1929’s Hell’s Heroes is one of the earliest movies made with sound and the first sound production to be directed by the revered William Wyler , so I’m surprised it’s available for free on Youtube. Telling the tale of three old west bank robbers on the run who end up having to squire a newborn baby to safety, this is one of a number of big screen adaptations of Peter B Kyle’s ‘Three Godfathers’ novel. Tokyo Godfathers appears to be loosely adapted from the same story, while John Wayne would later star in a film version as well.
Wyler’s version sees three bandits on the run named Bob (Charles Bickford), “Barbwire” Tom (Raymond Hatton) and “Wild” Bill (Fred Kohler) happen across a dying mid-labour woman in an abandoned wagon out in the desert just before Christmas. Before she croaks, the poor lady names them the child’s godfathers, entrusting them with returning the boy to his father…who they’ve just killed in a robbery. Whoops. This leads to a moving, gruelling tale of redemption with some parallels to the Nativity story.
It's an involving tale that doesn’t outstay its welcome, doing well to set up this gang of outlaws as some properly hard gun-slingin’, bank-robbin’ men. Passing a sign for a town called ‘New Jerusalem’, that warns it’s a place for ‘bad men’, they remark that “they must’a heard we were comin’!”
These murderous bandits make no apologies for the horrible things they’ve done, but even they know it’s just dang wrong to leave a baby to die. Still, at first we’re left wondering just how bad these guys are when, upon discovering this helpless woman, Bob hollers that he “seen ‘er first”, implying he’s got first dibs on whatever unspeakable act they might have planned. Shudder…
Thankfully, this is a Christmas tale, so you just know these boys will come good in the end. It’s a very dramatic struggle with the boys stranded, horseless and slowly dying of thirst, while taking the kid back towards the town where they’ll likely hang for murder. It becomes a race against time before their bodies give up on them coupled with the grim knowledge that they don’t have enough water to keep all of them alive, but what the hell, they’ll press on anyway.
It's a great looking film, full of harsh but beautiful desert-scapes and some impressive stunts and horseback chases before the serious stuff kicks in. The action here feels like a serious leap forward from the silent era and sound is put to really good use with some cracking banter between the unrepentant outlaws.
It all culminates in a delightfully Christmassy climax at the town church, while there are lots of little references to the birth of Jesus, Christianity and such. It’s very well directed with a heartening message about goodwill and absolution that feels totally in keeping with the spirit of the season.
It’s cool, because it’s a western story geared towards tough, manly men but with a universal message of love and forgiveness. Watching this reminds me just how much being the father to our little girl has softened my heart but also made me so much stronger. I realise I totally would crawl across a desert for her, and then some. It’s true – tasked with caring for a little one, we find reserves of strength and resilience we never knew we had. Sleep is for the weak. Pain is weakness leaving the body. And, sometimes, hell is for heroes.
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