Tom Selleck TV Movie Review: **** Last Stand at Saber River (1997)

 Paul Cable (Tom Selleck) returns home from the Civil War having fought for the Confederacy.  He left the war after being wounded and knowing the war is now a lost cause.  He meets his wife, Martha (Suzy Amis) and two kids, Clare and Davis (Rachel Duncan and Haley Joel Osment) in Texas where they have been staying with her father, James Sanford (Harry Carey Jr.).  Cable learns that is third child, Mary, became ill and died three years earlier.  Quickly we learn that things are not right between the Cables; they are both much changed from the war.  They are anxious to get home--which is in Arizona.  

However in arriving home things still are not good.  Another family has been living in their house, and when they ask them to move there is a gun battle in which Martha kills a couple men when they draw on her husband.  Of course the rest of the family wants to make it even and another brother dies.  In addition there are another coupoe ranchers, Vern and Duane Kidston (Keith and David Carradine) who supported the Union.  There is an instant feud.  Lastly there is a man who has been running guns for the confederacy, Edward Janroe (David Dukes) who wants Cable to continue fighting for the cause while Cable says the war is over.  

When the papers announce the war is over, Genroe says he will tell Cable who is on his ranch.  Instead he trashes the house, and then murders Duane Kidston.  He is framing Cable as the murderer.  He wants to create a war so Cable has to kill the local Unionists.   Would have worked but Cable and Kidston talk before killing each other as Martha has a gun drawn on Kidston to save her husband's life.  Then it is obvious what has happened.

This movie is very good.  It shows Selleck when he was young, before the Magnum PI days.  It also shows a very strong woman in Martha.  She saves her husband on several times.  And at the end of the movie her heart finally melts and she and her husband reconcile.  The kids are also pretty strong, especially Clare.

Tom Selleck Movie: ***Monte Walsh (2003)

 This is a made for T.V. movie with Tom Selleck as Monte Walsh, a long time cowboy who is struggling through a time when ranches are being taken over Consolidated Corporation.  He plays opposite Countess Martine (Isabella Rossellini) whose relationship is also changing because of the change in economics.  People react differently to change.  The representative of the corporation is Sam Brennan (William Devane).  Righting Joe Hooker (James Gammon) runs he and his horse off a cliff to their deaths. Walsh's partner in cowboying is Chet Rollins (Keith Carradine); but he leaves to get married and become a hardware salesman.   Shorty (George Eads) kills a marshall who has come to arrest him for a past bank robbery.  He then turns to stealing with a small band, and ends up killing Chet.   Shorty never breaks that one hard horse to break.  That horse is sold to a wild west company, but Walsh does ride him and break him.  He is offered a job in the show but declines not wanting to turn on himself.  Shorty has gone bad, rustling cattle.  He is without work.  Walsh catches up to him, but lets him go.  He and a partner confront Chet in town at the hardware store seeking money so they can run.  In the confrontation Shorty shoots Chet with a shot gun killing him.  Walsh is now on his trail.  However he hears his girl is sick.  He tries to go see her.  The Countess dies, probably of tuberculosis.  Shorty confronts him there knowing he would come.  This leads to the final gun battle.  

I found this film entertaining.  It was a bit slow at first for a western but overall it was good.  It also added the psychological piece of how people deal with change.  It was produced by Tom Selleck.