The Revengers

Nicholas Chennault ~ July 13, 2015

The Revengers—William Holden, Susan Hayward, Ernest Borgnine, Woody Strode, Arthur Hunnicutt, Jorge Luke, Warren Vanders (1972; Dir: Daniel Mann)

It is doubtful that “revengers” is even a real word, but you get the idea. Somebody’s after vengeance in this Dirty-Dozen-style flick. That would be John Benedict (a visibly aging William Holden at 54, after years of hard living). He’s a Colorado rancher whose family is slaughtered by Comancheros and their Comanche allies during a horse-stealing raid. He tracks them down to the borders of the U.S. and Mexico, and figures he needs help. Spotting a Mexican prison that rents out convict labor, he hires six of their worst inmates. Leaving the guards behind, he gets the six decent clothes and weapons, but has some difficulty getting their active allegiance (a staple of this kind of film).

John Benedict (William Holden, upper left) and his newly-recruited gang, including Ernest Borgnine (tall hat) and Woody Strode (front right).

He leads them in an attack on the Comanchero stronghold, getting most of the Comancheros. The Comanchero leader Tarp (Warren Vanders) escapes, although wounded. Depressed at this failure, Benedict drinks heavily and has a falling-out with one of the six, a Mexican gunslinger who fancies that he may be Benedict’s son. The six scatter, and Benedict, grievously wounded, is tended by the local healer, an Irish nurse of a certain age named Elizabeth Reilly (Susan Hayward). There is some attraction between them during the time it takes Benedict to heal, but he rides off in search of closure with Tarp. However, he is arrested and thrown in the Mexican prison from which he had helped the six escape.

Two of the six, Hoop (Ernest Borgnine) and Chamaco (Jorge Luke), the Mexican gunslinger, reassemble the six. They spring Benedict from the Mexican prison and resume the search for Tarp, whom they find held by a small U.S. cavalry unit besieged by Comanches and Comancheros, who want him back. Benedict proposes to kill Tarp and send him back to the Comanches that way, but doesn’t proceed with that out of respect for the badly wounded lieutenant in charge. Benedict and the six join the outnumbered cavalry and use dynamite and a little artillery to make a last stand. The cavalry wins, but not without casualties. The lieutenant and the Mexican gunslinger Chamaco are among them. And Benedict rides away without killing Tarp, having belatedly decided that revenge is an empty motivation.

The wounded Benedict (William Holden) and Irish nurse Reilly (Susan Hayward) get to know each other.

There are a couple of things about the movie that don’t work very well. One is the interlude with the Irish nurse (Susan Hayward) that doesn’t really go anywhere. Her accent isn’t good; it clanks as badly as Barbara Stanwyck’s faux-Irish in Union Pacific (1939). When Hayward makes a reference to the possibility of having children, we notice that she seems to be in her fifties (at 55, she was a year older than Holden and three years away from her death of cancer) and children are improbable. Benedict is supposed to be good with a gun, but he looks his age, his shoulders are rounded by now, and he’s not all that persuasive as a gunslinger. And the ending, with Benedict just walking away from the revenge that has been the point of the movie, is similarly unpersuasive. At the least, you’d expect that one of the remaining five would get Tarp, since they’ve all demonstrated that they’re not good at impulse control. Most of the six are not well fleshed-out characters, but the film does keep moving.

Daniel Mann (The Rose Tattoo [1955], The Teahouse of the August Moon [1956], Butterfield 8 [1960], Our Man Flint [1966] et al.) didn’t do many westerns; this may be the only one. Holden and Borgnine (a replacement for Van Heflin after Heflin’s unexpected death) were reunited from The Wild Bunch (1969) for more adventures in Mexico here, but this doesn’t remotely approach that classic in quality. This is Holden’s last western. Hayward, in her extraneous role, was coming to the end of her career and wasn’t making many movies. This was written by Wendell Mayes, who had been nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay for Anatomy of a Murder.(1956), and who went on to write the blockbusters Death Wish and Towering Inferno. The music occasionally reminds one of 1970s television. In color, shot in Sonora, Mexico, at 106 minutes. It was made available on DVD in May 2014, with a blu-ray to come in August 2015.

Benedict (William Holden) prepares to hold off the Comancheros and their Indian allies.

Although it was released in the heyday of the revisionist westerns of the 1970s, this is more traditional in its approach and sensibility. For better Holden and Borgnine at this late stage of their careers, see, obviously, The Wild Bunch. For good Susan Hayward in a western, you have to go back twenty years to Rawhide (1951) and Garden of Evil (1954).

Red Mountain

Nicholas Chennault ~ July 9, 2015

Red Mountain—Alan Ladd, Lizabeth Scott, Arthur Kennedy, John Ireland, Jay Silverheels, Jeff Corey, Neville Brand (1951; Dir: William Dieterle, John Farrow [uncredited])

This is one of Alan Ladd’s more elusive, seldom-seen westerns, a Civil War story with an excellent cast. Ladd plays Brett Sherwood, a captain from Georgia who has gone west in April 1865 to Colorado Territory to meet up with “Gen.” William Quantrell. (Reality note: Usually spelled “Quantrill,” he was a colonel at best, and he was long dead by this time, having been killed in Missouri.) The opening scene shows the legs of a person in the town of Broken Branch dismounting and killing an assayer, hiding his identity. Since a rare form of Confederate ammunition was used, the locals figure that former Confederate soldier Lane Waldron (Arthur Kennedy), paroled after he was captured at Vicksburg, is responsible.

A lynch mob captures Waldron and is about to hang him when Sherwood shoots the rope (a la Clint Eastwood in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly) and helps him escape. When Waldron discovers his rescuer is also a Confederate, he figures Sherwood killed the assayer, and, with the help of his fiancée Chris (Lizabeth Scott), he ungratefully captures Sherwood to turn him in and exonerate himself. Waldron has found a significant gold strike and wants to stay in the area to work it.

Sherwood (Alan Ladd) meets Gen. William Quantrell (John Ireland) in Colorado.

The upper hand shifts back and forth a couple of times until Waldron’s leg is broken in a scuffle. Sherwood flags down a passing Union patrol, which turns out to be a group of Confederates and their Ute sympathizers led by Gen. Quantrell (John ireland). Chris, a Union sympathizer who had lived in Lawrence, Kansas, when Quantrell raided there, is horrified. Sherwood works to keep the two prisoners alive, while Quantrell is pleased to have another military officer and kindred spirit. Gradually Quantrell reveals plans to foment a larger Indian rebellion (involving Comanches, Cheyennes, Utes and others) in the wake of the Civil War.

Chris is allowed to retrieve a doctor for Waldron, who is in bad shape, but the doctor is killed when Sherwood helps him escape. Against her better judgment, Chris is falling for Sherwood rather than Waldron, and Quantrell also becomes suspicious. As Sherwood helps Waldron and Chris defend themselves against the Utes, a real Union patrol attacks Quantrell. As Quantrell flees, Sherwood takes after him, and gets him in a final shootout. Waldron is dead of wounds by this time, and, as Sherwood recovers from his own wound, he confesses to the marshal that he killed the assayer. Sherwood had found a claim in Colorado Territory before the war, and the assayer had stolen it. Apparently Sherwood and Chris end up together. (We knew any character played by Arthur Kennedy was unlikely to get the girl.) Chris knows where Waldron’s gold strike was. And word reaches them that the Civil War has ended two days earlier.

Lane Waldron (Arthur Kennedy), Sherwood (Alan Ladd) and Chris (Lizabeth Scott) make their last stand.

Lizabeth Scott, best known for her work in films noirs, is fine here in one of her two westerns (with Silver Lode [1954]). Alan Ladd makes a sympathetic leading man, as usual, and is obviously becoming more comfortable in westerns than he was in Whispering Smith. If you haven’t seen him in a western, you should start with Shane and maybe Branded, both from around the same time as this film; but this one isn’t bad aside from the obvious historical impossibilities. Character actors Jeff Corey and Neville Brand show up in small parts as a couple of Quantrell’s troopers. Jay Silverheels is Ute chief Little Crow.

William Dieterle (The Hunchback of Notre Dame [the Charles Laughton version, 1939], Kismet [1944], Portrait of Jennie [1948]) was a mainstream director, not particularly known for westerns. The uncredited John Farrow directed a few scenes when Dieterle was unavailable during filming. Music is by Franz Waxman. Shot in color by Charles Lang around Gallup, New Mexico, at 84 minutes.

For another western that has Quantrell surviving the war and heading out west to continue his depredations, see Arizona Raiders (1965), with Audie Murphy.

100 Rifles

Nicholas Chennault ~ July 6, 2015

100 Rifles—Jim Brown, Raquel Welch, Burt Reynolds, Fernando Lamas, Dan O’Herlihy, Aldo Sambrell (1969; Dir: Tom Gries)

This is sometimes referred to as a spaghetti western, but it isn’t. Although it was filmed in Spain like many spaghetti westerns and featured Italian actor Aldo Sambrell in the cast, it had an American director, writer, producer and most of the cast. In fact, there was a lot of American talent involved here. This was the second of director Tom Gries’ three westerns (along with Will Penny and Breakheart Pass). He also co-wrote the script, along with experienced screenwriter Claire Huffaker (The Comancheros, Rio Conchos). It has a very good musical score by Jerry Goldsmith. And it featured three stars who were either on the rise (Burt Reynolds, Jim Brown) or near their peaks (Raquel Welch, known more for her physical attributes than for acting ability, but she still had box office appeal). It gave Jim Brown, who had his start in movies with the western Rio Conchos five years earlier, a more substantial leading role than he had previously enjoyed in films. And it also gave U.S. audiences the first bi-racial love scene in a mainstream movie.

It looks to be set in northern Mexico (specifically, in the state of Sonora) in the early 20th century, the era of continuous Mexican revolution, with trains, a few cars and a few modern armaments scattered around. Gen. Verdugo (Fernando Lamas), the official governor of Sonora, leads regular troops against the Yaqui Indians and rebels under Gen. Romero. One of the Yaquis is Sarita (Raquel Welch), as in the opening scene we see Verdugo hang her father. Into town separately ride two Americans. One is Yaqui Joe Herrera (Burt Reynolds), only half Yaqui, who has just robbed a bank in Phoenix, Arizona, of $6,000. The other is Lyedecker (Jim Brown), a former buffalo soldier who has taken a temporary job as a peace officer and hopes to make it permanent by bringing in Joe. Verdugo is not minded to let any of the three go, but they escape together with Verdugo and his men in hot pursuit.

Yaqui Joe (Burt Reynolds) and Lyedecker (Jim Brown) make a break for it.

Joe has used the stolen money to buy the 100 rifles of the title for the desperate Yaquis. They recover the rifles on mules outside of town, fighting a rearguard action against Verdugo. Lyedecker develops a relationship (or at least a one-night stand) with Sarita. As they arrive in the town where they expect to turn the rifles over to Gen. Romero, they find that he has been killed the day before, and Lyedecker is hailed as the new general. He leads in the capture of an army train, although Verdugo wasn’t on it as they had hoped. Taking the train into Nogales, on the northern border of Mexico, for an attack on Verdugo’s forces there, Verdugo hears of their plan and is ready for the train. Lyedecker, Joe, Sarita and most of the Yaquis and rebels jump off before the train crashes into Nogales, and a battle ensues, with the Yaquis using captured weapons. Finally, Verdugo himself is clubbed to death with rifle butts, but Sarita is also killed. Lyedecker appoints Joe his successor as Yaqui/rebel general and heads back to the U.S.

Jim Brown would become a bigger star in the blaxploitation films and a few more westerns of the 1970s, developing (like Robert Mitchum) a sub-specialty in westerns featuring adventures in Mexico (this, Rio Conchos, Take a Hard Ride, etc.). He works well here, although Burt Reynolds does better. Raquel Welch does what’s required of her, with flaring nostrils to indicate a fiery temperament and putting her physique on display (a bit quaint by current cinematic standards). Welch is particularly effective in a scene that calls for her to distract a trainful of soldiers by taking a shower under a water tower. Pretty smoky for a mainstream 1969 movie, but she’s wearing a white shirt while doing it; nevertheless it works as intended. Reynolds and Welch did not get on well during the filming and would not work together again.

A couple of publicity stills will give an idea of how this movie was marketed. Burt Reynolds was said to have suggested as a tongue-in-cheek strategy, “Take her shirt off, take his shirt off, and give me all the lines.”

The Lyedecker-Sarita relationship was daring for its time, but it seems unremarkable now and it does slow down the plot of a movie obviously based on action. The film seems like it could be tightened up to good effect. Sarita’s death off-screen in the final battle scene feels arbitrary, although clearly such things happen in battles like the one in Nogales. The movie’s not terrible, or even really bad, but the film’s present interest is more as a cinematic and cultural artifact of 1969 rather than because it’s a good western. In color, at 110 minutes. It was rated R on its release, because of all the violence and the steamy scenes with Raquel Welch.

Somehow Jim Brown got lost on this Asian poster.

If you didn’t get enough Raquel Welch, see her in Bandolero! (adventuring in Mexico again, this time with James Stewart and Dean Martin) and in Hannie Caulder, a female revenge story. Burt Reynolds had already done the spaghetti western Navajo Joe, and would go on to appear in Sam Whiskey and The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing as he became a bigger star in the early 1970s.

Black Spurs

Nicholas Chennault ~ July 2, 2015

Black Spurs—Rory Calhoun, Linda Darnell, Terry Moore, Scott Brady, Lon Chaney, Jr., Bruce Cabot, James Best, Richard Arlen, DeForest Kelley (1965; Dir: R.G. Springsteen)

The black spurs of the title belong to an outlaw called El Pescadore (The Fisherman with an extra “e”), who robs a bank in the movie’s first scene. Santee, a cowhand with ambitions, takes up his pursuit as a more lucrative line of work, and appropriates the black spurs when he gets his man. Returning to his town in Texas in 1885, he finds that his girlfriend has married a sheriff from Laredo and moved on.

Eventually, Santee comes up with an idea to make his fortune in Kile, Kansas. The railroad will come through Kile or Lark, but the railroad company avoids disorderly towns when making those decisions (historically, then they become disorderly after the railroad has arrived). Santee makes a deal with Gus Kile (Lon Chaney, Jr.) to open up Lark, causing the railroad to avoid Lark and go through KIle. He brings in more gamblers, gunmen (Bruce Cabot) and women (led by Linda Darnell), and backs off Sheriff Henry Elkins (James Best), now married to Santee’s former girl Anna (Terry Moore). Santee is unable to completely control some of his men, who tar and feather Sheriff Elkins. Anna reveals that her son is Santee’s, and that she had to marry Elkins to become respectable while he was out hunting El Pescatore.

Santee (Rory Calhoun) wins his spurs (black ones).

Santee has a change of heart now. (We always knew he was decent somewhere inside, because he was nice to kids.) He takes up Elkins’ badge and cleans out the saloon he had set up, taking on four gunmen at once. A preacher with a broken arm, Anna and even the all-but-immobile Elkins take shots during the battle. Finally, Santee takes down Henderson (Bruce Cabot), who is shot, falls, and is last seen being dragged screaming out of town by his frightened horse. As Santee rides out of town the next day, he discards the black spurs (reminiscent of Marilyn Monroe’s red slippers in River of No Return, among many other such cinematic gestures). The truly dreadful theme song intones: “He had no love of his own, because he wore … black spurs.”

This low-budget feature was late in the careers of Rory Calhoun (starting to get a little gray in his hair), Linda Darnell (still beautiful but thickening a bit), Bruce Cabot, who had been playing similar bad guy roles thirty years (Last of the Mohicans, Dodge City) and twenty years (Angel and the Bad Man) previously, and Lon Chaney, Jr. For Calhoun, this and Apache Uprising (also 1965, also directed by R.G. Springsteen) were his last significant western movies. It was Darnell’s last movie; she died tragically in a fire the same year at the age of 41 after 25 years in the movies. Director R.G. Springsteen was nearing the end of his movie career as well, with several low-budget westerns produced by A.C. Lyles. This is not among the best of Calhoun’s westerns, but it’s not the worst, either.

Santee (Rory Calhoun) puts on the badge; co-star Linda Darnell behind the scenes with producer A.C. Lyles.

In the 1960s, A.C. Lyles produced a series of thirteen low-budget westerns for Paramount, of which this was the fourth. One of the ways the budget was kept down was to use journeyman directors (like Springsteen) and to use stars with recognizeable names but who were past their primes–like those in this film. Silent screen star Richard Arlen was in several of them, including in this as a hard-bitten saloon owner. Shot in color at Ray Corrigan’s ranch in Simi Valley, California, at 81 minutes.

For better Rory Calhoun, see Dawn at Socorro or Apache Territory. For better Linda Darnell in a western (and her role here as Santee’s imported madam from New Orleans is quite minor, although she received major billing with Calhoun), see The Mark of Zorro, My Darling Clementine and Two Flags West, all from the 1940s. For another bounty hunter named Santee, see Glenn Ford in Santee (1973)—not one of his better westerns, either.

Bandido

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 29, 2015

Bandido—Robert Mitchum, Gilbert Roland, Ursula Thiess, Zachary Scott, Henry Brandon, Roldolfo Acosta (1956; Dir: Richard Fleischer)

Robert Mitchum had kind of a sub-specialty in westerns about adventurers south of the the border (The Wonderful Country, The Wrath of God, Villa Rides!), of which this is the earliest. It is set in the revolution of 1916, when Black Jack Pershing and the American army were unsuccessfully pursuing Pancho Villa around northern Mexico in preparation for World War I. Villa was not the only warlord in northern Mexico fighting the regular army at the time, as we all know from The Wild Bunch.

As this movie opens, an American arms dealer named Kennedy (Zachary Scott) is selling guns to the regulares, as they are known, using his wife Lisa (Ursula Theiss) to charm Mexican officials and high-ranking officers. As Kennedy puts together a deal with them, some of their marital discord is witnessed by American opportunist Wilson (Robert Mitchum), who wants to highjack Kennedy’s arms and re-direct them to one of the under-supplied warlords, Col. José Escobar (Gilbert Roland). Heading south from the border to where a battle between Escobar’s partisans and the regulares is taking place, Wilson intervenes with a few well-placed grenades, and Escobar wins.

Opportunist Wilson (Robert Mitchum) adds a few granades to the battle below.

With Wilson’s help, Escobar captures the train carrying Kennedy and his wife. Kennedy sets up a trap for Escobar in a fishing village with his intermediary Gunther (Henry Brandon). Instead of Kennedy leading them there, Wilson takes Kennedy’s wife and develops a relationship there. When the trap is discovered, Wilson escapes and Lisa is captured. Wilson now persuades Kennedy to tell him where the arms really are, on two barges in another village.

Wilson and Kennedy escape Escobar’s men, but Kennedy takes a bullet in the back. A sympathetic priest removes the bullet, and Lisa shows up, with the army not far behind. As Kennedy takes aim at Wilson with Lisa’s purse pistol, he is shot by Escobar, and Escobar and Wilson go to see whether Kennedy was finally telling the truth. They find the two barges, one with gasoline and dynamite (we can guess what will happen with that one), and the other with arms and ammunition. But the army and Gunther are not far behind them, and there is a standoff. As Escobar’s men arrive, they are about to be trapped, until Wilson and Escobar blow up the first barge to destroy the army’s position. In the end, Escobar gets the arms and ammunition to continue his fight, and Wilson heads back to the U.S. border to look for Lisa.

Escobar’s partisans and Wilson pursue the train carrying the Kennedys.

Silent screen star Gilbert Roland (Three Violent People, Cheyenne Autumn) makes a smoother and more elegant Mexican revolutionary than we usually see. He is probably the best thing about the movie. His relationship with Wilson evolves into a kind of Humphrey Bogart-Claude Rains friendship, as in Casablanca. Robert Mitchum’s voice is excellent, and his performance in this convoluted plot is fine. Zachary Scott is good as the ill-fated gun dealer. German-born Ursula Thiess was beautiful, but this was her last movie after marrying Robert Taylor and largely retiring from the movies. There is little on-screen chemistry between her and Mitchum. German-born Henry Brandon was no stranger to westerns, having played both Germans in Mexico (Vera Cruz and here) and Indian chiefs (The Searchers, Two Rode Together, War Arrow).

Director Richard Fleischer did not make many westerns, although he made the revisionist The Spikes Gang. However, he was a mainline director, known for Dr. Dolittle, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Fantastic Voyage, Soylent Green and a couple of Conan movies, among many others. The film was shot on location at several of the battle sites of the 1916 revolution, using as extras both old-timers who had fought for Villa and former army soldiers who had fought against them. It marked Robert Mitchum’s first producing effort. Music is by Max Steiner. In color, and at 92 minutes it is reasonably enjoyable but not particularly memorable. Most of it is spent in trying to figure out where Wilson’s loyalties lie, other than to himself. Turns out he goes for Escobar’s cause and love, not making any money for himself.

Wilson (Robert Mitchum) and Escobar (Gilbert Roland) hold off the regulares.

The title seems like maybe it once had an exclamation point after it (not usually a good sign, and some posters show the exclamation point), and it is not clear who the bandido of the title is. There are lots of bandidos in this movie. It does not appear to be available on DVD. Not to be confused with Bandidas (2006), starring Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz.

For other westerns set in Mexico during this revolutionary period, see Wings of the Hawk, They Came to Cordura, The Professionals, The Wild Bunch, The Old Gringo, or any of the westerns featuring Pancho Villa as a character (e.g., Villa Rides! with Yul Brynner, Charles Bronson and Robert Mitchum).

Pursued

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 24, 2015

Pursued—Robert Mitchum, Teresa Wright, Judith Anderson, Dean Jagger, John Rodney, Alan Hale, Harry Carey, Jr. (1947; Dir: Raoul Walsh)

This is a western noir, known as the first of that subgenre. It is also a range melodrama with overtones of Wuthering Heights and Rebecca. A not-entirely-clear past haunts and, to some extent, determines the course of the present. The lead here is Robert Mitchum, the same year that he did the marvelous Out of the Past and one year before another of his best westerns noirs, Blood on the Moon. The moving spirit behind this production appears to have been novelist and screenwriter Niven Busch (Duel in the Sun, The Furies), then a well-known writer. He was married to female lead Teresa Wright at the time.

The movie opens with a scene in a long-derelict ranch house in Glorieta Township, New Mexico Territory, early in the 20th century. Thor Callum (Teresa Wright) enters the place, finding Jeb Rand (Robert Mitchum), who seems to be the subject of the title. She tells him that she’s not coming with him; he claims he was able to tell that just by looking at her. The rest of the story is told in flashback.

Jeb Rand (Robert Mitchum) and Thor Callum (Teresa Wright) confront both the past and a dim future.

As a child, young Jeb Rand is under a trap door in that same ranch house, terrorized by flashes of light and large flashing spurs, which will haunt his dreams for the rest of the movie. Mrs. Callum (Judith Anderson), crawling across the floor, rescues him and adopts him as one of her family, along with her daughter Thor (short for Thorley) and son Adam. Thor and Jeb grow up fond of each other, but Jeb and Adam have an up-and-down relationship with frequent fights. One day Jeb accuses Adam of having shot a colt he was riding. Mrs. Callum says it was deer hunters, but she knew it was her one-armed brother-in-law Grant Callum (Dean Jagger), who seems determined to kill the boy but now agrees to let him grow up.

When Jeb (Robert Mitchum) reaches adulthood, he loves Thor but still has a wary relationship with Adam (John Rodney). They toss a coin to see who will go fight in the Spanish-American War; Jeb goes. He becomes a war hero and is wounded, returning to the Callum ranch. He plans to leave the ranch with Thor, and as he returns to make his departure, a figure ambushes him from a high ridge. Jeb shoots back and hits the figure; it’s Adam. He is acquitted at an inquest, at which he is prosecuted by Grant Callum, but Mrs. Callum and Thor do not forgive him.

Jeb Rand (Robert Mitchum) does not depart on good terms with the Callums (Judith Anderson and Teresa Wright, with John Rodney prostrate on the ground).

[Spoilers follow.] Jeb goes into a partnership with the saloon owner Jake Dingle (Alan Hale) and attends a dance to see Thor, who is dating young Prentice (Harry Carey, Jr.), son of the general store owner. Grant Callum goads Prentice into following and shooting at Jeb, intending to finish the job if necessary, until he is stopped by Jake Dingle. The result is the death of Prentice, further estranging Jeb from the Callums—until Thor appears to start to change toward him, encouraging his suit. As she explains to her mother, she’ll encourage him until they’re married, and then she’ll kill him.

But Jeb can read her mind, and provides her with a gun on their wedding night. She switches again, and now loves him again. But as they speak the house is surrounded by Grant and other Callums with guns. Jeb makes his escape, with Thor agreeing to meet him at the old ranch house, resulting in the opening scene. But the Callums show up, too, and they position Jeb for a hanging with a noose around his neck. A wagon draws up, and it’s Mrs. Callum. Jeb realizes what was going on the night she found him. The flashes of light were gunfire, and the spurs were his father’s the night he was killed by Grant and other Callums. Mrs. Callum had been having an affair with the senior Rand, and that is the root of Grant’s hatred and pursuit of Jeb. Mrs. Callum stops the hanging by blasting Grant with a rifle, and Jeb and Thor (who has apparently changed her mind again) ride off together.

It looks like the Callums will finally get Jeb Rand (Robert Mitchum).

The best performance here is by Judith Anderson as Mrs. Callum, although Dean Jagger is good as the implacable Grant Callum. Anderson reinforces the similarities with Rebecca, since it was her role as the fierce Mrs. Danvers that hung over that gothic tale. Her only other western was The Furies, directed by Anthony Mann and also written by Niven Busch. Robert Mitchum does well as Jeb Rand, the Heathcliff figure, although he is mostly impassive. Teresa Wright is too sweet-seeming an actress to make the vengeful Thor believable, and, as written, seems to change her motivations abruptly more than once. Heightening the noir sensibility, a whiff of forbidden sexuality, both past and present, hangs over the film.

Director Raoul Walsh could do well with noir-oriented westerns, as he does here; see his Colorado Territory (1949), with Joel McCrea and Virginia Mayo. Music is by Max Steiner. The brilliant black-and-white cinematography is by James Wong Howe; note the use of the canyons and rocks of the southwest (this was shot around Gallup, New Mexico), and the intricate lighting of the night scenes to heighten the noir feel. 101 minutes long.

The Crippled Gunman

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 18, 2015

The Crippled Gunman

One of the most common traditional themes of the western genre is having disputes and confrontations finally resolved in a shootout. Typically the good guy (or the forces of righteousness, however they are represented) wins with a combination of skill with a gun (the most common), guile, personal courage and moral force against great odds on the other side. Mostly it works; sometimes it doesn’t (see, for example, Colorado Territory [1949], with the fate of Joel McCrea and Virginia Mayo, The Gunfighter [1950] with Gregory Peck, Devil’s Doorway [1950] with Robert Taylor or Hombre [1967], with Paul Newman).

However, one of the ideas that became current in westerns beginning in the mid-1950s was that of the crippled gunman. How far can courage, guile and moral force take you in situations involving violence and requiring unusual physical skill, when the physical part isn’t at full strength? Even some of the greatest directors of westerns used this idea (Sam Peckinpah in The Deadly Companions; Budd Boetticher in Decision at Sundown and also in Seven Men From Now; Howard Hawks in El Dorado).

Usually, the impaired gunman goes on to demonstrate that “some things a man can’t ride around,” (see that line in Hondo, Seven Men From Now, The Tall T, Ride Lonesome and others), even if the fight isn’t fair any more—even if it appears hopeless. This often gives a woman the opportunity to provide him with an out on the eve of his trial. She tries to persuade him to go away with her instead of facing his adversaries, testing his moral worthiness and resolution. (See Angela Lansbury in A Lawless Street, Katy Jurado in Man from Del Rio, Virginia Mayo in The Proud Ones, Dorothy Malone in Warlock, and many others). Even Grace Kelly couldn’t make that work in High Noon.

Randolph Scott’s boarding house landlady explains the basics of what a man’s gotta do to his estranged wife Angela Lansbury in A Lawless Street.

Ramrod (Joel McCrea, 1947). The ramrod of the title is Dave Nash (Joel McCrea), good with a gun but badly wounded in the shoulder before his big showdown with cattle baron Frank Ivey. Solution: he takes a shotgun to the showdown.

Gunsmoke (Audie Murphy, 1953). Gunman Reb Kittredge (Audie Murphy) wins a ranch on the turn of a card, but immediately has to get his cattle to a buyer. After the bad guys smash up his gun hand and arm, he must also deal with his enemies.

The Far Country (James Stewart, 1954). The protagonists in westerns directed by Anthony Mann frequently had psychological impairments. In this one, James Stewart has a physical one as well; his gun arm’s in a sling as he approaches his final confrontation with John McIntire and his band of thugs (including Robert Wilke and Jack Elam).

Corinne Calvet nurses the badly-wounded James Stewart back to health in The Far Country.

A Lawless Street (Randolph Scott, 1955). Randolph Scott plays marshal Calem Ware, who goes up against his gunfighting nemesis (Michael Pate) with a smashed gun hand and a head injury. HIs only advantage is that the bad guys think he’s already dead because of those wounds. Director Joseph H. Lewis seemed to like to play with the idea of an impaired gunman (this and Terror in a Texas Town).

The Lonesome Trail (John Agar, 1955). Cowboy and Civil War veteran Johnny Rush (John Agar) returns to find his father dead, his land gone and his girl engaged to the local land baron. He loses the use of his gun arm in a fight with the henchman of the land baron, so he takes up the bow and arrow instead of the usual tools of violence.

Having had his gun hand shot by bad guys, James Stewart is forced to use a rifle in The Man From Laramie.

The Man From Laramie (James Stewart, 1955). Will Lockhart (James Stewart) has been shot in the right hand point-blank, but he doesn’t let that stop him in his quest to hunt down whoever killed his brother and is responsible for selling guns to the Indians. It does mean he has to use a rifle instead of a pistol, however.

Man From Del Rio (Anthony Quinn, 1956). Anthony Quinn’s Dave Robles has practiced for five years to become very good with a gun, and he is. However, in a fight before his final two confrontations, he has smashed the wrist in his gun hand. Now he walks into a final showdown in that condition.

Randolph Scott props himself up using a rifle as a cane, against Lee Marvin in Seven Men From Now.

Seven Men From Now (Randolph Scott, 1956). Former Sheriff Ben Stride (Randolph Scott) is disadvantaged in his final series of confrontations with miscreants because he can’t walk. His leg was injured when one of them shot down his horse, and he can only stand using his rifle as a cane.

The Proud Ones (Robert Ryan, 1956). Aging city marshal Cass Silver (Robert Ryan) may be proud, but he’s also very good with a gun and very experienced at taming wild towns. However, a bullet creases his skull early in the film, leaving him with impaired vision before his battle with the much larger forces of bad guy Robert Middleton, supported only by his uncertain (but also proud) deputy Thad Anderson (Jeffrey Hunter).

Randolph Scott faces a final shoot-out with a badly wounded hand in Decision at Sundown.

Decision at Sundown (Randolph Scott, 1957). Seeking revenge for the seduction and subsequent suicide of his wife while he was away at the Civil War, Bart Allison (Randolph Scott again) fights the entire town of Sundown, led by its corrupt sheriff (Andrew Duggan) and head bad guy and seducer Tate Kimbrough (John Carroll). The otherwise capable Allison’s gun hand is injured before his final shoot-out with Kimbrough.

Forty Guns (Hank Worden, 1957). Hank Worden’s city marshal isn’t much of a gunman (or even a main character), but he is all but blind when he is gunned down by Barbara Stanwyck’s no-good younger brother Brockie (John Ericson). In this case, picking on an old blind marshal early in the movie is indicative of Brockie’s moral bankruptcy, like shooting a dog or kicking a child.

Terror in a Texas Town (Nedrick Young, 1958). This is the rare situation where the bad guy, black-clad Johnny Cale (Nedrick Young), has lost his right hand, although he is still good with his left. The loss of a hand seems emblematic of his psychological deformities, but he doesn’t seem to feel the loss of it in his role as gunslinging enforcer—until he comes up against a whaler (Sterling Hayden) with a harpoon.

Richard Widmark has been beaten and stabbed in the gun hand but still has to go against Henry Fonda in Warlock.

Warlock (Richard Widmark, 1959). Brave but overmatched Deputy Sheriff Johnny Gannon’s gun hand is heavily bandaged, having been brutally pinned to a table with a knife by his former boss. Gannon (Richard Widmark) must now face both that boss and his men in the street, followed by an even greater challenge: going against Marshal Clay Blaisdell (Henry Fonda), who was obviously much better with a gun even before Gannon’s injuries.

Brian Keith’s shooting arm doesn’t work right in The Deadly Companions.

The Deadly Companions (Brian Keith, 1961). In director Sam Peckinpah’s first movie, Yellowleg (Brian Keith) has a rifle ball near his collarbone from the Civil War, and it often impairs the functioning of his right arm. At the start of the movie, it causes him to accidentally shoot saloon girl Maureen O’Hara’s son, and you know it will come up again in a critical situation.

The Gun Hawk (Rory Calhoun, 1963). Blaine Madden (Rory Calhoun) goes up against the conscienceless gunman Johnny Flanders (Robert J. Wilke) even though his gun hand is all but useless because of a bad wound to that arm. Not entirely convincingly, he does it by beating him in a fist fight. Ultimately, however, Madden does not win his bigger fight.

John Wayne’s gun arm goes numb because of an old bullet near his spine in El Dorado.

El Dorado (John Wayne, 1966). Expert gunman Cole Thornton (John Wayne) has his gun arm occasionally go numb, due to a wound in his back near the spine. You know this will happen at a critical time.

Arizona Bushwhackers (Howard Keel, John Ireland, 1968). This laughably bad A.C. Lyles production features the only saloon brawl on film between two one-armed battlers. One is a wounded sheriff (Howard Keel) and the other is his deputy crippled in the Civil War (John Ireland).

The Shootist (John Wayne, 1976). Aging gunman J.B. Books (John Wayne) is dying of cancer in turn-of-the-century Carson City. He arranges to go out on his birthday, in a shoot-out with three of the area’s deadliest gunmen at once.

One-Armed Bad Guys

Dean Jagger in Pursued

Tom Tryon in Three Violent People

Dean Jagger in The Proud Rebel

Clifford David in Invitation to a Gunfighter

David Dukes in Last Stand at Saber River

Terror in a Texas Town

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 15, 2015

Terror in a Texas Town—Sterling Hayden, Sebastian Cabot, Nedrick Young (Ned Young), Victor Milian, Carol Kelly, Sheb Woolley (1958; Dir: Joseph H. Lewis)

Sterling Hayden starred in several B westerns in the mid-1950s, sometimes venturing into more ambitious territory with more upscale films like The Asphalt Jungle (1950), Johnny Guitar (1954) and The Killing (1956), later even showing up in smaller roles in Dr. Strangelove (as Gen. Jack D. Ripper) and The Godfather (as a corrupt police lieutenant killed in a restaurant). He was said to have been more interested in sailing than in acting. This low-budget effort is his last starring role in a western, and it’s also the last film directed by Joseph H. Lewis (Gun Crazy, A Lawless Street, 7th Cavalry), who was known for his style-over-substance approach to filmmaking.

Some of that style is apparent from the opening scene, which shows Swedish whaler George Hanson (Sterling Hayden) marching down the dusty main street of the Texas town of the title without hat or gun, but carrying a whaling harpoon into a confrontation with a stereotypical black-clad, one-handed gunman, Johnny Crale (Nedrick Young). The rest of the story is told in flashback, getting us back to this point.

The opening scene sets up the final confrontation on a dusty Texas street.

The outlines of the plot are not remarkable. A wealthy man, Ed McNeil (Sebastian Cabot), has come to town, intent on taking over the surrounding land because it has oil. He brings in Johnny Crale, a gunslinger he has worked with before. Since then Crale appears to have lost his right hand and now wears one of metal with a glove, although his nasty disposition is intact. Among those who will not sell is Swedish immigrant Sven Hanson (Ted Stanhope in an uncredited role); and Crale coldly kills him. The killing is witnessed by Juan Mirada (Victor Milian), who keeps silent in part because his wife is expecting a new child any day,.and in part because it would do no good to say anything.

Sven’s son George Hanson comes to town to visit his father. Although he is generally peaceable, he has progressive run-ins with Crale, whose men beat him and put him on a train out of town. He returns and persuades Juan to tell the story of his father’s killing, until Crale kills Juan as his child is being born; the murder is witnessed by his own son Pepe. McNeil starts to see Crale as a liability and they have a falling-out, until Crale kills him, too. This brings us back to the opening scene, as George takes up the weapon he knows, a harpoon, and goes to meet Crale in the street in one of the most unusual western showdowns ever filmed.

Land magnate Ed McNeil (Sebastian Cabot) negotiates with his enforcer Johnny Crale (Nedrick Young), while McNeil’s “secretary” listens.

Hayden, who never looked much like the traditional western hero, does well enough as a Swedish whaler who can’t be pushed any farther. For once, devoted sailor Hayden got to play an actual seaman, even if in a western with no ocean. Sebastian Cabot is better than most range tyrants as the nefarious oil-hungry magnate. Kendrick Young is not entirely satisfying as the one-handed gunman, in a kind of stereotypically-written role. Victor Milian (who was in the film noir Touch of Evil the same year, but spent most of his career in television) does well as the Mexican witness weighing his responsibilities to his family against telling the truth about Crale.

Director Lewis earns his reputation for style by constantly distracting us from the outlines of a routine story with unusual camera angles, lingering close-ups on weathered faces and disturbing editing. In general, virtue is not rewarded, nor are those who summon the courage to do the right thing (Sven Hanson, Juan Mirada). The psychologically-tortured gunman Crale seems almost as much a victim as those he killed–perhaps because his mother never loved him or because his crippled gun hand represents another kind of impotence. The whole thing has the kind of bitter aftertaste of, say, The Ox-Bow Incident, with justice coming out on the short end. This has become something of a cult favorite in some circles.

When the law fails, George Hanson (Sterling Hayden) uses the weapons at hand–in this case, a harpoon.

Except for the inclusion of “Texas,” there is little about the alliterative title that signals this is a western. Written by the black-listed Dalton Trumbo, one of the Hollywood Ten, under another name. Shot in black and white by Ray Rennahan, at 80 minutes. For another Lewis-directed western featuring a gunman with a crippled hand (Randolph Scott this time), see A Lawless Street (1955). If you’re only going to watch a couple of the eighteen Sterling Hayden westerns, you should try this and Johnny Guitar, neither of which was exactly typical for him.

The Gun Hawk

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 11, 2015

The Gun Hawk—Rory Calhoun, Rod Cameron, Rod Lauren, Ruta Lee, Robert Wilke, John Litel, Morgan Woodward (1963; Dir: Edward Ludwig)

This is a late western in the careers of Rory Calhoun and Rod Cameron, and the last movie for director Edward Ludwig (who made such John Wayne non-westerns as Big Jim McLain, Wake of the Red Witch and The Fighting Seabees).

The title refers to the mysterious figure who runs the haven of Sanctuary on the Mexican border, enforcing his rules with his gun. Blaine Madden (Rory Calhoun), not bad with a gun himself, rides into Baxter, the town where he grew up, in time to meet and help young footloose gunman Reb Roan (Rod Lauren). Sheriff Ben Corey (Rod Cameron, with lots of gray paint in his hair) liked Madden when he was growing up and once offered him a job as his deputy. He didn’t take it, but his jealous childhood friend Mitch (Morgan Woodward) did, and he still resents Madden. Madden tells Corey he’s not staying in town but is headed to Sanctuary.

Sheriff Ben Corey (Rod Cameron), Deputy Mitch (Morgan Woodward) and Blaine Madden (Rory Calhoun) all see trouble coming but differ in their responses.

In the local saloon, after Madden helps Roan in a fight with the Sully brothers, those brothers start picking on the town drunk (long-time character actor John Litel, who had often played ministers and even Gen. Phil Sheridan). Finally, they shoot him, not realizing that he’s Madden’s father. Madden leaves town, saying he’s not going in pursuit of them, but he finds them before Corey does. Corey rides up, sees Madden standing over the two dead Sullys and tries to arrest him. Madden rides away, gambling that Corey will not shoot him in the back, but he does, winging him.

Aimless young drifter Reb Roan finds Madden having collapsed from his wound and does what he can to doctor it. It’s in Madden’s right arm (his gun arm), and it obviously impairs Madden’s ability to use his gun. As the two of them ride into Sanctuary, Madden is greeted as “El Gavilan,” Spanish for “the hawk”—he is the mysterious figure who presides over Sanctuary. His first action is to run out Johnny Flanders (veteran screen heavy Robert Wilke), who has violated Sanctuary’s rules about not using guns. He accomplishes this not with guns but (not very convincingly for some one with a badly wounded right arm) with his fists.

Roan (Rod Lauren) and Madden (Rory Calhoun) ride into Sanctuary.

[Spoilers follow.] Ben Corey rides into Sanctuary and takes Madden into custody, but the residents of the hamlet prevent him from riding out with El Gavilan. Mitch tries unsuccessfully to raise a posse in a neighboring town and wants to just shoot Madden down. Corey takes back his badge. Meanwhile, in Sanctuary Madden’s romantic interest Marleen (Ruta Lee) spends the night with him, and in the morning he forces Roan into a gun fight. Roan is wounded but Madden (who was dying from his wound) is dead—a death the way he wanted it. Marleen then explains to Roan that, having violated the rules of Sanctuary, he must now leave.

The ending is not terribly satisfying, and the rationale for Reb having to leave not all that convincing now that Madden is dead. There are at least two alternate endings that would have worked better: (1) Instead of Madden dying, he and Roan stage the final gunfight, but it is just that—staged, for Corey to witness from his perch above the town. When he sees Madden’s apparent death, he gives up the chase, and Madden and the inhabitants of Sanctuary live happily ever after in their remote location. Or better, (2) if Madden has to die, it plays out as in the movie, but with his last words the dying Madden passes to Roan the mantle of El Gavilan, and Roan becomes the protector of Sanctuary in the place of his mentor. And it’s never really explained why the fatherly Corey actually did shoot Madden in the back, although theoretically just wounding him. The result in the film is probably more true to the state of 19th-century medicine on the trail than if Madden had survived.

A last night for Madden (Rory Calhoun) and Marleen (Ruta Lee).

Experienced hands Calhoun and Cameron are fine in this low-budget effort, although Calhoun spends too much time just looking pained, either from his wound or the situation around him. Lauren and Ruta Lee are not impressive. This is not among Calhoun’s very best efforts; those would probably be Dawn at Socorro (1954) and Apache Territory (1958), both with better writing. But it does pull us in with interesting characters, good world-weary acting from Calhoun and with its twist on familiar situations up to a point, until things fall apart at the end. Rory Calhoun fans will want to watch it anyway. In color, at 92 minutes.

For another tale of a haven for outlaws in the Southwest, see the more famous Rancho Notorious (1952) by director Fritz Lang, with the establishment presided over by Marlene Dietrich. There is a string of westerns about gunmen with physical impairments, the best-known of which is El Dorado (1966), in which John Wayne is the afflicted gunslinger.

Santa Fe

Nicholas Chennault ~ June 8, 2015

Santa Fe—Randolph Scott, Janis Carter, John Archer, Roy Roberts (1951; Dir: Irving Pichel)

In the wake of the Civil War, southerners Brit Canfield (Randolph Scott) and his three brothers have lost their plantation in Virginia and head west. In northern Missouri, they encounter hostile Yankee soldiers and are forced to kill one. In their escape (Scott leaves behind his beautiful horse Stardust, who disappears from the movie), they hop on a passing train and end up in Kansas. Brit goes to work for the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, but his embittered brothers fall in with Cole Sanders (Roy Roberts), operator of a mobile saloon with a lot of other unlawful activities.

The Canfield brothers in northern Missouri. Randolph Scott (second from left) is still riding Stardust.

Brit quickly becomes the chief assistant and troubleshooter for Dave Baxter (Warner Anderson), a former Yankee officer who remembers Britt as a capable commander for the opposition during the late war. Baxter’s clerk, payroll manager and telegraph operator Judith Chandler (Janis Carter) is initially hostile, having lost her husband in the Civil War action for which Baxter remembers him. Sanders (and Canfield’s brothers) fire up Indian hostility to the railroad, until Britt lets the chief drive the iron horse. Canfield is continually at war with Sanders, with his brothers caught in the middle.

With the railroad rushing to the Colorado state line to make a bonus, Sanders causes a drunkern surveyor to move the state line designation so that the bonus is imperiled until Brit and Baxter drive the construction through the night for the final 48 hours. The Denver and Rio Grande threatens to take Raton Pass in eastern Colorado (effectively blocking the Atchison, Topeka) until Brit makes a marathon ride to buy the toll road in the pass from Uncle Dick Wooton first.

Brit Canfield (Randolph Scott) meets the hostile Judith (Janis Carter). Note Scott’s trademark jacket.

A mysterious gang robs the train carrying the payroll, and Britt recognizes a couple of his brothers. One of them is wounded and dies of his wounds. Bat Masterson from Dodge City arrests the youngest brother until Britt creates a reasonable doubt for him, with the help of Judith Chandler. Baxter sets up a decoy train, but Sanders overhears Britt telling his brothers it’s a trap, and they rob the Wells Fargo safe instead. While pursuing the robbers, Britt encounters Bat Masterson and Baxter and persuades them to let him join their posse.

At a remote station they trap Sanders and his gang; when the remaining two Canfield brothers balk at killing during the escape, Sanders and his men shoot them. Sanders and his remaining henchman leap aboard a passing train with Britt in pursuit, and since he’s Randolph Scott, we know how that will turn out. Baxter finds that Judith has hidden a wanted poster for the Canfields and no longer trusts Brit; although the railroad makes it to Santa Fe (despite the name of the railroad, the original line didn’t go to Santa Fe), but by that time Brit is working for a railroad in Nevada. When Judith finds out where he is, she goes to join him. Fade to black.

Brit Canfield (Randolph Scott) hunts for train robbers in the rocks.

This is one of several movies with Randolph Scott as a railroad troubleshooter (see Canadian Pacific and Carson City, for example) in building a western railway. The film has a lot of plot and good action, with Scott continually torn between getting the railroad through and trying unsuccessfully to get his brothers to go straight. There are some loose ends in all of this; it’s not clear why Sanders would profit from sabotaging the railroad, for example. You’d think he would do best with his mobile saloon if the railroad prospered. This isn’t one of the better supporting casts for a Randolph Scott western; Janis Carter is a fairly colorless female lead, as was common in those films. The film starts with misattributing a well-known phrase from Lincoln’s second inaugural address to the Gettysburg Address; and includes windy Manifest-Destiny pronouncements and speeches by C.K. Holliday (Paul Stanton playing the owner of the railroad) on more than one occasion.

On the whole, however, this is worth watching, with lots of good action–one of the better Randolph Scott westerns from the early 1950s. It would make a good double feature with Carson City. Shot in color in Arizona by Charles (Buddy) Lawton, Jr., at 87 minutes. This was one of the last films from director Irving Pichel. The producer was Harry Joe Brown, who frequently worked on Scott projects, most notably those directed by Budd Boetticher in the late 1950s.

Great Western Movies

An In-Depth Guide to Westerns