1923: The Duttons Have Something to Lose

The Duttons have something to lose

Jacob and Cara Dutton aren't setting out towards an imagined future. They have a home, responsibilities and a way of doing things. Losing the land would mean losing the place around which their lives have been organised. That makes their determination understandable even when their methods are hard to defend.

The dispute over grazing is a strong way into this world. Land is only useful if it can sustain the animals, and another man's immediate need can become your long-term problem. There is no comfortable separation between business and personal hostility. The next argument might be with somebody you have known for years, and neither of you can simply move on.

Jerome Flynn makes Banner Creighton more than an angry man provided for Jacob to shout at. There is grievance in the performance, and a sense of somebody who is tired of being told where he stands. You don't have to agree with him to understand why the argument keeps getting worse.

Ford and Mirren don't need to prove anything

Harrison Ford is excellent as Jacob. His authority has a worn quality: this is a man accustomed to decisions being his responsibility, not somebody enjoying his first chance to give an order. Ford can make a short answer sound as though the conversation should have ended ten minutes ago.

Helen Mirren is just as good as Cara. She has the practical attention that a household like this requires, and very little patience for a problem made worse by someone else's pride. There is warmth behind the resolve, which makes the harder edge more convincing. She isn't performing toughness for the benefit of whoever has entered the room.

Together they give the marriage a believable history. A look or a change in tone can do the work that a less assured pairing would need to explain. I enjoy the grander stretches of 1923, but these two can hold my attention perfectly well at a table.

A long way from Montana

Spencer Dutton is introduced in Africa, working as a hunter after the First World War. Brandon Sklenar has the right physical presence for that life, but the reserve matters more. He looks capable without looking at ease.

That distinction gives the adventure some substance. Being able to deal with immediate danger doesn't mean he has worked out what to do with himself. There is a distance between the man other people see and the life he seems willing to accept, and Sklenar makes it interesting to watch.

Julia Schlaepfer, as Alexandra, brings a very different energy. She is curious, direct and impatient with the life laid out for her. Their exchanges have the appeal of two people who don't already know how the conversation will go. Schlaepfer gives her enough conviction that the attraction feels personal rather than simply a requirement of the scenery.

This strand has a taste for old-fashioned romantic adventure. I like that about it. It is larger and more openly dramatic than the business at the ranch, and the change of pace gives the series room to breathe.

Teonna's world

Aminah Nieves plays Teonna Rainwater, a young Indigenous woman at an abusive boarding school. These are among the hardest scenes in the series. The cruelty is institutional: people who claim authority over her use it to control the most ordinary parts of her life.

Nieves keeps the character visible beneath that treatment. Teonna watches, judges and resists; she isn't there merely to supply an image of suffering. The performance has anger and alertness as well as fear, and that makes her someone to follow rather than someone to pity at a distance.

Her story also changes the meaning of the surrounding landscape. The Duttons are trying to preserve their home, but theirs is not the only experience of belonging to this place. 1923 can move between those lives without making them interchangeable.

The school material is severe, and worth knowing about before starting. It is also substantial drama, not a brief detour that can be forgotten as soon as the story returns to the ranch.

Money has time to wait

Timothy Dalton is a formidable presence as Donald Whitfield. Where a dispute with a neighbouring sheepman is immediate and physical, Whitfield brings the advantage of being able to treat someone else's emergency as an opportunity.

Dalton understands how unsettling patience can be. He doesn't have to match the Duttons' attachment to the land, or care about the arguments that have governed their lives. His confidence comes from possessing a different sort of power. Jacob may be used to being the most imposing man in a conversation; that isn't always the same as holding the stronger position.

It gives the Montana story more reach than a succession of threats at the fence. The family can win an argument and still be vulnerable to the terms on which the next one will be conducted. There is a satisfying unease in that, particularly with Ford and Dalton on opposite sides.

It takes the long way round

1923 has the scale to make distance matter. Montana is beautiful, but the space between people can be a problem rather than a luxury. News, help and the person you need cannot be summoned as readily as they can in a modern drama.

The series enjoys that delay. It spends time with conversations and journeys, and it doesn't always hurry back to the strand you most want to see. If you prefer a tightly contained Western, 1883 is the more concentrated experience. Here the attraction is the wider sweep, and I was happy to spend time in it.

The period world feels convincing to inhabit, without needing to treat every incident as a history lesson. Work, weather and money put limits on what people can do. The costumes and scenery are impressive, but the characters' dependence on things outside their control is what gives the setting its weight.

Across both seasons, the performances keep that scale from becoming remote. These are still people waiting for news, worrying about family and trying to get through the next difficult day.