GREAT DAY IN THE MORNING is a 1956 Western, released by RKO in Technicolor and Superscope. It was directed by Jacques Tourneur, better known for his work for producer Val Lewton and other thrillers and film noirs.
Tourneur actually made a number of Westerns, and despite his expertise in black & white atmospherics, he was quite proficient when it came to colorful outdoor adventures. GREAT DAY IN THE MORNING stars Robert Stack as Owen Pentacost, a devil-may-care loner who has just arrived in Denver during the early part of 1861. Owen has heard of a fortune in gold mined by Southerners in the area, and he proposes a deal with them--he'll help escort the treasure down South (it's meant for the Confederacy) in exchange for a cut of it. Before he can get the gold out Pentacost wins a saloon in a card game, gets involved with two different women, earns the distrust of both Union and Confederate sympathizers, and eventually learns he's not as selfish as he thinks he is.
GREAT DAY IN THE MORNING has plenty of things going on in it--maybe too many. There's the main plot, dealing with the gold horde meant for the Confederacy. There's the tension between those for the Union and those for the South (Fort Sumter is captured about halfway through the story). There's Owen's romantic entanglements with shopkeeper Ann (Virginia Mayo) and saloon girl (Ruth Roman). Another subplot deals with Owen bonding with the young son of a man Pentacost killed in a gunfight, and there's a Union agent (Alex Nichol) who wants to make sure the gold doesn't get to the South.
All the subplots tend to get in the way of each other, and there's also the fact that Owen Pentacost isn't a particularly likable character. He's cocky and conniving, and he's constantly reminding everyone that the only side that he's on is his own. It's the type of role that actors like Clark Gable and Errol Flynn could have made work, but Robert Stack seems uncomfortable playing it.
One also wonders why someone with Pentacost's attitude would get the devotion of two different gorgeous women. Virginia Mayo gets first billing as the "nice" girl, but it's Ruth Roman who gets the better part as saloon gal Boston. The resolution of the love triangle is rather surprising. (By the way, we do get a brief glimpse of Virginia Mayo taking a bath.)
Raymond Burr plays another of his pre-Perry Mason villains, and this one is very nasty. Long-time bad guy Leo Gordon is Burr's main henchman, and the two of them belong to a gang of Union sympathizers (those citizens of Denver who are for the North in this story are belligerent troublemakers).
Most of the outdoor scenes for this film were actually shot in Colorado, and Jacques Tourneur makes excellent use of them. He also reminds the viewer of his Val Lewton days with a sequence that deals with the unexpected killing of a major character in a darkened saloon. There isn't much he can do with the abrupt ending, which seems to have been designed to tie up as many loose ends as simply as possible.
GREAT DAY IN THE MORNING is a decent adventure story, but it reminded me of several other Westerns. The main plot resembles VIRGINIA CITY, Ruth Roman plays about the same type of role she did in THE FAR COUNTRY, and Raymond Burr plays a similar character to the one he essayed in HORIZONS WEST.
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