Robert Mitchum puts in an outstanding performance here as the mean son at the head of a dysfunctional family in a harsh snowy landscape at around the turn of the century. Mitchum's is a detailed performance worth watching very closely to observe a great actor in action.The film is fascinating boasting several strong characters at variance to each other, including an extrovert but unrealistic alcoholic father, a dried-up, sniping bible thumping mother and a thoughtful, kind older brother as well as Mitchum. Then there is the startling outdoors photography in the snowy mountain landscape. Mitchum remembered the film as the toughest he had ever been through. The snow is the backdrop for a panther legend believed by the old Indian help and played out for real as a panther is known to be in the area attacking the livestock. Two of the brothers try to track it down while the remaining family members in the home experience shifts in the balance of power.Track of the Cat is a stylised, expressionistic film that reminds of Charles Laughton's film with Robert Mitchum, The Night of the Hunter. So many of even Mitchum's best regarded films are very flawed, but Track of the Cat has many strengths not least a star on searing top form.

A family feuds with one another, while a big cat menaces their homestead high up in the Rockies.Ordinarily, I don't follow a clock while watching a movie. I'm sorry to say this one couldn't end soon enough. I still can't figure out how two such gifted writers as novelist Van Tilberg Clark (The Oxbow Incident) and scenarist Bezzarides, (Kiss Me Deadly, {1955}) could come up with such a turgid gabfest as Track.... In short, the movie's a mess. There may be an engaging narrative buried somewhere in all the talk and formless editing, but if so, the patches never come together in coherent fashion. At the same time, that final showdown with the panther comes across more like a poorly staged after-thought than a gripping climax. Given the writing talent, plus ace director Wellman, I suspect the film's basic problem was interference from the executive level.Anyway, it's a waste of Mitchum and Wright, along with some fine alpine scenery and experimental cinematography. On the other hand, there's Phillip Tonge's clownish performance as Pa, an ill-advised attempt at comic relief. At the same time, bobby sox idol Tab Hunter does what he did best on screen: stand still with a blank stare. And just how did "Alfalfa" Carl Switzer end up as the wizened Indian Joe Sam, though he does well enough under a ton of heavy make-up.It's really no fun panning this scenic misfire. It's just that given the talent involved, I was expecting so much better.

An ambitious but ultimately unsatisfying western that is bound to irritate fans beyond measure, "Track of the Cat" (1954) is an uneasy mix of hunting-the-cat action and sub-Eugene O'Neill playwriting, complete with jarring comic relief and loquacious but indecisive moralizing. Unfortunately, the former is given the short end of the stick in this irritatingly static production which spends an undue amount of time indoors. Mitchum tries hard to hold the film together, but although he plays the main character, he has the least footage. Beulah Bondi and Philip Tonge dominate the action to such an extent, they tend to push the other players off the screen. Only Mitch can stand up to them but he disappears for long stretches. Despite her second billing, Teresa Wright is hardly in the movie at all. Diana Lynn is better served by script and director, but the best performance is delivered by Carl Switzer as an aged Indian.

I liked "Track of the Cat" as a "psychological western" and also thought it could be produced as a stage play. The term "painter" is the way pioneers pronounced the word "panther," as I learned in my Indiana History class. The characters in the story view the cat itself as a supernatural and eternal creature that brings evil, death, and sorrow to the innocence of the valley.I found Joe Sam, the 100-year-old Indian portrayed by Alfalfa Switzer, interesting, mysterious, and downright spooky. Drawing on Native American wisdom and folklore, Joe Sam said the panther always came with the first snow, and he implied the panther was an evil spirit or creature that could not die. As the story progresses, the viewer develops mixed feelings about the old Indian's beliefs, as do the members of the Bridge family. Actually, there is a rational explanation for the panther's arrival in the valley: the cattle, deer, and other game had moved into the valley to search for food and water when the snowfall began. Then the panther, which preyed on such animals, followed them. The old Indian, however, expressed his belief in the panther's immortality when he claimed the "same" panther had killed his wife and daughter during a first snow many years ago.I believe the Indian himself symbolizes the conflicts between (1) life and death (2) the eternal and the temporal, (3) the spiritual world and the physical world, and (4) superstition and rational thought. The Bridge brothers stated the old Indian had been a survivor of a battle between settlers and Indians at least 60 years earlier and that all of the Indian's grown sons had been killed in the battle. They estimated the old Indian was at least 40 when his sons died, so that he had to be over 100 years of age. The old Indian's spryness and ability to lift bodies and heavy objects lead the viewer to believe the Indian himself is eternal.The tragic loss of the old Indian's family foreshadows the likelihood the Bridge family also will die out. Mrs. Bridge, the overly controlling mother, has run off all the marriage prospects her grown children have had, and the brothers fear their generation will not marry and have children. The last marriage prospect is the neighbor Gwen, in whom all the brothers have some interest. However, Mrs. Bridge has met her match as Gwen is determined to marry Harold. In the end, life and love triumph over death when Gwen and Harold decide to leave the ranch, get married, and move to Aspen, the symbol of civilization.Mr. Bridge, the alcoholic father, is a sympathetic and comical character throughout the film, retrieving his whiskey bottles from assorted hiding places throughout the house. From his accent I judge him to be an Irish immigrant from a large city in the U.S. Toward the end of the film, Mrs. Bridge finally admits she had persuaded her husband to move to the isolated ranch where he had felt like a "fish out of water" and had taken to drinking. In the end she does admit to being a catalyst for the dysfunction in the family and accepts Harold's wanting to get married and leave the ranch for Aspen.In the scene where Curt (Robert Mitchum) has the fire go out, I am reminded of "To Build a Fire" by Jack London. There is a sort of naturalism in this scene and throughout the film with its man vs. nature theme. I would recommend this film as a very different sort of western.