General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

Cimarron

Cimarron is a 1931 American pre-Code (Hollywood era before strict 1930s censorship rules) epic Western directed by Wesley Ruggles for RKO Radio Pictures, adapted by Howard Estabrook from Edna Ferber's 1930 novel of the same name. Starring Richard Dix as the restless lawyer and newspaper editor Yancey Cravat and Irene Dunne as his wife Sabra, the film traces roughly forty years of Oklahoma history from the land rush of April 22, 1889, when two million acres were opened to settlement, through statehood and the oil boom of the 1920s.¹^•² It won the Academy Award for Outstanding Production, making it the first Western to win the top Oscar, and it remained the only Western to do so until Dances with Wolves in 1990.³^•⁴

Key fact	Detail
Release	New York premiere January 26, 1931; general release February 9, 1931, RKO Radio Pictures¹
Source	Edna Ferber's 1930 novel; RKO reportedly paid $125,000 for the rights, described in an October 1932 news item as the highest sum then paid for literary properties¹
Awards	Outstanding Production, Art Direction (Max Ree), and Adapted Screenplay (Howard Estabrook) at the 4th Academy Awards; first film nominated for the Big Five³^•⁵
Cost and loss	Production cost $1,434,800, over budget by $354,114; the film lost $565,000 in its initial release, partly recouped by a 1935 re-issue¹
Land rush scene	5,000 extras and 47 cameras, filmed over a week at Jasmin Quinn Ranch near Bakersfield, California¹
Standing	First Western to win Best Picture; RKO's most expensive film until Gunga Din (1939)⁴^•⁵
Modern ratings	52% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer (33 reviews); 5.8/10 on IMDb⁶^•⁷

Spoilers

Story and characters

The film follows Yancey Cravat, a lawyer and newspaperman who moves his wife Sabra and their son from her family's home in Wichita, Kansas, to the instant boomtown of Osage, Oklahoma, after being cheated out of his chosen claim in the 1889 land rush.² In Osage he founds a newspaper, metes out two-gun justice to the town bully during a church meeting, and kills an old friend who has turned outlaw. Lured by adventure, he abandons his family for the Cherokee Strip land rush of 1893 and later disappears for years at a time, while Sabra inherits his editorial duties and raises the family, eventually running successfully for Congress.²^•¹⁰

Yancey is written as a paradoxical figure: an outspoken advocate of Manifest Destiny who settles land taken from Indian tribes, yet also a champion of Native rights whose newspaper demands citizenship for Indians and exposes a scheme to defraud them of Osage oil, a stance that costs him a chance to run for governor of Oklahoma.¹¹ The story spans from the land rush to the eve of the Depression, by which time Osage has grown into a city fueled by oil from the Osage Indian Reservation.¹⁰

Production

RKO, the newest of the major studios, mounted Cimarron as its biggest gamble. The studio bid $125,000 for the rights to Ferber's novel, and production ran from August 27 to November 22, 1930, with retakes through December 3.¹ The film was shot in black and white with the RCA Photophone sound system, ran 124 minutes on 13 reels, and was copyrighted by RKO on December 31, 1930.¹

The land rush sequence is the production's centerpiece. Staged by action specialist B. Reeves Eason, it required a week to film at the Jasmin Quinn Ranch near Bakersfield, California, with 5,000 extras and 47 cameras covering 40 acres; one account puts the camera crew at 61 people, among the largest ever assembled for a single sequence.¹^•⁸ The opening depicts the dash of settlers on horseback, in wagons, and on foot to stake claims at the signal of a pistol shot, and reviewers at the time singled it out as the film's great spectacle.⁹

Reception and awards

Contemporary reviews were overwhelmingly positive. Variety called it "an elegant example of super film making and a big money picture" and "a spectacular western away from all others"; the New York Daily News declared it "1931's first great contribution to the screen"; and Mordaunt Hall of The New York Times praised its impression of the early days in the territory.⁵^•⁹ At the 4th Academy Awards, covering releases from August 1930 to July 1931, the film won Outstanding Production, Art Direction for Max Ree, and Adapted Screenplay for Howard Estabrook.³ It was the first film to receive more than six nominations and to be nominated in all five major categories, and Richard Dix and Irene Dunne both received acting nominations.⁵

Despite the acclaim, the film's heavy investment did not pay off at first: it lost $565,000 in its initial release, and some of the loss was recouped by a 1935 re-issue that premiered again in Oklahoma City. It remained RKO's most expensive production until Gunga Din in 1939.¹

Later reputation

Modern appraisals diverge sharply from the 1931 reception. The film holds a 52% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where the critics' consensus credits Irene Dunne's performance while calling the film "uneven in basically every other regard, and riddled with potentially offensive stereotypes."⁶ James Berardinelli, the film critic who runs Reelviews, wrote in 2009 that the film is frequently cited among the most undeserving Best Picture winners and is criticized for racist overtones and scattershot storytelling, while noting that the recreation of the 1889 land rush remains an exciting spectacle.¹⁰^•⁵ The depiction of the young Black servant Isaiah and of Native American characters has drawn particular criticism; publicity even noted that the Native American performers were "made up white to appear coppery on the screen."¹^•¹²

Scholarship has also found historical interest in the film. J. E. Smyth, a film historian whose work examines classical Hollywood's historical cinema, argues that Cimarron presented a multiracial and multiethnic West, elevated minorities to positions of power in the narrative, and anticipated the "New Western History" of the late twentieth century.¹³ The film is listed by the Library of Congress among features not yet named to the National Film Registry.¹⁴

Remake

MGM remade the story in 1960 under director Anthony Mann, with Glenn Ford as Yancey and Maria Schell as Sabra, in a 2-hour-27-minute production that critics generally received as inferior to the original.¹⁵ The remake's production was beset by studio interference, and Mann was replaced by Charles Walters before completion.¹⁶

Notes on the running time

Sources disagree on the film's length: the AFI Catalog records 124 minutes, Rotten Tomatoes lists 2 hours 11 minutes (131 minutes), and Turner Classic Movies lists 2 hours 4 minutes.¹^•⁶^•⁸

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Action and adventure films (individual works) › Westerns before 1980 › Released 1930 to 1960

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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