Westerns

[movieman1957]

Courtesy of Netflix I saw "Gun The Man Down." It stars James Arness as a robber who is left behind by his partners and girl (Angie Dickinson) after he is wounded in a robbery. After jail he sets out for revenge.

Nothing special going on here. In fact 50+ years later it looks and feels like an episode of "Gunsmoke" or "Cheyenne." It doesn't help that Arness wears the same hat and rides the same horse. It also is chock full of actors who made the TV western rounds in the 50s and 60s.

Even with the likes of Andrew McLaglen directing, William Clothier as Cinematographer and Burt Kennedy doing the script it is never quite is tense as it wants to be. There is a long section in the middle where a hired killer is looking for Arness and we gets lots of shots of everyone waiting to see what happens. If we get one shot of a profile of one of the characters there must be a dozen. So lots of waiting and lots of chasing. One section is so dark during its actual night filming that I couldn't make out what was going on.

You won't miss much if you take a pass.

[Richard--W]

Oh, I liked Gun the Man Down well enough.
A reasonably original B western and a solid directorial debut for MacLaglen.

Richard

[Richard--W]

Apparently Orson Welles was allowed to write his own scenes in this movie by director Jack Arnold. Arnold was sort of interesting too since he used to take exploitation movies with prosaic scripts and found a way to give them an appealing cheesiness, as he did in The Creature from the Black Lagoon or he found a way to give a genre picture an unexpected dimension, as he did in the surprisingly haunting The Incredible Shrinking Man. Welles may have done this movie primarily to gain financing help from the producer Albert Zugsmith for Touch of Evil. Some of the comments I've come across about Man in the Shadow and Welles' role opposite Jeff Chandler indicate that it may have been sort of a warm-up for his turn as the flamboyantly corrupt policeman in Touch of Evil.

I've always thought Man In the Shadow is a very interesting film, a contemporary western. It needs to be seen in widescreen.

The lobby card above catches my eye. The perspective is really strange. How did Orson Welles and his killer dog get so unnaturally short, and Jeff Chandler so unnaturally tall, when they're standing in front of each other? They should be pretty close to the same height.

Richard

[movieman1957]

Another pleasant enough "B" film with one of my favorites, Joel McCrea. "The Lone Hand" is a story about a widowed farmer who comes to town to make a life and when one too many things happen takes up crime to make life better. Stick with it.

McCrea is his usual fine self. Barbara Hale plays his love interest. Nothing special but okay. Fine support by Jimmy Hunt as his son who is quite conflicted over his father's behavior.

As usual for these films there is lovely location shooting. A early role for James Arness as a bad guy. Okay film. 79 minutes courtesy of Netfilx instant viewing.

[movieman1957]

A little throw away from Audie Murphy called "Tumbleweed." Not sure where the title comes in except that most of it is set in the desert.

Murphy plays a wagon train leader who tries to negotiate with Indians while the rest of the tribe is killing his fellow travelers. When he is let go by a Indian woman because he once helped her son he arrives back in town being thought a coward for abandoning the group. After being nearly lynched he escapes. Gets some help from a sympathetic rancher. Rides off on one of the ugliest, but smart, horses in the history of film. He then spends the next hour or so being chased by Chill Wills and posse.

Not much going on. Wills is pretty good though.

Courtesy of Netflix.

[MissGoddess]

I saw this on Encore not long ago. The bit with the horse was really cute.

I love Chill Wills. His voice is swoony. I adore his "Uncle Bawly" in Giant.

[movieman1957]

I don't know how I miss these on Encore but manage to find them on Netflix. I'm usually better than that. I always like Murphy. He is a pleasant actor to watch. Sometimes his little fun comments are thing he delivers best.

I do like the way Wills' as sheriff stood up for Murphy at the beginning even though he would just as soon not ever see him again. That was very professional of him.

[movieman1957]

John Payne starred in "Santa Fe Passage." Oddly enough this one started out rather like Murphy's "Tumbleweed." Wagon train scout out making a deal for safe passage has group massacred at the same time. Can't find a job for a while but finally hits good luck on gun dealers going to Mexico.

Plenty of double crossing and revenge at work. Nothing real deep. Usual type fare. For all the raving we did about Payne in "Kansas City Confidential" and "99 River Street" he doesn't have much to work with here. He sure can ride a horse though. Some shots are clear enough he's riding in a hurry. Slim Pickens plays his sidekick and he is fun. Leo Gordon and Anthony Caruso play a couple of guys you don't want to turn your back on.

[MissGoddess]

He can ride a horse, too??? I'm in love.

[klondike]

Leo Gordon and Anthony Caruso play a couple of guys you don't want to turn your back on.

There's an understatement, regardless what movie you're talking about!
Especially Leo Gordon - personally, I wouldn't turn my back on that guy in church!

[movieman1957]

April, there are at least two scenes where Payne is without a shirt if that helps.

Klondike: I'd seen Caruso is a couple of "Gunsmoke" episodes so my thought of him was a little off base compared to here. He brings heightened awareness since my brother-in-law shares the name. Has Gordon ever played anyone nice?

[MissGoddess]

April, there are at least two scenes where Payne is without a shirt if that helps.

Klondike: I'd seen Caruso is a couple of "Gunsmoke" episodes so my thought of him was a little off base compared to here. He brings heightened awareness since my brother-in-law shares the name. Has Gordon ever played anyone nice?

Didn't he play a pal of Cheyenne's once or twice (when he wasn't playing his enemy)? But he was always the bad guy.

I used to know a sleazy mafioso movie producer in Hollywood named Anthony Caruso. I mean I knew him professionally, not personally.

[klondike]

Off the top of my bean, Chris, without back-checking IMDb, I'd say the closest Leo Gordon's characters came to 'decent' was when he played Clint Walker's old pal/current rival in Night of the Grizzly; beyond that, I seem to recall that he may have been second banana to a couple of police detectives.
My favorite reference to LG was a critic's description of his having "a face like a clenched fist" - though personally, I always thought Lee Van Cleef's claim of being 'the man with the rattlesnake eyes' was actually more approprate for Gordon.

[mrsl]

.
Recently we had a minor discussion about Randolph Scott's beautiful horse, with the long white mane and tail that reached the ground, and since then, I've been looking at other horses to find distinctive marks. In this search I found myself comparing the big buckskin horse that Jim Arness rides in Gunsmoke, and the buckskin that Lorne Greene rides in Bonanza. It turns out that they are the same horse, and his name is actually Buck. Arness rode him first until he seemed to become uninterested, and Lorne Greene inherited him. After Bonanza ended, he bought Buck to let him live his remaining years in ease and relaxation on Lornes ranch.

I just thought that was a nice story and wanted to share it. I got most of the info from the 50's site that I go to about once a week. Whenever I do, I choose a different category and get lost just reading and remembering.

.

[movieman1957]

Thanks for the info on the buckskin horse. He must be the most on screen and tired horse in the history of television.