The Big Trail
Starring: John Wayne, Tyrone Power Snr, Marguerite Churchill
Director: Raoul Walsh
The film: Widescreen movie formats such as Cinemascope and VistaVision were introduced to cinemas in the 1950s in an attempt to counter the growing popularity of television, and the biblical epic The Robe (1953) is generally thought of as being the first such theatrical release.
Hollywood film studios had, however, already made several widescreen productions in the late 20s and early 30s, but Depression-era cinemas were unwilling or financially unable to install the projectors required to show them, and the format was shelved. And while almost everything that was made in 70mm widescreen from that era has since been lost, Raoul Walsh's The Big Trail has survived and has just been restored and released for the first time on DVD.
Filmed using the Fox Grandeur format (a forerunner of Cinemascope), The Big Trail also gave John Wayne (above left, with Tyrone Power Snr) his first starring role, as the guide for a huge wagon train heading across the US from Mississippi to Oregon. Wayne, who was only 23 when filming began, has a strong screen presence and holds his own against a seasoned cast, but returned to the B-movie wilderness after this, where he spent the next nine years before he found lasting fame in John Ford's Stagecoach.