once again, she was easy on the eyes in technicolor as a woman in love with a railroad constructor (Wayne) in conflict with his employer over construction of tracks through the Andes mountains. She handled the role capably enough but it was one that any young actress could have played and offered no new challenges."

The nice supporting cast included Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Judith Anderson, James Gleason and Anthony Quinn. It passes the time, but don't expect anything much.