Question: What was the mixture that Mississippi gave to JP Harra?
Answer: It was an old folk remedy for a hangover. It was supposed to make someone unable to drink liquor for a short period of time. The fictional potion's ingredients were not specified.
The ingredients of Mississippi's hangover concoction are very surely in the scripted dialogue. Mississippi: "Johnny Diamond had a recipe. Let's see. Cayenne pepper, mustard-the hot kind, ipecac, asafetida, and oil of cloves or was it? No, it was croton oil." Bull: "Croton oil?! I'll be a suck-egg mule. You know what that mixture'll do to a fella?" Mississippi: "Guaranteed kill or cure." The final ingredient is gunpowder.
Answer: Croaking oil, gunpowder, hot mustard, ipecac, asafetida.
Question: When Wayne exits Jason's ranch by guiding his horse backwards (a display of fine horsemanship and/or animal training, by the way), you may notice that he is holding his right hand exactly the same way as he does later in the movie when he has the bullet-against-the-spine problem and is temporarily paralyzed toward the end of the movie. Perhaps he did have a problem with his hand at that time, and the script was altered accordingly?
Answer: He is holding his gun hand ready. Just in case any of Jason's men get any ideas, hence the line "hey fancy vest". He was just being ready.
Answer: Cole was ensuring his gun hand was ready if someone tried something. In this scene he does hold his right hand up close to his chest, but the difference is that, in this scene his palm is not showing. With his palm not showing he is basically telling Bart Jason's men, "I'm ready to draw so don't try anything stupid." When he had the spasms in his arm, he would hold his hand palm up.
Question: When JP is taking a bath in the jail, his leg is propped up out of the water. It reveals a significant ankle injury. From what?
Answer: Earlier in the movie, Colt and Mississippi are doing a nighttime patrol of the town, when men on horses charge at them. There is a shoot out and JP comes running to help. He gets shot in the leg.
That did not address the ankle injury. It looks badly bruised not a gun shot. Can you tell what happened?
Question: Where were the interior shots of the jail filmed?
Answer: Online information says "El Dorado" was filmed at the Old Tucson Studios located west of Tucson, AZ and also near the Suguaro National Park, as well as other outdoor locations in Arizona and Utah. Old Tucson was a complete recreation of a mid-1800s Old West town, which had over a hundred authentically-recreated western buildings, including a jail. There was also a film studio housed there. Hundreds of western movies and TV shows were filmed at the location. Most likely the jail scenes were filmed at the Tucson film studio and also at the replicated jail. The site also operated as an amusement park, but it has recently closed.
Answer: It looks almost exactly the same as the interior of the jail in Rio Bravo.
Answer: Paramount studios is the only building location listed at IMDB. Everything else is outdoor locations. Towns, ranches, horse trails and mountain terrain.
Answer: Paramount Studios. Look in IMDB.
There's 16 filming locations listed, how do you know Paramount Studios is where the interior of the jail scene was filmed? Nothing on IMDB suggested it.
Answer: The prime ingredient was Ipecac, a nausea-inducing compound (still used today) which so inflames the stomach lining that it's impossible for the patient to hold anything down. Hot mustard in large doses has a similar effect. The other ingredients (croton oil, cayenne pepper, etc) acted as powerful laxatives, so the entire gastrointestinal tract is evacuated in short order. The gunpowder was a fantasy ingredient, no doubt, as gunpowder is known to cause gangrene of internal tissues.
Charles Austin Miller