By Fred Blosser

When I was in college, my friend Bill Davis and I spent nearly half a day one Saturday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. at a local movie theatre for a ten-hour marathon.  The lineup included Sergio Leone’s “A Fistful of Dollars,” “For a Few Dollars More,” and “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,” capped with Clint Eastwood’s American Western, “Hang ‘Em High,” an attempt to replicate the Italian filmmaker’s violent, gritty style. It was the equivalent of binge-watching in those long-ago days, before home video and streaming services made it easy to access older films. To revisit favourite movies in that Neolithic age, you had to hope they would return for second- or third runs on the big screen, or wait until they resurfaced on TV in visually degraded, ad-infested prints. The fact that the Leone movies were still pulling in healthy ticket sales on rerun, four years after their initial U.S. release, attests to their popularity. Aside from special events like the periodic return of “Ben-Hur” or “The Ten Commandments,” the only other pictures with the same level of second-run durability at the time were the first five James Bond features with Sean Connery.

The initial success and ongoing appeal of the Leone trilogy prompted Hollywood to import other Spaghetti Westerns in hopes of matching (or at least approaching) the same level of commercial success. The era ran from 1968 to the mid-1970s, surviving even the U.S. box-office disaster of Leone’s fourth Western, “Once Upon a Time in the West.” The operatic epic starring Charles Bronson, Henry Fonda, and Jason Robards was lamely marketed here as a conventional Western, baffling fans of John Wayne and “Gunsmoke.” Adding insult to injury, it suffered wholesale cuts that rendered entire sections of the story incoherent. On smaller investments, more modest imitations in the mode of “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” fared better. One such picture was Giuseppe Colizzi’s Western, I quattro dell'Ave Maria, a tremendous hit in Europe. The Italian title cryptically translates to “The Four of the Hail Mary,” which sounds more like a farce about comedic nuns than a Western. Paramount Pictures (the same studio that, ironically, mishandled “Once Upon a Time in the West”) wisely retitled the production “Ace High” for U.S. release.

In Colizzi’s film, bounty hunters Cat Stevens (Terence Hill) and Hutch Bessy (Bud Spencer) ride into El Paso with $300,000 in stolen money recovered from train robber Bill San Antonio. They intend to turn in the money and claim a hefty reward. The Bill San Antonio back story referred to Colizzi’s previous Western with Hill and Spencer, “God Forgives . . . I Don’t!” (1967; U.S. release, 1969), but you needn’t have seen the predecessor to get up to speed. Cat and Hutch discover that the bank president in El Paso was Bill San Antonio’s partner, not his victim, and instead of settling for the reward, they demand the entire $300,000, else they’ll expose the banker’s secret. In turn, the banker approaches an outlaw, Cacopoulos (Eli Wallach), who sits in jail waiting to be hanged the next morning. He offers to free Caco (as the scruffy felon is called) if he’ll kill Cat and Hutch.

This being a Spaghetti Western, a genre that reveres double-crosses like no other, thanks to the template set by Leone, Caco correctly guesses that the banker plans to do away with him too, as soon as the bounty hunters are out of the way. Grabbing the $300,000, he flees town on his own quest for vengeance. The money will finance his long-delayed pursuit of two former friends, Paco and Drake, who left him to take the fall for a heist years before. Cat and Hutch follow after him to reclaim the $300,000. Caco finds Paco south of the Border, presiding over the summary execution of rebellious peons, and Drake (Kevin McCarthy, in hardly more than a brief guest appearance) as the owner of a lavish gambling house on the Mississippi. Drake is still a crook who swindles his rich patrons with a rigged roulette wheel. Along the way, Caco and the bounty hunters befriend a Black high-wire artist, Thomas (Brock Peters), whose talent is pivotal for the bounty hunters’ scheme to break into the impregnable casino to take control of the wheel and clean Drake out. Italian viewers probably realized that Caco, Cat, Hutch, and Thomas were “the four of the Hail Mary” in Colizzi’s original title, planning their break-in as Caco fingers his rosary. Following Sergio Leone’s lead, the Italian Westerns loved to tweak Catholic piety.

Colizzi also dutifully copies other elements of the Leone playbook, especially those featured in “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.” Alliances are made to be broken, greed and expediency always overrule loyalty, and the sins of thieves and hired killers are dwarfed by the inherent corruption and callousness of society as a whole. But Colizzi’s cynicism seems superficial compared with Leone’s, and his violence toned down. In the Leone movies, showdowns are “hideous fantasies of sudden death,” to quote the late film critic Bosley Crowther, in which the losers literally line up in groups to be gunned down. When my friend Bill and I watched the Leone marathon all those years ago, we counted a hundred casualties even before we were well into the third feature, “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.” In one gunfight in “Ace High,” Hutch, Cat, and Thomas simply shoot the hats off their opponents’ heads, the kind of slapstick more likely to appear in a comedy Western with Bob Hope or Don Knotts. The final shootout with Drake and his henchman is a parody of Leone’s showdowns, which invariably were choreographed to Ennio Morricone’s dramatic music. Caco has dreamed for years that his reckoning with his traitorous partner would be accompanied by “slow, sweet” music, and so Cat and Hutch order Drake’s house orchestra to play a waltz as the “Four of the Hail Mary” square off against Drake and his henchmen. On one hand it’s a clever idea for viewers who recognise the joke, but on the other, it trivialises the revenge motif in a way Leone never would have.

In another connective thread with “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,” Eli Wallach’s scruffy character is virtually a clone of his bandit “Tuco” from the Leone epic, even to a nearly identical name. But Leone shrewdly counter-balanced Wallach’s manic performance with Eastwood’s laconic presence and Lee Van Cleef’s steely menace. In “Ace High,” Colizzi already has two mismatched characters who play off each other—Terence Hill’s terse, handsome Cat and Bud Spencer’s burly, grouchy Hutch. Wallach is mostly left to his own Actors Studio devices of grins, tics, and swagger, which is good for fans who couldn’t get enough Tuco but not so good for others who just want the story to move on. Tied up by villagers who intend to torture him to learn the location of his stolen $300,000, Caco relates a long, soporific account of his childhood. The scene serves a dramatic purpose, since Caco is trying to lull a drowsy guard to sleep, but it goes on and on. You’re likely to nod off before the sentry does.

“Ace High” is available in a fine Blu-ray edition from Kino Lorber Studio Classics, offering Colizzi’s film at the correct 2.35:1 ratio in a rich Technicolor transfer. Films like this always looked good on the big screen, but most casual fans probably remember them instead from lousy, pan-and-scan TV prints in the old days. The Blu-ray includes the original trailer, plus trailers for several other Spaghetti Westerns released by KL. The company’s go-to expert on the genre, Alex Cox, contributes a new audio commentary. Cox has always been forthright in his dour opinion of directors like Giuseppe Colizzi, Gianfranco (Frank Kramer) Parolini, and Giuliano (Anthony Ascott) Carnimeo, who turned the Italian Western in the direction of burlesque in the late 1960s, and away from the gritty style of Sergio Leone, Sergio Corbucci, and Sergio Sollima. But his comments on “Ace High” are even-handed, informative, and entertaining.

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(Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

Director Sergio Leone’s monumental Western classic ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST celebrates its 55^th anniversary this year and to mark the occasion Paramount Home Entertainment will release the fully restored film for the first time on 4K Ultra HD^™ May 14, 2024, as the latest addition to the studio’s Paramount Presents line.

One of the most iconic and influential movies ever made, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST has been restored from the original 35mm Techniscope camera negative by Paramount’s archive team, L'Immagine Ritrovata and The Film Foundation. This restoration honors the 2007 Film Foundation photochemical restoration overseen by legendary director Martin Scorsese by matching its build and color palette.  The result is the definitive home release of the film, which features the 165-minute extended cut restored to its glory. 

A must-own for every cinephile’s collection, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST will be presented in a Limited-Edition two-disc 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray^™ set that includes both new and legacy bonus content, as well as access to a Digital copy of the film.  The film is presented in Dolby Vision^™* and HDR-10, along with English 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio and English Restored Mono Dolby Digital for an exceptional home viewing experience.

Bonus content presented on the Blu-ray Disc^™ is detailed below:

· Commentary by the Hosts of the Spaghetti Western Podcast –NEW!

· A Look Back with Leonard Maltin—NEW!

· Commentary with contributions from directors John Carpenter, John Milius & Alex Cox, film historians Sir Christopher Frayling & Dr. Sheldon Hall, and cast and crew 

· An Opera of Violence                                            

· The Wages of Sin        

· Something To Do With Death

· Railroad: Revolutionising the West

· Locations Then & Now (Gallery) 

· Production Gallery 

· Theatrical Trailer   

Widely considered to be one of the greatest Westerns—and one of the greatest films—ever made, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST was selected for preservation by the Library of Congress in the U.S. National Film Registry in 2009.  The film stars Claudia Cardinale, Henry Fonda, Jason Robards, and Charles Bronson.

Synopsis

Set in the dying days of the Old West, a struggle to control water in a dusty desert town embroils three hard-bitten gunmen in an epic clash of greed, honor, and revenge.   

ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST will also be available on 4K Ultra HD Digital on May 14.

This is a limited edition. Click here to pre-order now from Amazon.

By Adrian Smith

One of the UK’s most beloved film franchises has been somewhat neglected of late. Despite decades of television reruns, since the DVD boxset release over a decade ago there has been no sign of any sort of upgrade of the ‘Carry On ‘films, which, if there were any justice, would have been raised to Criterion levels by now. Remarkably this is still the case in the UK, so thankfully Australian company Via Vision Entertainment have taken a firm grip of the baton and begun releasing the ‘Carry On’ films in series order, four at a time. The first eight films in the series were mostly shot in black and white and based around everyday life, such as military service, the healthcare system, schools, the police, cruise holidays, and the beginnings of second-wave feminism (Carry On Cabby (1963), if you’re wondering). But then Peter Rogers, the producer and brains behind the series, had the fabulous idea to begin making period dramas and spoofs of current hits. Carry On Jack (1964), about pirates, was the first of these, and with that move, in my opinion, the ‘Carry On’ films really hit their creative and comedic peak.

This means that ‘Carry On... Collection 3’ contains arguably the four best films in the entire franchise (although I know some fans would beg to differ): Carry On Spying (1964), Carry On Cleo (1964), Carry On Cowboy (1965) and Carry On Screaming (1966).

Carry On Spying (1964), the last one shot in black-and-white and the first to directly spoof genre conventions, has perhaps been forgotten in favour of the more smutty ‘Carry On’ films that followed later. Starring regulars Bernard Cribbins, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, and introducing newcomer Barbara Windsor as Daphne Honeybutt, a name even Ian Fleming would have been proud of. Far from being the giggling saucepot she would later be known for, Windsor’s character here is brave, intelligent and forthright, more than once saving the mission and her hopeless compatriots. Hot on the heels of From Russia with Love (1963), the film is a hilarious and almost spot-on spoof of the budding James Bond franchise (Cubby Broccoli objected to one character being called Agent 009½ so they were reluctantly renamed 000), coming before the flood of Eurospy films that would take all sorts of liberties with Bond a couple of years later. Shot at Pinewood Studios, already the home of Bond, it is unsurprising that the sets here are very close to Ken Adam’s designs, especially the secret underground headquarters of STENCH, led by the evil Doctor Crow, and were probably built and lit by many of the same technicians. The cast, with Kenneth Wiliams taking a rare lead role, are a joy. Williams, who would often be cast as pompous, arrogant authority types in later films, plays here his idiotic character made famous in Hancock’s Half Hour, complete with his catchphrase “Stop messing about!” The comedy is hilarious, and as a Bond spoof it works very well as a standalone film for those who may be unfamiliar with the charms of the ‘Carry On’ franchise. Naturally, given that it is now sixty years old, some of the humour is a little painful, reflecting some of the post-colonial attitudes of the time. But the odds are that if you are Cinema Retro regular, you can probably handle it.

Carry On Cleo is probably the franchise’s most lavish and high budget production, thanks to the genius decision of Peter Rogers to move in on the abandoned Cleopatra sets left behind at Pinewood when the disastrous Elizabeth Taylor production was shipped off to Cinecittà in Rome to start again. With full access to sets, props and costumes, Carry On Cleo looks a million dollars, and is also a million times more entertaining than Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s Cleopatra. The cast are fabulous, with Kenneth Williams in full arrogant mode as Caesar, Sid James as the lecherous Mark Anthony, Jim Dale as an escaped English slave, but most importantly with Amanda Barrie, who had an important role in Carry On Cabby, as the beautiful and mesmerising Cleopatra. Whether in costumes originally created for Liz Taylor, or bathing naked in ass's milk, she's simply stunning. It has always been my favourite ‘Carry On’ film, packed with sight gags, brilliant nods to the original film (20^th Century Fox were particularly furious at the original Carry On Cleo poster design which mercilessly spoofed theirs) and wonderful sets and matte paintings. This was the heyday of Pinewood Studios, and the skill and expertise on show here sets it apart from the later, cheaper ‘Carry On ‘films shot mainly in muddy fields.

Carry On Cowboy arrived just as the Spaghetti Westerns were getting started in Italy but owes more to the prevalence of American western films and TV shows (Bonanza, Gunsmoke, etc.), and is another clear spoof in the Carry On Spying mode. Genre conventions are milked for all their comic potential, and the cast are uniformly excellent, from Jim Dale’s accidental sheriff, Sid James as the villainous Rumpo Kid, Charles Hawtrey as the whisky-addled Big Chief Heap, Joan Sims as a prostitute with a heart of gold, Kenneth Williams as a cowardly mayor and, in a reference to actual history, Angela Douglas as the first-rate shot Annie Oakley. This is great fun, and not far removed from what Mel Brooks would do less than ten years later, but without the fourth wall breaking.

The last film in the set is possibly the most well known outside of the UK – Carry On Screaming. This time they had Hammer Films firmly in their sights, with references to Frankenstein, Jekyll and Hyde, spooky mansions and the sexiest of sexy vamps, all mixed together with plenty of gags and a plot which borrows heavily from House of Wax (1953), meaning Vincent Price gets a bit of a nod as well. In the lead role as Police Sargeant Bung is Harry H. Corbett, making his only ‘Carry On’ appearance, but he was an extremely popular comedy actor in the UK at the time thanks to his starring role in the sitcom Steptoe and Son. Kenneth Williams plays the undead Dr Watt (his name allowing for some “Who’s on first?”-type comedy confusion), alongside Jim Dale, Angela Douglas, Joan Sims, Charles Hawtrey and the stunning Fenella Fielding, who vamps for all she’s worth in a red dress so tight fitting that she was unable to sit down between takes.

Across the films are appearances from other ‘Carry On’ favourites including Bernard Bresslaw, Kenneth Connor, Peter Butterworth and a pre-Doctor Who Jon Pertwee, who in the early 1960s was probably best known for doing funny voices on radio comedy shows like The Navy Lark.

It’s wonderful to see these films restored and available in HD at last. They look fantastic and remind us of what great craftsmanship there was in British cinema in the 1960s, even at the cheaper end of the production scale. This boxset also comes with a lovely booklet which reproduces in full colour the original pressbooks for the first twelve ‘Carry On’ films. They’re fascinating to look at, although you might need a magnifying glass if you want to read some of them! Bonus features-wise, the sets are a bit light, simply including original trailers for each film and the commentary tracks which were recorded for the original DVD releases more than a decade ago. Whilst it’s great to have these, and they are very entertaining (Fenella Fielding has the kind of voice you could listen to all day), it would be great to see some of the archival documentaries and interviews that have been shown on TV over the years included too, or even commission the official ‘Carry On’ historian Robert Ross, whose new co-authored book Carry On Girls is also excellent, to produce some new documentary material.

However, we physical media collectors are spoiled these days and often expect too much! For the price, this boxset delivers what we really want, which is excellent restorations of much-loved British comedy gems. These really are the best of the series, and if you don’t agree, in the immortal words of Sid James: “Knickers!”

You can order ‘Carry On Collection 3’ direct from Via Vision here:

https://viavision.com.au/shop/carry-on-film-collection-3-limited-edition-blu-ray-booklet/

By Fred Blosser

“Tales of Adventure Collection 2,” a special edition, Blu-ray box set from Australia’s Imprint Films, gathers five movies from the 1940s and ‘50s with “wild and dangerous” jungle settings. To the best of my memory, I don’t recall seeing any of them among the scores of jungle pictures I enjoyed as a kid in the ‘50s and early ‘60s, either on the big screen or on local TV morning movie matinees. Of the five diverse selections in the Imprint box set, three are Republic Pictures productions, the fourth is a Paramount release, and the fifth bears the Columbia Pictures logo. All five feature superior transfers (the three Republic entries are transfers from 4K scans of the original negatives) and captions for the deaf and hard of hearing, and four of them come with excellent audio commentaries. Younger viewers be aware, the films tend to reflect attitudes about race and conservation that were commonplace seventy years ago, but frowned upon today; you won’t see anything remotely like Black Panther’s democratic technocracy of Wakanda here.

The older two Republic releases, both in black-and-white and paired here on one disc, underscore the studio’s reputation as a purveyor of lowbrow entertainment with stingy production values. “Angel on the Amazon” (1948) begins with Christine Ridgeway (Vera Hruba Ralston) trekking through the Amazon jungle with safari hat and rifle, stalking panthers. It promises (or threatens, if you’re a conservationist) to become a film about big-game hunting, where wild animals exist to be turned into trophy heads. But then Christine’s station wagon breaks down, and she radios for help. Pilot Jim Warburton (George Brent) flies in with the needed carburetor part, just in time for the party to escape from “headhunters.” This may be the only jungle movie in history where rescue depends on a delivery from Auto Zone. Jim is enchanted by Christine, but she has something to hide and refuses to warm up to his advances. Later, meeting Jim again in Rio de Janeiro, she becomes frightened when an elderly, apparently harmless man watches her from a distance. As film historian Philippa Berry notes on the informative audio commentary for the Blu-ray, the answer to the mystery revolves around the then-popular theme of physical effects from psychological trauma, here given a mystical and somewhat absurd twist. The studio-bound sets and back projection that waft the characters from the Amazon to Rio and then to Pasadena, California, are charmingly phoney. George Brent and two other fading co-stars from the 1930s, the aristocratic Brian Aherne and Constance Bennett, stoutly maintain straight faces in the backlot rain forest.

“Daughter of the Jungle” (1949) is even more formulaic, as a young blonde woman raised in the jungle comes to the aid of pilot Paul Cooper (James Cardwell), a policeman, and two gangsters in the lawman’s custody when their plane crashes somewhere in Africa. Called Ticoora by the local tribe, she is actually Irene Walker, who was stranded with her millionaire father in their own plane crash twelve years before. As film historian Gary Gerani notes in his audio commentary track, Ticoora is one of a long line of virginal jungle sirens in movies that range from the ridiculously sublime, like 1959’s “Green Mansions,” to the sublimely ridiculous, like 1983’s “Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.” She can summon elephants with a Tarzan-like yodel that recalls Carol Burnett’s parodies on her old TV show. As Ticoora leads the party to safety, the oily head gangster, Kraik, schemes a way to claim her inheritance, which awaits in New York. Some viewers will see Kraik, played by the great Sheldon Leonard with a constant volley of “dese, dose, and dem” insults, as the only reason to stay with the movie’s plod through lions, gorillas, crocodiles, and indigenous Africans played by white actors in greasepaint. Others (I plead guilty) tend to view unassuming, ramshackle pictures like this one more leniently, providing we can accept if not endorse their racial attitudes as a product of their times. Consistent with Republic’s nickel-and-diming on its B-feature releases, especially those made in the late ‘40s, the more spectacular long shots of Ticoora swinging from vines in her above-the-knee jungle skirt were recycled from one of the studio’s earlier releases. In those scenes, it’s actually Francis Gifford’s stunt doubles in the same outfit from the 1941 serial “Jungle Girl,” not Lois Hall who plays Ticoora in the new footage. Gary Gerani’s audio commentary provides lots of information about the cast, including the two obscure leads, Lois Hall and James Cardwell. Gerani points out that the Blu-ray print, from the original negative, presents the movie’s full 80-minute version for the first time ever. The 69-minute theatrical release in 1949 omitted some B-roll filler and some scenes where Paul woos Irene. More action, less kissy, was crucial for encouraging positive playground word-of-mouth from sixth graders in the audience—the pint-sized forerunners of today’s Tik-Tok influencers.

The third movie retrieved from Republic’s vaults, “Fair Wind to Java” (1953), was one of the studio’s intermittent efforts to offer more expensive productions in living Trucolor, with a rousing Victor Young musical score, to compete with major postwar costume epics from the MGM and Paramount powerhouses. Ironically, Paramount now owns the rights to Republic’s home video library. In 1883 Indonesia, New England sea captain Boll (Fred MacMurray) picks up the trail of lost diamonds also sought by a pirate chief, Pulo Besar (Robert Douglas). Obstacles include the pirates, some scurvy knaves in Boll’s own crew, Dutch colonial authorities, and the fact that the only person who can direct Boll to the treasure is dancing girl Kim Kim (Vera Hruba Ralston), who has only an imperfect memory of the route from her childhood. Substitute Indiana Jones for Captain Boll, and you’d hardly notice the switch. It turns out that the gems are hidden in a temple on Fire Island—unfortunately for the captain, not the friendly enclave of Fire Island, N.Y., but the volcanic peak of Krakatoa. Will Krakatoa blow up just as the rival treasure hunters make landfall there? Are you kidding? The script doesn’t disappoint, and neither do the FX by Republic’s in-house technical team, Howard and Theodore Lydecker. A former ice skating star who escaped Czechoslovakia ahead of the Nazis, Ralston was the wife of Republic studio head Herbert J. Yates and widely derided as a beneficiary of nepotism who couldn’t act her way out of an audition. She was still a punch line for comics in the 1960s, long after most people had forgotten the point of the joke. In reality, both here and in “Angel on the Amazon,” she is an appealing performer, no more deserving of ridicule than other actresses of her time with careers mainly in escapist pictures. The sultry but vulnerable Kim Kim was the kind of role that Hedy Lamarr might have played under other circumstances. Ralston’s performance is at least as engaging, and she looks mighty nice in brunette makeup and sarong.

If you first met Fred MacMurray as the star of “My Three Sons,” as I did as a kid, it may take some adjustment to see him in action-hero mode. It’’s no big deal when Dwayne Johnson or Jason Statham slings a bandolier over his shoulder or has his shirt torn off in a brawl with a pugnacious sailor . . . but Fred MacMurray? When Boll ponders whether or not to trust his shifty first mate Flint (John Russell), it’s a little like MacMurray’s suburban dad asking Uncle Charlie if he should trust Robbie and Chip with the family car. John Wayne was originally envisioned for the role, following his starring credit in a similar Republic production, “Wake of the Red Witch,” but MacMurray wasn’t completely out of his element, having played lawmen and gunslingers in several Westerns before his sitcom days. Frankly, it’s fun to see the normally buttoned-down actor shooting it out with the pirates and racing a tsunami. Imprint includes another excellent commentary, this one by historian Samm Deighan. As she notes, colourfully mounted and briskly scripted movies like this were designed to attract the whole family in those days before Hollywood marketing fractured along lines of audience gender, age, and race. As she observes, Junior might not recognise the sado-sexual elements of the scene where Pulo Besar’s burly torturer (played by Buddy Baer!) strips Kim Kim and plies his whip across her bare back. All in a day’s work in the dungeon. But dad likely would have sat up and paid close attention.

Only a year later (1954), Paramount’s “Elephant Walk” furthered Hollywood’s trend of filming exteriors for its more prestigious movies in actual overseas locations rather than relying on studio mockups, as “Fair Wind to Java” did. Ruth Wiley (Elizabeth Taylor at her most luminous) travels to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) with her new husband John (Peter Finch), the charming and prosperous owner of a tea plantation. Initially, Ruth is enraptured by the lush countryside and John’s bungalow, Elephant Walk, actually a mansion almost as large as Grand Central Station and a lot more lavish. But trouble portends as Ruth realizes that the memory of John’s imperious father Tom, reverently called “the Governor” by John and the other British residents, still pervades and controls the household. The elderly head steward, Appuhamy (Abraham Sofaer), is quietly hostile when Ruth questions the need to continue running the house exactly as it was run in the Governor’s day. In trying to communicate with the other indigenous servants and workers, she runs into the barriers of language and culture. The estate itself, complete with Old Tom’s mausoleum in the backyard, is built across an ancestral path the native elephants still try to use as a short cut to their watering holes. Hence its name. Wiley keeps the peripatetic pachyderms out with a wall. His plantation manager (Dana Andrews) is more sympathetic to Ruth, and the two fall in love as the increasingly surly John lapses back into old habits of drinking all night with rowdy fellow expatriates who camp out in the sprawling mansion. Andrews’ character is named “Dick Carver,” the kind of name you’re not likely to see on credits anymore outside Pornhub. I wonder if some moviegoers in 1954 found it funny too?

If the combination of shaky marriage, illicit affair, and luxurious colonial life on a jungle plantation sounds familiar, you may be thinking of “Out of Africa” (1985) or the less romanticised “White Mischief” (1987), the latest examples of this particular jungle sub-genre of domestic drama in the tropics. As Gary Gerani points out in his audio commentary, enthusiasts of melodrama will also cry “Rebecca!” in the subplot about the shadow that “the Governor’s” pernicious, posthumous influence casts over the married couple. The movie’s lush Technicolor palate, William Dieterle’s sleek direction, the special FX of an elephant stampede, Edith Head’s ensembles for Liz, and Franz Waxman’s symphonic score have an old-fashioned Hollywood polish, shown to good effect on the Blu-ray. But as Gerani notes, the script by John Lee Mahin, based on a 1948 novel, offers an implicit political commentary too. As viewers of “The Crown” know, British rule was already crumbling in the Third World in the early 1950s and would soon fall, just like Wylie’s wall faces a renewed assault by drought-stricken elephants in the final half hour of the movie. Thanks to the capable cast, glossy production values, and a script that takes interesting, unexpected turns, I liked “Elephant Walk” more than I thought I would.

Terence Young’s “Safari” (1956) from Columbia Pictures begins with a jaunty title song to a percussive beat that wouldn’t be out of place in “The Lion King”—“We’re on safari, beat that drum, / We’re on safari to kingdom come”—leading you to think that the picture will be a romp like “Call Me Bwana” (1963), “Clarence the Cross-Eyed Lion” (1965), or the last gasp of jungle comedies so far, “George of the Jungle” (1997). But the story takes a grim turn almost immediately. An American guide and hunter in Kenya, Ken Duffield (Victor Mature), is called back from a safari to find his 10-year-old son murdered and his home burned by Mau Mau terrorists. He determines to find and kill the murderer, Jeroge (Earl Cameron), a formerly trusted servant who, unknown to Duffield, had “taken the Mau Mau oath.” The British authorities revoke Duffield’s license to keep him from interfering with their attempts to apprehend Jeroge and the other culprits, but then they hand it back under pressure from Sir Vincent Brampton (Roland Culver), who comes to Africa to kill a notorious lion called “Hatari.” “You know what ‘Hatari’ means, don’t you?” Duffield asks. “It means danger”—the very tagline used for Howard Hawks’ movie of the same name a few years later. Coincidence? Brampton is a wealthy, borderline sociopathic bully who makes life miserable for his finance Linda (Janet Leigh) and assistant Brian (John Justin), and Duffield doesn’t much care for him either. But the millionaire insists on hiring Duffield as the best in the business, and the hunter uses the safari as a pretext for pursuing Jeroge into the bush. The script juxtaposes Duffield’s chase after Jeroge with Brampton’s determination to bag Hatari, but the millionaire is such an unpleasant character (well played by Culver) that most of us will hope the lion wins.

This was one of the last “big bwana” movies where no one thinks twice about killing wild animals for sport, and viewers sensitive about the subject may not share Sir Vincent’s enthusiasm for Ken Duffield’s talents, or the production’s matter-of-fact scenes of animals collapsing from gunshots. The political material about the Mau Maus is a little dicey too; the Mau Mau insurrection of 1952-60 was more complicated than the script suggests. Poster art for the movie, reproduced on the Blu-ray sleeve, depicts a fearsomely painted African. Actually, it isn’t a Mau Mau but a friendly Massai tribesman; Linda makes the same mistake in the movie before learning that the Massai have agreed to help Duffield track Jeroge. Squirm-worthy dialogue occurs as well, when Duffield and Brampton alike refer to the hunter’s African bearers and camp personnel as “boys.” But Terence Young’s brisk, muscular direction on outdoor locations in Kenya is exemplary, and the CinemaScope vistas of Kenya in Technicolor are sumptuous. This was one of Young’s four projects behind the camera for Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli’s Warwick Films, preceding Broccoli’s later partnership with Harry Saltzman when the producers engaged Young to direct the inaugural James Bond entries. For 007 fans, it may be heresy to suggest that his work on “Safari” equals that on his best Bond picture, “From Russia With Love,” but so be it. The Imprint Blu-ray doesn’t contain an audio commentary or other special features, but the hi-def transfer at the 2.55:1 widescreen aspect ratio is perfect.

“Tales of Adventure Collection 2” contains the four region-free Blu-ray Discs in a sturdy hardbox, illustrated with a collage from the poster art for the five movies in the set. Limited to a special edition of 1,500 copies, it can be ordered HERE. (Note: prices are in Australian dollars. Use currency converter for non-Australian orders.)

By Lee Pfeiffer

No one has ever clamored for a remake of director Howard Hawks' "Red River". The 1948 film is routinely considered to be one of the great American westerns, although Hawks was never completely satisfied with the end result. Between changes he made to the film and some changes imposed by the studio, the result was that film scholars are still debating which version should be considered as the final cut.  However, the film's impact is indisputable. It afforded John Wayne the best role of his career up to that time and elevated up-and-coming Montgomery Clift to major stardom. I must admit that I was surprised to learn of a 1988 television remake of the film when I saw it is now streaming on ScreenPix, an optional subscription channel, which is available for a nominal monthly fee to Amazon Prime subscribers. It would take a big man to step into Duke Wayne's shoes but James Arness filled the bill. In fact, Wayne was a mentor to Arness and made several films with him before he convinced the young actor to accept CBS's offer to star as Marshall Matt Dillon in the TV series "Gunsmoke", an adaptation of the popular radio program. Arness plays Thomas Dunson, who was on a wagon train to Texas along his fiancee. Dunson and his sidekick Groot (Ray Walston in a role originally played by Walter Brennan), leave the wagon train to scout for appropriate land to settle on. While they are away, the wagon train is attacked by Indians. The begins with Dunson and Groot discovering that all of the pioneers have been killed except for a young boy, Matt Garth (Mickey Kuhn), who Dunson unofficially adopts as a son. The gesture proves to be mutually beneficial, as it helps both grief-stricken people cope with their losses. Ultimately, the headstrong Dunson finds the perfect land to claim for his own and it stretches as far as the eye can see. The film then jumps ahead a number of years. Dunson's spread, known as the Red River D, has been a major success and he is getting ready to move his enormous herd to Sedalia, Missouri to sell the steers for a considerable profit. He is heartened by the return of Matt (now played by Bruce Boxleitner), who has been away fighting with Southern forces in the Civil War. With Matt and Groot as his trusted right-hand men, Dunson assembles a major company of experienced drovers for the perilous journey that lies ahead. 

As with Hawks' version of "Red River", the TV production chronicles the increased hardships the cattlemen endure and the slow breakdown in morale as food supplies become skimpy and the dangers increase from inclement weather and the threat of hostile Indians. Dunson rules the company with an iron fist and tells the men that he is financially broke, as he's put all of his money into the cattle drive. He reminds them that the only way they will get paid is if they get the herd to Sedalia, where it can be sold. Some cowhands encounter the drovers and say there is a rumor that the rail line has now reach Abilene, Kansas. If true, it will make for a lucrative market to sell the cattle in order to feed the booming population. It's also a shorter and safer journey for the drovers to make. However, Dunson will have not risk changing direction on the basis of an unfounded rumor. Ultimately, some men choose to leave the drive. However, when a couple of drovers also steal some precious food before absconding, Dunson has them hunted down and captured. Enraged, he tells them he will lynch them. When Matt can't convince him that he is going to far, a major rift occurs and Matt informs Dunson that he is taking control of the herd and gambling on taking the cattle to Abilene. Dunson refuses to go along and promises to hunt Matt down and personally kill him, despite the fact that Matt intends to turn any proceeds over to his adoptive father. 

The story continues to follow events in the film, albeit in truncated fashion since the film runs 96 minutes compared to the 133 minutes of the original version. Matt and flashy gunslinger Cherry Valance (Gregory Harrison) encounter a wagon train besieged by Indians. They ultimately rescue the survivors which include Kate Millay (Laura Johnson), a Civil War widow with a young son. Both Matt and Cherry are smitten by her, which introduces an element of sexual tension as both men become antagonistic towards each other in increasingly dangerous ways. Ultimately, Matt gets the herd to Abilene and finds that the rumors were true. The town is booming and anxious to buy the herd for top dollar. Matt's joy is short-lived, however, as Dunson arrives with his personal posse of hired gunmen- and he's intent on keeping his vow to kill Matt.

There is nothing in the TV version of "Red River" that improves on Hawks's original in any meaningful way. However, it does offer some fine performances. It's interesting to see Arness, who gives a commanding performance, finally play a character whose judgment is flawed and whose actions border on the reckless. He has good chemistry with Bruce Boxleitner, possibly because the two were old friends who had co-starred in Arness's post-"Gunsmoke" TV series "How the West Was Won". Gregory Harrison has a meatier role as Cherry Valance than John Ireland did in the original version, possibly because Harrison was an executive producer on this production. He provides ample doses of both charm and reckless behavior. There are plenty of familiar Western stars who make brief appearances including Ty Hardin, Robert Horton, L.Q. Jones and Guy Madison, in his final screen appearance. The script has been updated with some new characters added, most notably Stan Shaw, very good as Jack Byrd, an ex-slave who must endure bigotry before winning the respect of the drovers with his skills. The film is crisply directed by Richard Michaels, who keeps the balance between action and personal dramas well-balanced.

I viewed the film with the expectation that it would be simply a pale imitation of the 1948 classic. However, while the original reigns supreme, I'm happy to say that if the TV version is viewed as a stand-alone production, it's actually surprisingly good.

I can find no record of this film having been released on home video aside from an early VHS version, so the Screenpix option is the best way to view it.

By Fred Blosser

Life goes from bad to worse for Confederate soldier John Warner (George Hilton) in the opening half hour of “A Bullet for Sandoval,” a 1970 Spaghetti Western now available on Blu-ray in a Special Edition from VCI Entertainment. On the eve of battle in Texas, Warner learns that his sweetheart Rosa has just given birth to their son in plague-ridden Los Cedros, and now is dying from cholera. Denied authorisation to leave camp, Warner rides off anyway, incurring a death sentence for desertion. Arriving in Los Cedros with hopes of marrying Rosa before she dies, he finds no sympathy there either. Rosa has passed away, and her father Don Pedro Sandoval (Ernest Borgnine), a powerful grandee who loathes “gringos” in general and Warner in particular, is infuriated that the soldier has returned. He disowns the baby and drives Warner and the newborn out of his palatial hacienda.

Fleeing Los Cedros with his son, Warner is rebuffed at one way-station and then a second when he begs for milk for the infant. The people at both places are fearful of being infected when they learn that he has just come from Los Cedros. The weakened, feverish baby dies, and Warner becomes a vengeful outlaw, assembling a gang of henchmen to raid the settlements that drove him away when he needed their aid to keep his child alive. Three of the men—Sam, Lucky, and Priest—are trustworthy. The other three—Morton, One-Eye (“a sex maniac convicted of raping two little girls”), and Guadalupano—not so much. Warner comes to enjoy the riches and women that accrue from his new career as a bandit, but his ultimate target remains Sandoval. In the meantime, Don Pedro and his fellow cattle barons on the Border convince the Confederate army to help them pursue and eradicate Warner and his band.

Like most Spaghetti Westerns, “A Bullet for Sandoval” was an international production with Italian studio backing, a cast of actors from several countries, outdoor locations in the Spanish desert, and in this case, a Spanish director (Julio Buchs), and Spanish writers. In the starring role, George Hilton (born Jorge Hill Acosta y Lara) was an accomplished, darkly handsome Uruguayan actor who had a thriving career in Italian genre movies but was largely unknown to U.S. moviegoers. For marquee value in the States, the producers paired him with Ernest Borgnine as the imperious Don Pedro. Who didn’t know Ernest Borgnine from “The Wild Bunch,” “Ice Station Zebra,” a hundred other movies, and “McHale’s Navy”?

With Borgnine’s name prominently displayed on ads, “A Bullet for Sandoval” was one of several Spaghetti Westerns that opened in the U.S. in 1970, after the surprise success of “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.” Derided by most critics as violent trash, they were usually relegated to drive-ins and second-run movie houses. There, they filled a void on double-bills left by the death of traditional, American-made B-Westerns like those made a decade before with aging stars like Dana Andrews, Glenn Ford, and Robert Taylor. Sometimes, ironically, they were paired with the homegrown Spaghetti imitations that Hollywood studios had begun to produce, like “Two Mules for Sister Sara,” “Barquero,” “Macho Callahan,” and “El Condor.”

The critics may have dismissed the genre, but their opinions were immaterial for the U.S. target audience of young guys in their teens and early twenties, who welcomed pictures like “A Bullet for Sandoval” on all-night movie marathons at local drive-ins. At one o’clock in the morning, in a pleasant stupor of fatigue and beer, few would question the accuracy or plausibility of a Civil War in which Confederate officers pause their military campaign to help ranchers chase outlaws. As far as fans were concerned, such fine points could be argued by history professors, as long as they could rely on filmmakers like Buchs to deliver a gritty succession of gunfights, chases, and gorgeous European starlets—in the case of “A Bullet for Sandoval,” Annabella Incontrera, Mary Paz Pondal, and Paquita Torres—in low-cut peasant blouses.

VCI Entertainment’s new Special Edition of “A Bullet for Sandoval” presents the film in a remastered, 4K version from the original negative, adding the English-dubbed voice track and diligently restoring ten minutes of footage edited out of the U.S. print in 1970 and consequently, out of previous American home video releases. As director and enthusiast Alex Cox suggests in his informative audio commentary for the disc, the movie is better than its synopsis implies. The script and direction give the story an epic scope despite a limited budget, culminating in a briskly staged showdown in a bullfighting arena, and Hilton and Borgnine offer heartfelt performances as the two antagonists. Relatively rare for a Spaghetti Western, both Warner and Don Pedro are emotionally damaged characters instead of the cool-cat bounty hunter and deranged bandido who usually anchor such films.

Cox notes that the grim scenes of Warner and his friends Lucky and Priest trying to keep Warner’s baby alive in the desert owe an obvious debt to “Three Godfathers,” John Ford’s 1948 parable of the Nativity story with horses and six-shooters. Ford was ever the optimist, and the infant in “Three Godfathers” survives, delivered safely to a Western town called Jerusalem by outlaw Bob Hightower, played by the indomitable John Wayne. Warner’s newborn isn’t as fortunate in a world bereft of Christian charity, reflecting the grim philosophy of the Spaghetti genre where the innocent are as likely to suffer as the corrupt and the guilty, and often, more likely.

In addition to Alex Cox’s commentary track, the VCI Special Edition includes the title sequence from the original Spanish version, titled “Los Desperados,” and the U.S. theatrical trailer. It is an admirably respectful package for a movie that few would have regarded as anything other than disposable entertainment five decades ago.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

"Young Billy Young" is the kind of film of which it can be said, "They don't make 'em like that anymore". Not because the movie is so exceptional. In fact, it isn't exceptional on any level whatsoever. Rather, it's the sheer ordinariness of the entire production that makes one pine away for an era in which top talent could be attracted to enjoyable, if unremarkable, fare such as this. Such films, especially Westerns, were churned out with workmanlike professionalism to play to undemanding audiences that didn't require mega-budget blockbusters to feel they got their money's worth at the boxoffice. Sadly, such movies have largely gone the way of the dodo bird. In today's film industry, bigger must always be better and mid-range flicks such as are no longer made. However, through  streaming services such as ScreenPix, it's possible to still enjoy the simple pleasures that such movies provide. (The Kino Lorber Blu-ray is now out of print.) 

The story opens with botched robbery in Mexico committed by Billy Young (Robert Walker) and some cohorts including Jesse (David Carradine). The plan to steal horses from the Mexican military goes awry and Billy is forced to split from his fellow robbers with the army in hot pursuit. Making his way back across the border to New Mexico, he is penniless and desperate. He has a chance encounter with Ben Kane (Robert Mitchum), a tough, sarcastic older man who he encounters again in a nearby town. Here, Billy is being cheated at cards by the local sheriff, who goads him into a gunfight. Billy ends up killing him but stands to be framed for the sheriff's death. He's saved by Ben, who rides along with him to another town where Ben has agreed to take on the job of lawman. Ostensibly he is there to keep order and collect back taxes from deadbeats but in reality, he is on a mission of revenge. Some years before, Ben's son had been gunned down by a criminal named Boone (John Anderson) and Kane has learned that Boone is a presence in the new town and that he is being protected by a local corrupt businessman, John Behan (Jack Kelly). Ben makes his presence known immediately by enforcing the law in a strict manner. He's confronted by Behan, who tries to intimidate him. This results in Behan being slapped around by Kane. Behan also grows to resent the new lawman because he is flirting with his mistress, saloon entertainer Lily Beloit (Angie Dickinson). When Behan abuses her as punishment, he gets another beating from Kane. Meanwhile, Billy runs into Jesse and accuses him of having deserted him in Mexico. The two men fight it out and Jesse is later involved with the accidental shooting of the town's beloved doctor while in the employ of Behan. Kane learns that Jesse is Boone's son and holds him in jail as bait for Boone to come out of hiding. The plan works all too well. Boone turns up with a small army and lays siege to the jailhouse where Kane and Billy are holed up.

"Young Billy Young" was compared to a TV show by New York Times critic Howard Thompson on the basis that it contains so many standard elements of westerns from this time period. There is the bad girl with the heart of gold, the evil business tycoon, the brash young gun and his wiser, older mentor, the heroes outnumbered by superior forces and a lovable old coot (played against type by Paul Fix in full Walter Brennan/Gabby Hayes mode.) Yet somehow it all works very well, thanks mostly to Robert Mitchum's stalwart presence. With his trademark ramrod stiff walk and cool persona, Mitchum tosses off bon mots like a frontier version of 007. Even the Times acknowledged that "Mitchum can do laconic wonders with a good wise-crack". He has considerable chemistry with Dickinson, though the action between the sheets is more implied than shown. Robert Walker Jr. acquits himself well in the title role and David Carradine makes an impression even with limited screen time. The film was directed by Burt Kennedy, an old hand at directing fine westerns in reliable, if not remarkable, style and it all culminates in a rip-snorting shoot-out that is genuinely exciting. The fine supporting cast includes Willis Bouchey, Parley Baer and Deanna Martin (Dino's daughter) in her acting debut.  One oddball element to the film: Mitchum croons the title song over the opening credits. If this sounds strange, keep in mind that Mitchum improbably once had a hit album of calypso music. 

The film is currently streaming on ScreenPix, which is available to Amazon Prime customers for $2.99 a month.

By Nicholas Anez

The incentive for this 4^th volume in my Celluloid Adventures series was a dismissive review in a reference book of the 1956 film version of George Orwell’s novel, 1984, calling it “a great disappointment and a lackluster adaptation of the briliant novel.” This derogatory opinion remains the general consensus among many critics. I disagree with this assessment, in part

because the movie remained in my memory long after I first saw it. Furthermore, I had read the novel so I knew that, though the adaptation was definitely a loose one, it was actually faithful to Orwell’s ideas. So I wanted to redress this negative opinion of the movie and proceeded to write about it. This led to my considering other movies in the science fiction and horror genres that, I believe, are also underrated. Thus was born the concept for Celluloid Adventures 4: Science Fiction Thrills….Horror Chills.

I should state at this point that I became a fan of science fiction and horror movies in my adolescence. I also loved Westerns (Shane is my all-time favorite movie) and it has always upset me when a good movie, particularly in my favorite genres, fails at the box-office. Thus, my objective in the first three volumes was to bring overdue attention to some of these movies. In these books, I discuss films within several genres while I devote individual chapters to science fiction and/or horror movies. For this fourth book, I decided to focus only on science fiction and horror because the ascendancy of these genres that began with Star Wars (1977) and The Exorcist (1973) relegated to relative obscurity many fine movies that preceded this dominance along with a few that followed. And it is some of these films that I wanted to retrieve from anonymity for this book. (Not coincidentally, my devotion to the genres more or less ended in the late 70s, coinciding with this ascendancy, but that’s another story.)

It was very rewarding for me to research the movies in Celluloid Adventures 4 because I discovered numerous interesting details about their development and production that I hope will make this book equally interesting. For instance, here are just a few of the many intriguing facts that I learned:

The director of one movie fired his own brother who had written the screenplay.

One movie is based upon a legend of the birth of a deformed monster.

One movie was made by a married couple that later engaged in an acrimonious divorce.

One movie failed upon its original release but played to enthusiastic audiences in New York

and Los Angeles 65 years later.

The screenplay for one movie is based upon actual inhumane experiments conducted in

prestigious universities.

The producer of one movie was forced to cast the actor who starred in it.

The director of one movie considers it among his worst.

One serious movie suffered because its studio promoted it as an exploitation movie.

The 14 movies that I highlight cover a period of three and one-half decades, from 1943 to 1978, and I would speculate that the average moviegoer today has not heard of most of them. With one exception, they were financial failures or disappointments, a fact that contributes to their obscurity. However, I believe that they still deserve the recognition and praise that they did not receive upon their original release. In my estimation, these are all excellent films but yet most of them did not attract wide audiences.

These movies include a wide variety of subjects. In Son of Dracula (1943), the main character is a woman who is not only eager to die but is also willing to kill the man that loves her. In Alias Nick Beal (1949), Lucifer is determined to condemn an innocent man him to eternal suffering. Both The Power (1968) and The Medusa Touch (1978) portray men with superior brains that have the capability to either save or destroy the entire world. One of them will choose destruction because he hates humanity with a passion.

Very few people have heard of the movie, Who? (1974), and those who have heard of it were probably confused by the title. And yet it is a poignant story of an altruistic man who is victimized by futuristic technology. The protagonist of The Groundstar Conspiracy (1972) also endures tremendous suffering from another type of futuristic technology. The future of the aforementioned 1984 (1956) is extremely frightening because it depicts a world in which a sweet-looking child will betray her own father to be tortured and perhaps killed.

I am hoping that this book will encourage people, including some of you who are reading this, to view these movies. They are all entertaining and, in some respects, provocative. For instance, after seeing The Maze (1953), you might actually sympathize with a monstrous amphibian. If you believe that a brain is lifeless once it is removed from its body, Donovan’s Brain (1953) may change your mind. You might also discover how fragile our brains are after viewing The Mind Benders (1963), a story about the cruelty of pitiless scientists. If you view Crack in the World (1965), you will witness how the earth is almost destroyed by a scientist with abundant hubris. Upon viewing Journey to the far Side of the Sun (1969), you will witness a benevolent scientist lose his sanity because of his extraordinary discovery.

There are moments of pure excitement and suspense as well as pure terror in these movies. Viewers of Capricorn One (1977) will inevitably break out in ecstatic applause at the sight of a rickety biplane suddenly appearing on an isolated desert road. This is the only movie among the 14 in this book that was a success – with the public if not the critics. In contrast, The Mummy’s Shroud (1967) played the bottom-of-the-bill of double features and was unnoticed upon its release. But I believe it deserves some kind of awareness.

So I hope that I have piqued your curiosity enough to encourage you to read about the making of these movies. But even if you choose not to buy the book, for your own safety, I implore you to please heed this warning: Beware the beat of the cloth-wrapped feet!

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By Fred Blosser

Released on June 29, 1966, “Nevada Smith” was well-received by audiences who still flocked to A-list Westerns in those days, earning $14 million in ticket sales—about $132 million in today’s value. Produced by Joseph E. Levine and directed by Henry Hathaway, it starred Steve McQueen in the title role, as a young half-Indian man, birth name Max Sand, who determines to track down the three outlaws who murdered his parents. The movie was a spinoff from a previous Levine release, “The Carpetbaggers,” a sensational hit in 1964 based on a Harold Robbins novel. There, in his final role, Alan Ladd played the older Nevada Smith, a reformed gunfighter turned B-movie cowboy actor in the 1930s. Thus the 1966 release was a prequel, as we’d now call it, based on a lengthy section from Robbins’ novel. The reviews for the 1966 production were mostly positive, except for two opinions that observers continue to raise in on-line and print discussions about the film. At 35, they argue, McQueen was too old and seasoned to play a kid supposedly in his late teens. And with blond hair and blue eyes, nobody would mistake him for anyone with Native American genetics. Does either point of view stand up to examination? We McQueen fans would say, not really. Movies are all about illusion anyway, in case anyone forgets all those John Hughes films of the ‘80s starring actors in their twenties as high school kids. At this late date with McQueen’s iconic status firmly established, it’s impossible to imagine anyone else playing the part. (Although someone else tried, not counting Alan Ladd as the older, more sedate Nevada in “The Carpetbaggers.” Cliff Potts essayed the role in a 1975 TV production also titled “Nevada Smith,” designed as a direct sequel to Hathaway’s picture. Filmed as a hopeful pilot for a TV series, it’s pretty much forgotten now. Cliff Potts was a good actor, usually cast as charming but devious characters, but he was no Steve McQueen.)

In Hathaway’s movie, three drifters, Fitch, Bowdre, and Coe, ride up to young Max Sand and claim to be friends of his father’s. The actors in the roles were Karl Malden, Arthur Kennedy, and Martin Landau. Try to find a trio of that caliber in any 2023 release. Helpfully, Max tells the strangers to find the homestead, immediately getting a bad feeling when they speed off, yelling and firing their pistols. The three drifters know the elder Sand all right, but they’ve really come to demand the gold they believe he’s found in a nearby mine. When he says the mine is worthless, and all it ever yielded was a $38 nugget, the intruders don’t believe him and work themselves into a rage. Coe draws a knife, cold-bloodedly cuts Sand’s Kiowa wife, and threatens to skin her alive if the miner doesn’t tell them where he’s supposedly hidden his riches. By the time Max reaches the cabin, he finds his parents’ mangled corpses, and the killers are long gone.

Max sets out to avenge the murders, but inexperienced and naive, he isn’t cut out for the job—at first. “If you want to find those men, you’ll have to look in every saloon, hog farm, and whorehouse you come to,” warns a chance acquaintance, Jonas Cord (Brian Keith), a friendly traveling gunsmith. “You’ll have to become what they are, and wallow in the same garbage they do.” Realizing he can’t persuade Max to call it quits, Jonas teaches him the essential skills he’ll need to survive: draw fast and shoot straight, learn to play poker, do everything you can not to give yourself away, and don’t trust anybody, “not even your friends.” Working his way up through Coe and Bowdre, he finally locates Fitch. Calling himself “Nevada Smith,” he joins the outlaw’s new gang in a plan to rob a gold shipment, bringing the story, neatly, full circle. Fitch knows Max Sand is after him, but he doesn’t remember what Max looks like; regardless, he grows suspicious and paranoid about Nevada Smith as the day of the robbery approaches.

Filmed at locations in California and Louisiana (where Max robs a bank to get himself sentenced to a prison farm, next to Bowdre), “Nevada Smith” impressed audiences in 1966 with McQueen’s athletic performance against scenic outdoor backdrops, beautifully composed by Hathaway and his cinematographer, Lucian Ballard. This may not seem to be a remarkable achievement until you revisit the old TV Westerns of the ‘60s, which still run every day on streaming platforms like GritTV and Cinevault Westerns, and remember their tired stock-in-trade of aging stars, repetitive storylines, meager action, and generic backlot sets standing in for Dodge City, the Ponderosa, and the Big Valley. A new Blu-ray edition of “Nevada Smith” from Kino Lorber, in a 4K scan of the original camera negative, reproduces the vistas in stunning detail and richness, a long overdue boost for viewers who may have seen the movie only in edited, pan-and-scan TV prints. C. Courtney Joyner, Mark Jordan Legan, and Henry Parke offer a fine ensemble audio commentary, pointing out—among other elements—the legion of fine character actors in the supporting cast. Normally, I pride myself on that sort of Hollywood trivia, but Joyner, Legan, and Parke put me in my place. They pointed out some faces I would have missed otherwise.

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(Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

RETRO-ACTIVE: FROM THE CINEMA RETRO ARCHIVES

By Lee Pfeiffer

Although I have a weak spot for Italian westerns of the 1960s and 1970s, most can be appropriately evaluated by paraphrasing Longfellow: "When they were good, they were very, very good, and when they were bad, they were horrid." "Blindman" is a curiosity from 1971 that I previously panned after viewing an allegedly "remastered" DVD edition that looked barely better than a VHS transfer.  The film fits rather comfortably into the latter part of Longfellow's famous nursery rhyme. Although the movie has a devoted fan base, when I first reviewed it I call it "a pretty horrid experience and inexcusably amateurish in execution, given the well-seasoned people involved". The good news is that Abkco Films has released a truly remastered DVD version that considerably improves one's perception of the film. As the title implies, it's about...well, a blind man. He's played by Tony Anthony, who did rather well for himself as a sort of Clint Eastwood Lite character known as The Stranger in a series of Euro Westerns (Any similarity to Eastwood's Man With No Name must have been purely coincidental). Anthony went on to star in any number of lucrative, low-budget action films, the most notable being "Comin' At Ya!, a 3-D flick that has also built a loyal cult following.  His co-star in "Blindman" is Ringo Starr. More about him later. The film was based on a Japanese movie titled "Zatoichi" about a blind samurai hero. As with "The Magnificent Seven", which was based on Kurasawa's "Seven Samurai", the story has been transplanted to the American west. When we first see the Blindman (whose name is never mentioned), he rides into a one-horse town and confronts his former partners. Seems they had a lucrative contract to deliver 50 mail order brides to some horny miners. However, a better offer was made from a Mexican bandito named Domingo (Lloyd Battista), who has exported them South 'O the Border to force them into prostitution. Blindman apparently has a sense of honor in terms of fulfilling the original contract. He manages to kill his former partners and sets off to Mexico to rescue the women, presumably so they can sold into another form of prostitution. At first the premise of this film intrigued me. How, after all, can you logically present a story about a blind gunslinger? The answer is you apparently can't. You could get away with it if the film was a satire, but there is surprisingly little overt humor in "Blindman". Yes, in true Eastwood fashion, the hero sometimes makes some snarky quips before, during and after dispatching his adversaries, but for the most part, the film takes itself far too seriously. 

How does the Blindman find his way around? Well, he has his own "wonder horse" who seems more like a companion than a beast of burden. The hoofed hero is always at his disposal and seems to be able to do everything but read a map for him. Speaking of maps, Blindman gets to various destinations by running his finger over maps that engraved in leather...sort of a braille system. Given the fact that he has to navigate the state of Texas, then Mexico, one would think he would require maps the size of rolls of kitchen linoleum, but somehow he gets by with navigational tools that fit neatly into his pocket.  When Blindman arrives in Mexico, he has numerous confrontations with the brutal Domingo and his army of thugs. He suffers the ritualistic beatings of any hero in the Italian western genre, but always manages to get the better hand by his deadly use of the rifle that he uses as a walking stick. Somehow the Blindman can use instinct and an uncanny hearing ability to gun down his would-be assassins with uncanny precision, though occasionally he does impose on some allies for advice. He also confronts Candy (Ringo Starr), Domingo's equally sadistic brother, who is keeping a captive woman as his mistress. What follows is a seemingly endless series of  chases, confrontations and the obligatory imitation Morricone score, all of it under the pedestrian direction of Ferdinando Baldi, who has a revered reputation with some fans of the genre and does manage to set off some impressive explosions. (Amusingly, the concept of showing the "50" mail order brides must have taxed the limited budget so we only get to see them in small clusters.). There are a couple of sequences that stand out in terms of creativity. One involves the surprise slaughter of a barroom filled with Mexican soldiers. The other has a bit of suspense as the Blindman is served a food bowl that he doesn't realize contains a deadly snake. The finale of the film finds Blindman wrestling with Domingo, who has been blinded by a cigar! (Don't ask...) It's supposed to be a tense confrontation, but the sight of the two blind guys rolling around in the dirt looks like an outtake from a Monty Python sketch.  The most intriguing aspect of the film is what led Ringo Starr into appearing in it. He had considerable on-screen charisma that he parlayed into a successful acting career. Here, however, his role is colorless and bland. He doesn't even play the main villain, but rather a supporting character who disappears from the story before the movie even reaches the one-hour mark. Starr supposedly was looking to jump-start his film career and worked with Tony Anthony to develop this production. While he acquits himself credibly, he might have at least given his character some memorable lines or characteristics. 

The previously reviewed version of the film pointed out that the packaging had indicated the film had a running time of 105 minutes, which matches with the original timing cited on on the IMDB site. However, the screener we reviewed ran only 83 minutes and it looked like it had been edited with a meat cleaver. The ABCKO version is the actual 105 minute cut and the transfer is excellent, a vast improvement over the muddy mess we had previously reviewed. Seeing "Blindman" again under these conditions has allowed me to reevaluate my opinion of the film. While it certainly never rises to the standards of a Sergio Leone production, the movie's quirky premise and the amusing performance by Tony Anthony made the experience far more enjoyable the second time around. 

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By Hank Reineke

We film collectors are a spoiled lot: and, yes, I include myself in that assessment. When Australian video label Imprint first announced their seminal Silver Screams Cinema collection in 2021, I was ecstatic. Though the now defunct U.S. based Olive Films had already given us Blu-rays of three titles soon-to-be featured on the Imprint set (Return of the Ape Man (Monogram, 1944) She Devil (1957) and The Vampire’s Ghost (Republic, 1945), it was the Aussie’s inclusion of several long-neglected films from the vault of Republic Pictures - Valley of the Zombies (1946), The Phantom Speaks (1945) and The Lady and the Monster (1944) - that compelled one to pre-order.

The Imprint set contained almost every title a fan of Republic’s horror-mystery offerings might desire… with one notable exception. Where was Lesley Selander’s The Catman of Paris (1946)? It was the one Republic horror flick I had been wishing on the longest. Decades ago I gave up hope of ever seeing any sort of legitimate home video issue. So I sought out the serviceable – if scratchy and hazy - gray-market bootleg long making the rounds on the collector’s market. So the exclusion of The Catman of Paris from Imprint’s otherwise magnificent Silver Screams set was a bit frustrating.

So it was with great anticipation when Imprint’s single-disc Blu-ray of The Catman of Paris recently arrived. I’m pleased to report that the release not only looks great but also arrives with a couple of bonus features. But while this film’s arrival on Blu-ray brings with it a satisfying sense of closure, I think it’s best to acknowledge that The Catman of Paris is by no means a riveting lost classic of horror cinema. Though the film holds a certain charm in my personal nostalgia bank, The Catman of Paris often plods along for most of its hour or so running time. But I’m still a fan.

Republic Pictures was, of course - unfairly, in my mind – deemed a Hollywood “Poverty Row” studio. But the production values of the studio were often of high-caliber despite meager budgets, the studio producing more than a thousand features and serials from its inception in 1935. Though associated with Monogram Pictures – a purveyor of a number of 1940s low-rent horror and mystery pictures (which often featured the likes of genre stars Bela Lugosi, George Zucco, Lionel Atwill and John Carradine), Republic was late in getting on the exploitative horror-film train. I suppose it can be argued that they nearly missed the train entirely. The studio only really began to test the horror-picture market when public interest in such fare was clearly on the wane.

But the studio’s first horror pic The Lady and the Monster (1944), featuring Erich von Stroheim as a cold and humorless mad scientist, did well enough for the studio to greenlight a double-dose of new horror in 1945: The Vampire’s Ghost and The Phantom Speaks – two films which we’ll get to in a moment. Generally speaking, the Republic horrors were of similar construct to Monogram’s. But unlike the Monogram films – which have been mostly available over the years on home video due to their public domain status – the Republic horror pics have been, until recently, almost entirely commercially inaccessible to students of the genre.

It’s possible the Republic horror pics have been glossed over due to the fact that, unlike the studio’s western film counterparts – which featured such star-spangled stars as Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and John Wayne – their horror pics offered no similar marquee attraction. Perhaps if the Republic horror and mysteries features offered such boogeymen as Lugosi or Boris Karloff there might have been more of a commercial interest in getting these out to fans and collectors. But Paramount Pictures, the company that ultimately absorbed the Republic catalog, seemed mostly disinterested in making available that studio’s horror film efforts.

To be fair, Republic wasn’t Universal: there actually wasn’t a great deal of true “horrors” to choose from. In 1999, film historian Tom Weaver examined some of the Republic titles in his tome Poverty Row Horrors!: Monogram, PRC, and Republic Horror Films of the Forties (MacFarland). A decade- and -a -half later author Brian McFadden published his Republic Horrors: The Serial Studio’s Chillers. Both books were welcome additions to the film scholar’s personal libraries. But while McFadden’s effort seemed to promise a deeper-dive into the Republic’s long-neglected horror catalog, it mostly reminded readers that the studio actually released very few true horror pictures during the Golden Age of the 1940s. Of the ten films chosen for examination by McFadden, only five could justify being classified as genuine “horrors.” The remaining five titles selected were simply mysteries with woven eerie elements.

But if Universal’s reign as the preeminent horror-movie studio was beginning to wind down by the mid-1940s, Republic’s was just beginning to rev up. In early May of 1945, the Los Angeles Times reported that executives at Republic Pictures, “encouraged by the current success of The Vampire’s Ghost and The Phantom Speaks,” were already planning a pair of thrillers of similar design. Under the watchful eye of producer William O’ Sullivan, Republic’s newest horror pics, titled The Catman of Paris and The Valley of the Zombies, was to “be sold to exhibitors as a pair.”

Associate producer Marek M. Libkov told the Hollywood Reporter that their newest, The Catman of Paris, would have a provisional start date of September 20, 1945 with casting to “start immediately.” In fact, most of the principal casting was already in place by early September, though casting notices for small roles were still being announced as late as October 5. It was also later reported that the film’s start date would be pushed to September 22. The film’s presumed co-feature – Phil Ford’s Valley of the Zombies – was already just shy of two weeks into production with production on The Catman of Paris set to follow immediately on its heels. But even the revised start date of September 22 is in doubt. On September 24, 1945, the Los Angeles Times noted production on Lesley Selander’s The Catman of Paris was, at long last, to start “today at Republic.”

It’s of some interest that the two primary cast members of The Catman of Paris, Carl Esmond and Lenore Aubert, were both born in Vienna, Austria. Though neither had ever appeared in a horror film, both already would share near-miss flirtations with real-life horrors. Esmond left for the U.S. as early as 1938 at the behest of MGM’s Louis B. Mayer. The actor had been performing with a touring company in London when Nazi troops swept into Austria in March of 1938. Esmond reflected to Hollywood scribe Maxine Garrison that Mayer dangled an MGM contract before him, warning ‘You would be foolish not to come [to America]. Europe will be lost in war before long.” Esmond admitted, “I had not thought of it that way, but he was right.”

Aubert too left Vienna, choosing travel to Paris. But with German troops already occupying the City of Light, the actress also made the decision to immigrate to America. (Ironically, Aubert’s first screen credit was for a performance as a villainous Nazi spy for Samuel Goldwyn’s They Got Me Covered (1943), an early Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour comedy). Though not a household name to most cinephiles, the darkly beautiful Aubert is likely best remembered for her performance as the sinister Dr. Mornay in the time-tested Universal classic Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).

The Hollywood trades were reporting a lot of activity on the Republic Studios lot that first week of October of 1945… but most interest was fixed on producer-director Frank Borsage’s ambitious and expensive Technicolor effort Concerto. But a wandering journalist noted that only “two stages away,” Republic’s dual monochrome horror pics, The Catman of Paris and Valley of the Zombies, were being shot concurrently for a provisional double-feature release. “On both sets, the visitor must have nerves of steel,” it was reported, “to withstand sudden appearances of perambulating cat people and corpses.”

By Thursday, October 11, 1945, the Hollywood Reporter noted that production on The Catman of Paris had wrapped on the night previous, when “final exterior scenes were filmed on the studio’s back lot.” The report also indicated that co-feature Valley of the Zombies had finished shooting a mere “one day before Republic started rolling Selander’s picture.” If true, the earlier reportage of dual-picture sightings of “perambulating cat people and corpses” was little more than promotional ballyhoo.

So who was this sinister cinematic Catman of Paris? Parisian police detectives are of the belief that it’s none other than the best-selling, dashingly handsome French novelist Charles Regnier (Carl Esmond). The popular-selling author has recently returned to Paris following two years of international travel – including a possibly fateful visit to the tropics. Not everyone has enjoyed his most recent book. Regnier’s fiction-novel Fraudulent Justice has come to the attention – and annoyance – of the French government. It seems Regnier’s narrative appears to have been based on a true-life crime and trial: the details of which were never brought to public scrutiny and the judicial outcome now thought a travesty of justice. So how was it that Regnier could accurately account so much about a secretive government trial?

Regnier has also returned to Paris to wrestle other demons. The writer suffers headaches which bring about unexplainable subsequent episodes of amnesia. During such sessions Regnier is visited by images of violent weather disturbances and of a mysterious black cat. Regnier’s moneyed patron, Henri Borchard (Douglas Dumbrille), suggests Regnier’s fragile mental state is due to his having contracted some sort of fever when visiting the tropics. There’s also a measure of astrological hokum in the scripting mix as well.

Both Bouchard and Regnier’s publisher Paul Audet (Francis Pierlot) are concerned that following two gruesome murders of which Regnier is at least tangentially involved, the author’s book sales might plummet and bankrupt the publishing house. And circumstantial evidence of Regnier’s involvement in the murders continues to mount. The Catman’s most recent victim - Regnier’s high-society fiancé Marguerite Duvall (Adele Mara), was recently jilted so the author might enjoy a new romance with publisher’s daughter Marie (Lenore Aubert). Having completely fallen for the dashing author, Marie Audet is completely convinced of Regnier’s innocence… until she herself is chased through a misty evening garden by a cloak and top-hatted Catman on the prowl for her blood.

Though the film would eventually pair with Valley of the Zombies, The Catman of Paris was initially paired on release with John English’s somewhat better-received ice-skating musical-mystery Murder in the Music Hall. The first wave of reviews of The Catman of Paris were generally fair - if mostly unfavorable. The Hollywood Reporter ignobly described the film as an “absurdity,” a career embarrassments to all involved. The lugubrious screenplay of Republic scenarist Sherman L. Lowe was decried as far too “wordy… every character uttering editorials instead of dialog.”

There were complaints – also not unfair - that the film displayed a curious lack of “physical action.” Variety was a bit more forgiving in its assessment, calling the Valentine’s Day preview of The Catman of Paris “a cross between a garden-variety whodunit and a Jekyll-Hyde horror-meller […] that taxes belief to the breaking point.” The Christian Science Monitor dismissed the film outright as a “routine horror story based on far-fetched thrills.”

Despite the lukewarm reviews of both Murder in the Music Hall and The Catman of Paris, the package managed a successful earning of $35,000 in its first week. Which, at the very least, guaranteed a second week of booking. Republic, presumptively optimistic and encouraged by strong initial returns, inked producer Libkov to a contract of three additional pictures. Though there was the inevitable revenue fall-off in the second week of release, the trades were reporting box office tallies in and around Los Angeles remained “good” if not showing signs of sustained momentum. But by week three, the box office receipts were down to disappointing four figure earnings. As the Catman creeped regionally across the U.S. through autumn of 1946, local reviewers and small-town theater managers found the film a mild mystery offering at best. Subsequently, four-figure weekly returns were now the norm.

Retro-Active: From the Cinema Retro Archives

The 1961 MGM Western A Thunder of Drums has been released by the Warner Archive. The film was regarded as a standard oater in its day but has since built a loyal following who have been eager to have the movie available on the home video market. What sets A Thunder of Drums apart from many of the indistinguishable Westerns of the period is its downbeat storyline and intelligent script, which was clearly geared for adults as opposed to moppets. There's also the impressive cast: Richard Boone, George Hamilton, Charles Bronson, Arthur O'Connell, Richard Chamberlain and Slim Pickens among them.The film opens with a sequence that was very unsettling and shocking for its day: an Indian attack on a tranquil homestead. A little girl is forced to witness the gang rape and murders of her mother and teenage sister. The plot then shifts to the local fort where commandant Boone is overseeing an understaffed cavalry contingent that has to find and defeat the marauding tribe, which has already slaughtered numerous settlers and soldiers. The Indians are window dressing in the story: nameless, faceless adversaries who are not given any particular motivation for their savagery. (These was, remember, far less enlightened times and such conflicts were generally presented without nuance.)

George Hamilton is the by-the-book West Point graduate assigned to the fort as Boone's second-in-command. He gets a frosty reception from minute one. Boone tells him he doesn't meet the requirements of a seasoned officer who can survive in the hostile environment. The two men spend a good deal of their time in a psychological war of wills. Adding to Hamilton's discomfort is the discovery that his former lover, Luana Patten, is not only living at the remote outpost, but is engaged to one of his fellow officers. The two rekindle their own romance and this leads to scandalous and tragic results. 

The film is based on a novel by popular Western writer James Warner Bellah and probably represents the career high water mark of director Joseph Newman, who was destined to toil for decades helming B movies. He gets vibrant performances from his cast. The ever-watchable Boone is in his predictably crusty mode, cynically second-guessing his officers and men, tossing out insults and sucking on an omnipresent stogie. Boone was so dominant in every role he played, one wonders why he never reached a higher status as a reliable box-office figure. Hamilton is in his standard pretty boy mode, but holds his own against macho men Boone and Charles Bronson, who is cast against type as a somewhat dim-witted character of low scruples. Singer Duane Eddy, who was a teenage pop star at the time, made his film debut here with a degree of fanfare, but it was obviously last minute stunt casting as Eddy is given virtually nothing to do except strum a few chords on his guitar. The film boasts some magnificent scenery and some rousing action sequences that are more realistic than those found in  most Westerns of the time. A Thunder of Drums isn't art or even a great or important Western - but it is fine entertainment and the Warner Archive edition looks terrific. A Blu-ray edition is overdue! The only bonus feature is the original theatrical trailer is included (the one seen above is of inferior quality to the trailer featured on the disc, but it does give a good overview of the film).

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By Ernie Magnotta

Action film icon Charles Bronson did it all. He made westerns (The Magnificent Seven, Once Upon a Time in the West), war films (The Great Escape, The Dirty Dozen), lone cop movies (The Stone Killer, 10 to Midnight) and vigilante films (Death Wish series). Just to name a few. Between 1968 and 1972, after mostly being a supporting actor in Hollywood movies and before become a Hollywood leading man due to films like Mr. Majestyk and Death Wish (both 1974), Bronson did a lot of great work in Europe and starred in many different roles; cop (Rider on the Rain aka Le passager de la pluie), thief (Farewell Friend aka Adieu l'ami), gangster (The Valachi Papers), etc. In 1970, he played a hitman (two years before playing a similar role in Michael Winner’s fantastic The Mechanic) in the underrated Italian-French co-production Violent City.

While vacationing with his lover Vanessa (Jill Ireland, Love and Bullets), professional hitman Jeff Heston (Bronson) is shot and left for dead. Heston survives, however, and tracks the killer down. After murdering him, Jeff decides to retire and live happily with Vanessa. But before the couple can leave town, Heston is asked by crime boss, Al Weber (Telly Savalas), to come work for him. Heston refuses, but Weber produces evidence of Heston’s previous murder. Jeff must now figure out a way to obtain the evidence from the dangerous crime boss and escape unharmed with the lovely Vanessa. However, Jeff is unaware that there are much more sinister forces conspiring against him.

Very well-directed by Sergio Sollima (The Big Gundown aka La resa dei conti, Revolver) from a thoroughly enjoyable script co-written by Lina Wertmüller (Seven Beauties), Violent City (aka Città violenta), is a well-done, entertaining piece of action cinema as well as one of the first examples of the subgenre called Poliziotteschi (Italian crime and action films of the 1960s and 70s which featured car chases, corruption, graphic violence, etc. as well as lone heroes who stood up to the system). Sergio Sollima does a wonderful job directing intricate, entertaining action sequences; most notably a Bullitt-like car chase Sollima swears was ripped off from one of his previous films and not from the 1968 Peter Yates/Steve McQueen action classic.

The adrenaline-charged script not only gives us plenty of action, but also a number of unexpected twist and turns; especially the ending. The well-written characters are made convincing by the estimable talents of Bronson, Savalas and Ireland. Through another terrific, mostly low-key performance, steely-eyed Bronson shows us that not only can he take care of business, but that his character possesses a softer side when necessary. Telly Savalas infuses his vicious character with quite a bit of humor, and the beautiful Jill Ireland gives several dimensions to Vanessa.

Violent City features even more great acting talent such as Michael Constantin (Cold Sweat, 1978’s The Inglorious Bastards), Umberto Orsini (The Damned), and Telly’s brother, George Savalas (The Slender Thread, Kelly’s Heroes).

Last, but not least, the engaging film, which was shot in the United States and distributed (in Italy) by Universal Pictures, benefits from a great musical score by the immortal Ennio Morricone (The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage, Once Upon a Time in America).

Although it’s not one of Bronson’s more well-known titles, that shouldn’t stop you. I enjoyed Violent City very much. It’s an entertaining action-thriller with a solid cast and an interesting story. I highly recommend checking it out.

Violent City has been released on a Region 1 Blu-ray from the always reliable folks at Kino Lorber. The wonderful-looking transfer is presented in the film’s original 2.35:1 aspect ratio and the disc also contains a highly informative audio commentary by Paul Talbot, author of the “Bronson’s Loose!” books; a terrific interview with director Sergio Sollima and the original theatrical trailer. We are also treated to a second disc which features Città violenta, the Italian print of the film as well as the 1973 U.S. cut known as The Family. Lastly, both discs feature exciting trailers to many different Bronson films.

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By Hank Reineke

Rightfully or wrongfully, I’m going to concentrate this review of Mill Creek’s Sci-Fi from the Vault Blu on two of this Blu-ray set’s decidedly lesser films: Creature with the Atom Brain (1955) and The Thirty Foot Bride of Candy Rock (1959). This is partially due to the fact that the set’s two most prominent titles, 20 Million Miles to Earth and It Came from Beneath the Sea, were previously issued by Mill Creek back in 2014 on their twofer Ray Harryhausen Creature Double Feature from the same transfers. Though Creature with the Atom Brain is making its U.S. Blu debut on this set, the film has seen a previous Blu issue on the UK import Cold War Creatures: Four Films from Sam Katzman. So only The Thirty Foot Bride of Candy Rock is making a worldwide debut on Blu with this set.

All four films in this new set come, as per the title, from the vaults of Columbia studios. Creature earlier appeared on the commentary-free DVD set Sam Katzman: Icons of Horror Collection (2007). As I am not privy to the sales figures of that set, I can only surmise should Mill Creek release a Sci-Fi Vault Vol. 2 on Blu, we might see the “missing” Katzman titles sprinkled into a future U.S. set. This Mill Creek set is not an “all Katzman” edition (ala Icons). The workhorse producer has no connection to either 20 Million Miles to Earth or The Thirty Foot Bride of Candy Rock.

It’s with no disrespect to the late, great special effects wizard Ray Harryhausen that I’m not going to do a deep dive into 20 Million Miles to Earth and It Came from Beneath the Sea. Though these two films are genuine and iconic sci-fi classics, both have previously gotten the Mill Creek Blu treatment and also received transatlantic Blu releases as well. So I can’t imagine anyone interested in these Harryhausen-associated titles not already in possession of copies. Fair to say, if you own Mill Creek’s previously published twofer, their reappearances here are redundant.

This new set, priced at an MSRP of $29.99, is – happily - available far less expensively from any variety of on-line retailers. In some sense, it’s a bargain. This recent edition does offer a new and informative audio commentary on It Came from Beneath the Sea, courtesy of Justin Humphreys and C. Courtney Joyner. So if you’re an enthusiast of commentary tracks, that’s a checkmark in the plus column. On the other hand, there’s no audio commentary included on 20 Million Miles to Earth, a film no less deserving of annotation. So that’s a checkmark lost.

Oddly, Edward L. Chan’s Creature with the Atom Brain (1955), an arguably less-deserving film, does come with a commentary track – this time courtesy of film producer-writers’ Phoef Sutton and Mark Jordan Legan. It’s nice to have a commentary supplied by two established screenwriters since Creature producer Sam Katzman had conscripted the great Curt Siodmak (The Wolf Man) to script his low-budgeter. The often curmudgeonly Siodmak was a pretty productive scripter, memorably knocking off no fewer than nine sci-fi/horror programmers for Universal 1940-44 – and many other original scenarios for other studios.

Though Siodmak provides a decent enough script for Creature, director Kahn’s film proves a B-film guilty pleasure a best. On their commentary, Sutton and Legan provide a breezy, lighthearted narration filled with the usual, occasionally colorful, anecdotes, often based on their rattling off resumes of the film’s various cast and crew member. To their credit, the two honestly acknowledge the film’s shortfalls, mulling that “the first four and a half minutes are the best thing about it.” The film is a bit of slow-going unless one has a sense of nostalgia about it.

It was late October 1954 when Variety reported that Katzman had tapped Kahn to direct Creature, the first of the producer’s first sci-fi feature film forays. News of actor Richard Denning signing on to star was reported the following week. Similar to Katzman, Kahn was a film industry workhorse, a director not identified with any one particular genre. In the 1950s, Kahn helmed war films, westerns, gangster pics and teenage melodramas. But he also managed to put the fright into the “Frightened Fifties,” cranking out no fewer than eight serviceable sci-fi pics in a four-year period: beginning with She Creature (1956) and finishing with Invisible Invaders (1959). Actor Denning provided a face familiar to 50’s sci-fi fans: the actor had lead roles in The Creature from the Black Lagoon, Target Earth and The Black Scorpion, to name only a few.

It was Columbia’s intention to bill the more pedestrian Creature as the supporting feature to It Came from Beneath the Sea. In June 1955 it was reported the double-bill was to be first rolled out to thirty-one theaters in and around the Los Angeles area. Both films would be produced under the aegis of Katzman’s Clover Productions. Though Kaufman’s low-budgeted independent offerings weren’t expected to bring in boffo box-office numbers, Columbia’s accountants were aware the absence of big name stars and inflated production costs brought better returns on investment.

A trade paper reported bluntly that Columbia, “feels it’s better to make a 15% to 25% profit on a picture than to stand to lose 50% to 75% on a wholly-made studio picture.” While Katzman’s pictures for Columbia (Creature with the Atom Brain, The Giant Claw, Zombies of Mora Tau and The Werewolf) might not have produced great art, they did bring in worthwhile returns on investment. It Came from Beneath the Sea, the far stronger film (with a bigger budget) managed great business, helped in part by a combination of Harryhausen’s screen magic, word-of-mouth excitement and a supportive radio-television-print campaign of $250,000. Though It Came from Beneath the Sea was not the first “giant” monster movie of the 1950s, it was among the earliest, and this monstrous sci-fi sub-genre would blossom throughout the 1950s and well into the 1960s.

Which leads us into our discussion of the final “giant” film offered on this set. The working title of Sidney Miller’s The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock was originally titled The Secret Bride of Candy Brock. The film’s co-screenwriter, Arthur Ross, was familiar writing for films featuring gargantuan(s): he had already helped craft the screenplay for Columbia’s The Three Worlds of Gulliver, a soon-to-be- released pic in 1960. But Candy Rock was to serve primarily as a vehicle for comedian Lou Costello. Though his 1940s heyday was behind him, the roly-poly actor had been introduced to a new generation of fans in the ‘50s through airings of The Abbott and Costello Show television series.

The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock was to be the comedian’s first feature film project following the dissolution of his partnership with Bud Abbott in July of 1957. That pair’s final film, the saccharine comedy-drama Dance with Me, Henry (United Artists, 1956) was generally dismissed as a tired re-play of routines long gone cold. Now, as a solo player, Costello was hoping that Bride might reestablish his box-office prowess. This indie production, shot on the Columbia studios lot, saw Costello’s manager, Eddie Sherman, serving as the film’s executive producer. With such leverage Costello was even able to gift a small role to daughter Carole.

Producer Lew Rachmil suggested to a reporter from London’s Picturegoer that Costello’s titular bride, Dorothy Provine (a 22 year-old blonde that stood 5’ 4” tall), was a “born comedienne – nearly as funny as Lou at times.” Provine was a relative newcomer to Hollywood, having worked only two studio soundstages, one for The Bonnie Parker Story and for a two- episode role as a twelve year old (!) on TV’s Wagon Train. Provine told gossiper Erskine Johnson that she hadn’t “missed a day’s work since I arrived in Hollywood, but I was always scared about every job being my last job.” She needn’t have worried, following Bride the actress was picked to star alongside Roger Moore as a regular character on the television series The Alaskans and would also have a prominent role in the 1963 Cinerama comedy It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

In conception, Bride seems little more than Lou Costello’s attempt to lampoon the popularity of the ongoing “giant monster” craze. Whiling away his days in an amateur laboratory, Costello’s rubbish collector and would-be inventor Artie Pinsetter (‘a world-famous scientist who’s not famous yet”) is determined to unravel secrets: primarily he wishes to learn how the prehistoric beasts that once roamed a local region known “Dinosaur State Park” had achieved gargantuan sizes. He’s investigating an ancient Native American belief that these creatures achieved such measurement due to a mysterious stream of steam emissions emanating from a canyon cave.

To this end he has constructed an elaborate electronic contraption that he calls “Max.” His invention is part time machine – due to its ability for “changing time curves” - and part straight man. Pinsetter hadn’t needed to go through all the trouble of mechanical tinkering. Walking through the canyon, girlfriend Emmy Lou (Provine), accidentally walks through a plume of canyon steam and finds herself having gained an additional 25 feet in height. The steam, we are told, is the castoff of atomic energy escaping from the bowels of the earth.

To make matters worse for Pinsetter, we learn Emmy Lou is the niece of the town’s self-involved and self-important bank president/gubernatorial hopeful Raven Rossiter (Gale Gordon, of Our Miss Brooks fame). Rossiter doesn’t care much for Pinsetter, and his ill-tempered behavior provides much of the film’s lukewarm comic tension. But ultimately, the film’s concentration is whether or not the townies – and alarmed Pentagon officials – can escape the problems wrought by Costello’s foolish inventions or of his skulking thirty-foot bride.

Shot in the fanciful descriptions of “Wonderama” and “Mattascope,” Bride is not a great film by any measure. But having said this, it’s an innocuous 73-minute nostalgia trip that admittedly brought a number of head-shaking smiles to my face. The film is an innocent bit of nonsense, a “family-friendly” movie that I’m certain brought fun to kiddie audiences of its day. My favorite time capsule moment occurs when an airborne Costello nearly collides with the Soviet Union’s recently launched Sputnik 1 satellite.

Sadly, Lou Costello would not live to see the finished film released to the public. The legendary film star would die of a heart attack, just days shy of age 53, on March 3, 1959 – a mere ten weeks following his first day of shooting on Bride in November of 1958 (production wrapped a mere month later). On March 24, 1959, executives at Columbia announced the aforementioned title change. The film was still in editing by June of 1959 – as was the Three Stooges’ sci-fi comedy Have Rocket, Will Travel. In July Columbia shared plans to package Bride as a late summer trip bill of such other family fare films as Rocket and Ted Post’s The Legend of Tom Dooley.

There were studio previews as early as July 7, but when Bride finally was unleashed on movie screens it was not as one-third of the aforementioned package as scheduled - but rather as the under bill to Disney’s Darby O’ Gill and the Little People or Have Rocket, Will Travel. Though there were no critical raves for Bride – truthfully the film was undeserving of such praise – most reviewers found the film harmless and wholesome family entertainment. Which it was. I suppose it would have been in poor taste to completely dismiss the value of the final film of one of Hollywood’s most beloved – and successful – actor-comedians.

In any event, Mill Creek’s Sci-Fi from the Vault collection has made The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock available for the first time on Blu-ray. Previously the film had only appeared on VHS by Columbia/Tri-Star in 1986 and – with a far lesser transfer - on the cheapie Good Times label in 1988. Its first digital appearance was a 2010 release as a DVD MOD from Sony/Columbia Screen Classics. So, regardless of merit, it’s nice to get this one on Blu. Its appearance here should interest fans of both Abbott and Costello-related productions as well as collectors of vintage 50s Silver Age sci-fi. There’s also a light-hearted but informative audio commentary for Bride provided by the Monster Party Podcast team. Think of a few wise-cracking - but informative - movie-buff friends sitting on the couch alongside you. The commentary adds a bit of color to an otherwise monochrome film.

To its credit, the set also includes two bonus features well worth a look: Daniel Griffith’s 25-minute doc They Came from Beyond: Sam Katzman at Columbia as well as his 14:30 minute doc Fantastical Features: Nathan Juran at Columbia. The former gives us a thumbnail tracing of Katzman’s career in film. The producer knocked out dozens of serials for Victory and Columbia - including Superman (1948) and Batman and Robin (1949) - from the mid-1930s on. He later moved on to producing features for Monogram – a studio described here as Hollywood’s “lowest echelon” - where he enjoyed the first of his feature film successes.

Katzman’s films for Monogram and others were usually made on shoestring budgets with tight shooting schedules. The producer didn’t necessarily favor the horror sci-fi genre during his 40+ years working in Hollywood. But having employed Bela Lugosi on the 1936 serial Shadow of Chinatown, Katzman managed to bring the now underworked and underappreciated actor to Monogram for a series of guilty pleasure, fan-favorite cheapie horror-melodramas. But Katzman was not shy on capitalizing on whatever fad was capturing public fancy. His filmography included everything from ghetto dramas, gangster pics, East Side Kids/Bowery Boys comedies, westerns, sword and sandal epics, early rock n’ roll pics – even a couple of Elvis Presley films (Kissin’ Cousins (1964) and Harum Scarum (1965) .

In the mid-1950s, sensing sci-fi was proving popular with audiences, Katzman scored big as the Executive Producer on such less penny-pinching epics as It Came from Beneath the Sea and Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (1956). Both of these films featured the completely amazing stop-motion special effects of the great Ray Harryhausen, with whom Katzman was happy to collaborate. In all likelihood, it’s the appreciative audience of so-called “Monster Kids” that continues to stoke interest in Katzman’s work.

The second bonus doc, Fantastical Features, has C. Courtney Joyner and Justin Humphreys taking a brief look at the films of the fast-shot flicks Nathan Juran directed for Columbia. Though not necessarily a horror/sci-fi film director, Juran had previously helmed The Black Castle (1952) for Universal and, more importantly, for that studio’s great giant insect epic The Deadly Mantis (1957). Once moving to Columbia, Juran managed a number of sci-fi/fantasy epics including such cinematic touchstones as 20 Million Miles to Earth, Attack of the 50 Foot Woman (1958) and The 7^th Voyage of Sinbad (1958).

For the most part, all of these black-and-white films look great for their age, though they’re not entirely pristine: one can expect a few not terribly distracting scratches or speckling throughout. Personally, I’m not sure how many more times I will revisit Creature with the Atom Brain or The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock – they’re not great films - but it’s still nice to add these titles to my ‘50s sci-fi film collection. You’ll have to decide if they’re worth adding to yours.

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By John M. Whalen

Burt Reynolds was a movie star who became a “Hollywood Legend” the hard way—he earned it. He started out in small roles on TV in the 50s and 60s, went to Europe and made some spaghetti westerns, just like his pal Clint Eastwood. He had his own TV series (“Hawk” and “Dan August”) and gained stardom on the big screen after playing Lewis, one of the four guys in “Deliverance,” who run into bad luck at the hands of some good ol’ boys in the Tennessee backwoods. He became a superstar with the release of “Smokey and the Bandit” (1977), which he starred in with Sally Field and Jackie Gleason. His career ended with “The Last Movie Star,” (2017), where he basically played himself, a faded legend, who still manages to hold onto his dignity. He was about to play a small role in Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time . . . in Hollywood (2019)” but died in 2018 before filming began.

His career had a lot of peaks and valleys. “Heat” (1986), now available on Blu-Ray from Kino Lorber, while an entertaining movie with Reynolds at his charismatic best, was definitely not one of the peaks. Considering it was written by Oscar-winning writer William Goldman, (“All the President’s Men” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,”) and directed by Dick Richards (“Farewell My Lovely”), it should have been a lot better than it is. Reynolds plays Nick Escalante (also known as “Mex”), a Las Vegas bodyguard who dreams of one day leaving the rat race in the States and going to Venice, Italy to enjoy La Dolce Vita. Hmmm. That sort of reminds me of another guy William Goldman wrote about once, only he wanted to go to Bolivia. Anyway as “Heat” begins, Mex takes on a couple of jobs that he probably should have known better than to accept. One has him protecting a nerdy dude by the name of Cyrus Kinnick (Peter McNichol), who thinks he needs a bodyguard in case he wins big at the casino. Mex doesn’t last long on the job when he discovers Kinnick’s idea of big winnings is $50, and he quits. The other is a call for help from Holly (Karen Young) a Vegas hooker, an old friend of his, who was beaten and raped in a casino hotel room by three guys. She asks him to help her get revenge.

Mex (you probably couldn’t use that nickname today) finds out the rapist is a punk Mafioso by the name of Danny DeMarco (Neill Barry), who has two musclebound bodyguards of his own. Mex never carries a gun, but he’s known for being an expert with anything that has a sharp cutting edge. He pays them a visit and takes all three of them down with nothing more than the sharp edge of two credit cards and a few flying kicks, a-la Bruce Lee. He calls Holly up from the lobby and she takes a pair of scissors out of her purse and leaves Danny with a little souvenir on his private parts. She finds $20,000 that Danny had flashed around to tease Mex with earlier and offers half to him. He turns it down and tells her to leave town. It turns out Danny is connected to a local Mafia boss by the name of “Baby.”

Holly leaves town but manages to get 10 grand to him, which becomes a plot device that reveals that Mex has a gambling addiction problem. He takes the money, turns it into $100,000 at the Blackjack table run by a dealer named Cassie (Diana Scarwid), and ends up losing it all. So now we know why Mex has trouble paying the airfare to Venice. Kinnick shows up again and asks if he can just hang out with him so he can learn how to be a cool tough guy like him. Sounds dumb, doesn’t it? It is. Somehow, even though there’s a meeting with “Baby,” and later an action setpiece with Danny and some new goons he’s hired, the story loses momentum.

Part of the problem is Goldman’s script, which is all over the place, with enough story elements for at least two different movies. Or maybe they planned to spin it off into a TV series. But the biggest problem with “Heat” is what was happening behind the scenes during production. “Heat” was originally to be helmed by Robert Altman. That deal fell through, so they brought in Dick Richards to direct and for some reason Richards and Reynolds didn’t get along. It got so bad that a fight erupted and Reynolds punched Richards in the face. Richards left the picture after directing only 13 percent of it and sued Reynolds. “That punch cost me half a million,” Reynolds said. Television director Jerry Jameson was brought in to finish the picture without receiving a credit.

It’s too bad in a way that Altman didn’t take the job after all. Goldman’s screenplay, with all the various story ideas bouncing around in it, would probably have been right up Altman’s alley. He might have come up with something on the order of his earlier hits “The Long Goodbye” (1973) or “California Split” (1974).

Kino Lorber presents “Heat” in its original 1.78:1 aspect ratio in a very clean 1920x1080p transfer. A rollicking audio commentary is provided by action film historians Brandon Bentley and Mike Leeder. The disc also contains previews of a number of Burt Reynolds films available from Kino Lorber. In case you’re wondering if Mex ever get to Venice… I’ll never tell. But, if he did, let’s hope he made out better than that other guy did in Bolivia. Recommended primarily for  Burt Reynolds fans.

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(John M. Whalen is the author of "This Ray Gun for Hire...and Other Tales".)

By Adrian Smith

Cesare Mori grew up in an orphanage in the 1870s but rose to power and influence through the military, then the police, and finally as a Prefect in Mussolini’s Fascist Party. He was dispatched to Palermo in Sicily in the mid-1920s with the specific task of destroying the power and influence of the Mafia, who held a vicious and all-controlling stranglehold on the island. The Mafia were responsible for hundreds of brutal murders every year, bribed officials, and were a prime reason why so many lived in poverty. Mori was a man on a mission, and would stop at nothing to break this criminal organisation. He was extraordinarily successful. His reasoning was that it was not enough to simply arrest people: The citizens of Sicily had to see that the authorities could help them and that they no longer needed the Mafia for protection.

Following his promotion to the senate, where ultimately he fell afoul of Mussolini after expressing concern over Italy’s relationship with Hitler, he wrote his memoirs about the role he played in breaking the Mafia, and it was this that inspired the 1977 production of The Iron Prefect, starring Giuliano Gemma in the title role. Gemma was well-known to audiences thanks to his role in such Spaghetti Westerns as A Pistol for Ringo (1965, Duccio Tessari) and Day of Anger (Tonino Valerii, 1967) and he would even appear in Dario Argento’s Tenebrae a few years later in 1982. Despite being around twenty years younger than the actual Mori, he creates a believable, authoritative character, and one can see why the Sicilian police were willing to follow his sometimes-unorthodox methods. The film features Claudia Cardinale in a supporting role as the struggling mother of a young boy whose father was an influential leader of the Mafia, but having had enough, she wants to try and secure a better life for the boy away from Sicily. It was ably directed on location by Pasquale Squitieri, who was himself no stranger to the Western, and had also made other films about organised crime and the Mafia, including Camorra (1972) and The Climber (1975).

It’s an easy comparison to make, but one can’t help but think of the Sicilian section of The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972), and this film makes an excellent companion piece to that: Sicily is hot, dry and crumbling, where peasants are armed with shotguns and the authorities are powerless to do anything about the criminal gangs who brazenly murder entire families to maintain control, until Cesare Mori arrives of course. The Iron Prefect has been restored in 2K from the original negative and is available here from new boutique label Radiance Films with new and archival extras. As Squitieri and Gemma are sadly no longer with us, an archival interview with them both recorded in 2009 provides fascinating insight, and there is also a new interview with Squitieri’s biographer Domenico Monetti. My favourite bonus feature here is an appreciation of Giulliano Gemma by writer, director and western fan Alex Cox who goes into detail and brings wit and style to the piece. If Alex Cox, host of the important Moviedrome series of film screenings on British television in the late nineties, could shoot videos like this for all of Radiance’s releases, I for one would be very happy. The limited edition of The Iron Prefect comes with a booklet featuring new writing by Italian cinema expert Guido Bonsaver and an original article on the real-life Cesare Mori and his Mafia raid as depicted within the film.

This is another excellent release from Radiance, who have rapidly become a popular and collectible label with an eclectic mix of world classic and cult cinema. Cinema Retro recently interviewed founder Francesco Simeoni about the label. You can read it here.

You can order The Iron Prefect direct from Radiance by clicking here.

By Lee Pfeiffer

"Good Day for a Hanging" is minor 1959 color Western elevated by an unusually intelligent script and an impressive cast of veteran actors and a couple of up-and-comers who would find stardom in the 1960s. Fred MacMurray plays former town marshal Ben Cutler, a widower who is living a serene small town life in the company of his fiancee Ruth (Maggie Hayes) and his teenage daughter Laurie (Joan Blackman). Their peaceful existence is shattered when Laurie's former beau Eddie Campbell (Robert Vaughn) arrives in town in the company of some shady bandits. While Laurie tries to reignite the romance with Eddie, his companions are pulling off a robbery of the bank which goes wrong very quickly when a shootout ensues. Eddie and his companions flea the scene with a posse in hot pursuit led by Marshal Cain (Emile Meyer). Another shootout follows with some of the gang killed and others escaping with half the loot from the bank. In the melee, Ben witnesses Eddie fatally shooting Marshal Cain before Eddie is wounded and captured. When he is brought back to town, Eddie is nursed back to health, in part by Laurie, and admits the obvious- he took part in the robbery. However, he insists that he did not shoot the marshal and that he must have been hit by gunfire from another gang member. Ben knows this is untrue and tells the townspeople as much. He also reluctantly agrees to temporarily resume serving as town marshal until a permanent replacement can be found. Eddie is put on trial and plays the victim, recounting a hardscrabble upbringing and turning on the charm. Nevertheless, he is convicted of murder and sentenced to hang. From his jail cell, he can see the gallows being built. However, he begins to convince the townspeople that he is not guilty of murder and his death sentence should be changed to serving time in jail. Soon, many of the town's most prominent citizens are buying his story and they force Ben to take a petition bearing many signatures to the governor asking him to grant Eddie's request. Laurie, blinded by her romantic interest in Eddie, is his chief defender- a fact that causes Ben great consternation. Because this is a Western, there are dramatic developments that result in an action-packed climax.

What sets "Good Day for a Hanging" apart from many other minor Westerns of the period is the fact that it has a compelling and interesting script that touches upon sociological factors such as the ability of one person to manipulate many others, often against common sense, by using charisma and a strong will. Eddie has both and you can't help but be reminded of how many contemporary people, often in public service, are excused for all sorts of behavior simply because people find them personally likable or intimidating. Doubtless, there have been times when all of us have seen such scenarios and wondered how intelligent people can ignore established facts in their defense of someone whose actions are indefensible. In this case, Ben Cutler is 100% right in his testimony against Eddie but before long he is the odd man out, criticized and resented by the very people who only recently begged him to serve as marshal. Fred MacMurray gives a strong performance as the protagonist- a man who has lost the respect of his own daughter in her misguided quest to benefit a killer. Robert Vaughn gives an excellent, understated performance that allows the viewer to understand why he is able to win over so many townspeople.

It's interesting to analyze the career trajectories of several actors who appear in the film. Fred MacMurray had been going through somewhat of a minor career slump at the time but it would be short-lived. Later in 1959, he starred in his first Walt Disney movie, "The Shaggy Dog", which was a major hit. He would star in many other Disney films over the next decade. Additionally, he would give an outstanding performance as a misogynistic heel in Billy Wilder's Oscar winner, "The Apartment". Capping off his career turnaround, he would also star in the long-running sitcom "My Three Sons". Robert Vaughn would rise to stardom with his performance later that year in "The Young Philadelphians", earning an Oscar nomination for his work. That, in turn, led him to be cast as one of "The Magnificent Seven" and he would reach the level of international teen idol in the mid-Sixties due to his starring role in "The Man from U.N.C.L.E". Some of the fine character actors who would appear in the film would also find major success over the next few years. Howard McNear, who plays one of the prominent townsmen, would create his iconic comedic role as the eccentric Floyd the barber the next year in "The Andy Griffith Show". Denver Pyle, who plays  deputy in the film, would also make periodic appearances in the show as the lovably loony hillbilly patriarch Briscoe Darling, as well as appear in two major John Wayne films, "The Horse Soldiers" and "The Alamo" before landing his most memorable role as Sheriff Frank Hammer in "Bonnie and Clyde". James Drury, who would go on to star in "The Virginian" TV series, also has a supporting role. Special mention should be made of Edmon Ryan, who is especially good, portraying Eddie's defense counsel. One more note of interest: the film was produced by Charles H. Schneer, a respected figure in the British film industry who was most often associated with the films of special effects master Ray Harryhausen.

The Sony DVD has a reasonably good transfer, if a bit soft. The only extras are original trailers for "Silverado" and "The Professionals", both on Sony Home Video. Strangely enough, the trailer for "Good Day for a Hanging" isn't included, but we found it on YouTube and are providing it here. 

I don't want to exaggerate the merits of "Good Day for a Hanging". It isn't a great movie by any means, just a good Western- but it's loaded with fine actors who were on the cusp of major career successes.

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By Hank Reineke

The Cinerama Releasing Co. was in its seventh year of film distribution in 1973. The distributor had earned a reputation in the industry for working successfully with producers to distribute independent films. Such business partnerships had proven beneficial to both parties. In 1973 Cinerama scored big with two modest-budget indie hits: Michael Campus’s Blaxploitation pic The Mack (1973) and Phil Karlson’s Walking Tall (1973). Since the horror film genre was a (mostly) dependable box office gamble for low-budget film productions, Cinerama scored handsomely in 1972 with the domestically produced Willard rat-fest and the decidedly more up-scale and colorfully creepy Amicus-import Tales from the Crypt.

Hoping to continue to capitalize on this successful trend, Cinerama was preparing to distribute a slate of new horrors in 1973: the British Amicus production And Now the Screaming Starts, the U.S. produced mystery-horror Terror in the Wax Museum, and indie Freedom Art’s Doctor Death. Box Office reported in September of 1973, that Cinerama had only recently acquired the rights to Doctor Death. It promised the film would showcase “optical effects unseen before on screen... the illusion of souls passing from one body to another.” That was they called ballyhoo. We’d actually seen it all before, as the effects offered in Doctor Death had been present as early as the silent film era. Doctor Death, whose full title is actually Doctor Death: Seeker of Souls, was the brainchild of producer/director Eddie Saeta and associate producer/screenwriter Sal Ponti. It was the latter’s first (and only) produced screenplay. Ponti worked mostly – if infrequently - as a film actor and occasional songwriter. In contrast, director Saeta had a long-running career in Hollywood, working on studio lots and behind the camera from 1937 on. He was second generation Hollywood. Saeta’s dad had worked in the electrical department for Columbia Pictures from the late 1920s on.

It was through his father’s connections that Eddie Saeta worked as a messenger for Columbia studio chief Harry Cohn. He worked his way through the ranks, ultimately serving as an assistant or 2^nd unit director for such studios as Columbia and Monogram. He mostly assisted in churning out such low-budget fares as westerns, East Side Kids films and even The Three Stooges in Orbit (1962). (That latter film explains the curious and brief walk through of septuagenarian Moe Howard in Doctor Death). In his later years, Saeta also worked extensively as an AD on television. Eagle-eyed James Bond fans might also recognize Saeta’s name from his front end credit as co-Location Manager for 1971’s Diamonds are Forever.

Ponti’s original script wasn’t uninteresting in concept. Distraught over the loss of his wife in a deadly automobile accident he blames on himself, Dr. Fred Saunders (Barry Coe) goes to great lengths to see her revived by supernatural means. He visits her corpse daily where she lies in state in a conveniently unlocked crypt. Though his friend Greg (Stewart Moss) presses, “For God sake, let Laura rest in peace!” Fred is unable to do so. He visits any number of charlatans who profess revivification but who are unable to deliver on their promises.

Things change when Fred meets Tana (Florence Marley) who professes the greatness of an ex-magician known as “Doctor Death” (John Considine). She describes the not-so-good Doctor as, “The genius of all ages, the man who has conquered death.” The problem with Doctor Death is that while he’s actually pretty good in his practice of “selective reincarnation,” he also displays many characteristics you’d prefer your resurrectionist to not have: he’s a pompous, selfish, sadistic, pervert with a necrophilic bent.

He’s also a vampire… of a sort. We learn Doctor Death is more than a thousand year’s old. He sustains himself not on the feeding of blood of his victims, but by the absorption of their souls. Dracula, of course, is Dracula. He too may be a thousand or so years old, but he manages to retain his original physical appearance through the centuries. As someone who absorbs the souls of others, Doctor Death conversely takes on the physical appearance of whomever his latest victim might be. Through his soul absorptions, the doctor has appeared over centuries in any number of multi-racial, multi-ethic and transgender forms. The problem facing the grieving Fred is that Doctor Death, the heralded “genius of all ages,” has been unable to rustle up a suitable fresh corpse to transpose its soul to that of the still very dead Linda. Which was sort of the point of Fred’s hiring him.

Doctor Death was released in November of 1973, the film unflatteringly described by one critic as, “one of a handful of year end grotesqueries being dumped into theaters like a movie distributor’s version of a clearance table.” The reviews of Doctor Death were, in fact, mostly poor to middling. A Pittsburgh Press critic offered, the picture looked “like a grainy blow-up of a 16mm film and with the sort of flat soundtrack that usually accompanies porno films, this would-be horror item is horrible in ways not intended.” But I’d say such criticism is a bit unfair. Though the film’s Colorlab visuals are dark and gritty, this is after all an early 1970s production. Some of the film’s exterior’s sequences were photographed in and around Los Angeles’s Sunset Boulevard. It was intended to appear a bit seedy.

I’d argue the cinematography of Emil Oster and Kent Wakeford – both pros - was at least on par with such contemporary L.A. based horror-themed productions as The Night Stalker, the Count Yorga and Blacula films, and TV’s Night Gallery. In any case, if one’s nostalgic for the 1970s, this film is for you. The first-half of the decade is duly represented by telltale flashes of ‘70s hairstyles and clothing, of gaudy apartment furnishings and oversize gas-guzzling automobiles.

Doctor Death is occasionally defended as a misunderstood horror-comedy. That’s a bit of a stretch though it’s clear that Ponti’s script did try to lace his tale with a sprinkling of graveyard humor. The problem is that the satire, as written, is just too subtle (or perhaps so poorly played throughout) that many critics missed this angle. Variety thought the film too melodramatic and this, they reckoned, is what invoked “unconscious laughs” by those attending. But perhaps some of those chuckles were intentional. The Louisville Courier-Journal, on the other hand, saw no humor in the film at all. They lambasted, “A new horror has been released from the creaky medieval dungeons, and to tell the honest truth, [it] should have stayed there.”

Well, I disagree. Doctor Death, while no classic, does manage to offer ninety-minutes of dark entertainment and a smile or two. The Los Angeles Times was one of the few newspapers to recognize the film’s lighter aspects, describing Doctor Death as a “silly but kinda cute and ultimately entertaining spoof” of the horror-pic biz - with Considine playing the role of an “ersatz John Carradine.” The San Francisco Examiner also noted Doctor Death was, in essence, “a gruesome horror film that tries unsuccessfully to equate merriment with slaughter.” “The film sustains a certain amount of suspense,” its critic conceded. “But its unpleasant theme is quite repellant, especially in sequences that suggest Considine’s necrophilic [sic] persuasion.”

New York’s Independent Film Journal thought Considine’s performance, “rampantly theatrical, and that’s not a help because he isn’t rampantly hammy as well. And it would take an actor as overblown as Vincent Price to get some good fun into the good doctor.” This is a pretty prescient observation. Throughout Doctor Death, I also reflected on how Considine’s cool portrayal of the loathsome magician-turned-resurrectionist was simply off. He was OK when the role tasked him to be manipulative and sinister, but the absence of black-comedy winks are also painfully in evidence. It would have taken someone of Vincent Price’s caliber to pull it off. Price had, managed to successfully mix horror and humor a decade earlier in such earlier productions as Roger Corman’s The Raven (1963) and Jacques Tourneur’s The Comedy of Terrors (1963). And, of course, in the more recent and devilishly tongue-in-cheek horror classic Theatre of Blood.

It’s of some interest to note that Price was about to play a character named “Dr. Death” in the forthcoming Amicus/A.I.P. co- production of Madhouse (1974). It’s likely had Saeta’s flick not beaten Madhouse to the gate, the Price film might even have been released under it’s working title: The Revenge of Dr. Death. It’s almost certain the poor box-office reception of Cinerama’s Doctor Death was part of the decision of the Madhouse team’s intent to re-title and separate their new Vincent Price/Peter Cushing vehicle far from Saeta’s bargain basement production.

It’s also worth noting that even Cinerama and theater-owners thought Doctor Death not strong enough to stand alone. The film wasn’t playing on many upscale first-run screens, the picture almost completely relegated to grindhouses and west-coast drive-ins. Depending on the market, Doctor Death was part of a double or triple feature bill. These combo-bills mixed newish pics (Scream, Blacula, Scream (1973) and The Legend of Hell House (1973), with psychological thrillers and mysteries (Scream, Baby, Scream (1969), The Butcher (1970), Bluebeard (1972), The Other (1972) and A Name for Evil (1973). The film was also paired with an assortment of horror pictures on their second and third runs: (Count Yorga, Vampire (1970), Countess Dracula (1971), Lady Frankenstein (1971), The House That Dripped Blood (1971) and Asylum (1972). There were even a few golden oldies sprinkled into the bills when prints were available: (The Pit and the Pendulum (1964) and the incongruous A Long Ride from Hell (1968), a spaghetti western with Steve (Hercules) Reeves.

Even with such support, the box-office of Doctor Death was mostly weak. In its first week of screenings in San Francisco, the film pulled in a mere $4,500. When the film rolled out regionally, it pulled in only $2,500 on its first week Pittsburgh, but did slightly better in Detroit with a take of $4,000. But as Christmas week approached, even the Detroit sank to $2,500. The film did some surprising first week receipts in Chicago with a gross of $30,000. It might have been helpful that in Chicago the film had been paired as a double with the old school mystery Terror in the Wax Museum: a film featuring familiar faces (Ray Milland, Elsa Lanchester, John Carradine and Broderick Crawford). Regardless, the combo’s take in the Windy City dropped to $16,500 on week two and (as per Variety) a “tepid” $10,000 of earnings on week three. Though the film seemed destined to play New York City’s “Deuce” strip on its initial run, by mid-January of 1974, Doctor Death would only made it to screens near the upper regions of New York State before disappearing completely from sight.

In any event, the folks at Scorpion Releasing are making sure that Doctor Death doesn’t disappear from your home video screen. This release, taken from a 2015 High-Definition master from the Original Camera Negative is as good as it likely will ever look. The special features include both an audio commentary and separate interview with actor John Considine, as well the reminiscences of director Eddie’s son, Steve. The set arounds out with the film’s trailer and a “new” light-hearted introduction courtesy of Doctor Death himself. I suggest fans of 1970s fringy horror make their appointment with doctor.

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By Fred Blosser

Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan first appeared in the October 1912 issue of the pulp fiction magazine “All-Story.”  This inaugural novel, “Tarzan of the Apes,” introduced the character as a British peer, Lord Greystoke, who was reared by great apes in Africa as an orphaned infant, and then assimilated into European society in adulthood as a sophisticated adventurer and conservationist.  Burroughs was ingenious in working out the details of the premise (for example, how Tarzan taught himself to read and write), which bordered on science-fiction even by the standards of 1912.   

The story was immediately popular, and a hardcover edition followed in 1914.  It’s important to term the character “Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan,” as he was typically labelled in media credits, because the author shrewdly trademarked the name.  That way, he could control all uses of his creation, reap the profits, and legally stop any attempts by others to hijack it.  As Burroughs realized, the birth of the motion picture industry and the growth of newspaper syndication in the early 1900s offered access to unlimited audiences.  Many middle-class people in small towns might never buy a magazine or a book, but they were sure to be movie-goers and newspaper readers.  Securing Tarzan as his Intellectual Property allowed Burroughs to exploit those opportunities and ensure they didn’t fall into the hands of others.  He incorporated himself as Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., and wrote twenty-two more Tarzan novels over the next thirty-five years, along with many other science-fiction and adventure series.  Burroughs—and then after his death in 1950, his heirs—licensed Tarzan to numerous other media platforms, including movies, radio, a newspaper comic strip, comic books, toys, and television.  If podcasts, Twitter, YouTube, virtual reality, video games, and streaming video had existed back then, we can be certain he would have utilised them too.  Today, when we think of creators who wisely kept a tight commercial grip on their creations, Walt Disney and George Lucas are likely to come to mind, but Burroughs led the way. 

Over the years, movies’ portrayals of Tarzan have varied from the wily, masculine, powerful, articulate, principled character of Burroughs’ original vision to a muscular but asexual simpleton with the verbal skills of a two-year-old.  The latter version was popularised for one generation by MGM’s Johnny Weissmuller movies in the 1940s, and reinforced for the next by years of reruns on television.  The Weissmuller films began promisingly with the violent, sexy “Tarzan the Ape Man” in 1932 and “Tarzan and His Mate” in 1934, but over time at MGM (and then at RKO, where the series moved in 1943), they became increasingly simplistic.  Under the fierce censorship of Hollywood’s Production Code, MGM tightened down on the semi-nudity and mayhem of the first two films, aiming instead for a juvenile demographic.  The studio reasoned that kids were an easier audience who would laugh at the antics of Tarzan’s chimpanzee and not wonder why Weissmuller’s Tarzan never had intimate relations with Jane.  

The last seven decades have seen a variety of Tarzans.  Some producers adhered to the Weissmuller model, beginning with five features from RKO starring Lex Barker, who inherited the role after Weissmuller retired his loincloth.  Others redesigned the concept to meet changing trends in society.  In the James Bond era of the 1960s, a character closer to the Burroughs prototype appeared in two features starring Jock Mahoney and three with Mike Henry.  This peer of the jungle realm was a suave, jet-setting trouble shooter.  The image of an articulate ape man carried over to a 1966-68 NBC-TV series with Ron Ely in the role.  Where Mahoney’s and Henry’s character travelled to India, Thailand, Mexico, and South America to solve jungle crises, Ely’s remained in Africa, in one episode coming to the aid of three nuns from America played by Diana Ross, Mary Wilson, and Cindy Birdsong, better known as the Supremes.  Even with those attempts to appeal to a more contemporary audience, popular interest waned.  In part, this was because the Weissmuller image was the one that stuck in the popular memory, lampooned by television comics.  What can you do with a hero once your audience laughs at him?  Even more to the point, enormous cultural changes around racial issues occurred with the advancements of the Civil Rights era.  Many critics now saw Tarzan as a worrisome symbol of white entitlement, despite the prominent casting of Black actors and a more nuanced portrayal of African tribal societies in the Ron Ely series. 

Nevertheless, with a brand name that older viewers still recognised at least, the character continued to appear sporadically.  If you gathered around the VCR with your family as a kid in the Reagan years, the Tarzan you may remember best was Christopher Lambert’s portrayal in 1984’s “Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes.”  “Greystoke” had the good fortune to appear as VCRs became standard fixtures in American television rooms; on home video, the movie enjoyed a long life as a VHS rental.  Adapted by Robert Towne from “Tarzan of the Apes” and directed by Hugh Hudson, the film was promoted as a return to Burroughs’ concept of a feral but innately intelligent man who attempts to blend back into polite society.  Some Burroughs fans, primed to embrace a virile Tarzan close to the commanding pulp-fiction character, were disappointed.  In trying to rectify the prevailing Weissmuller image from decades past, Towne and Hudson may have overbalanced in the opposite direction.  Burroughs’ Tarzan dominated whatever environment he chose to be in; Lambert’s was a sad figure, overwhelmed and lost,once he left the jungle.  Nevertheless, lavishly produced, the movie was popular with critics and general audiences.  There were Academy Award nominations for Towne’s screenplay and for Rick Baker’s costuming effects for Tarzan’s adopted ape family.  Another live action movie (“Tarzan and the Lost City,” 1998), two short-lived, syndicated TV series, and Disney’s animated “Tarzan” (1999) were released through the 1990s.  

The latest iteration as a live-action feature, “The Legend of Tarzan” (2016), drew tepid reviews and disappointing box-office.  Although the producers cast Samuel L. Jackson in a prominent role alongside Alexander Skarsgard’s Tarzan above the title, the strategy probably did little to attract younger, hipper, and more diverse ticket-buyers as it was intended to.  Jackson’s American envoy remained little more than a sidekick to Tarzan in an 1885 period setting.  If you hoped to see Jackson’s character shove Tarzan aside to get medieval on somebody’s ass, you were disappointed.  In contrast, Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther,” with a modern Black jungle hero, a largely Black supporting cast and production team, and James Bond-style action situations, emerged two years later with a whopping $1.3 billion in ticket sales and a place on many critics’ Top Ten lists.  The 2022 sequel, “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” performed nearly as well with an $838.1 million return. On a $50 million budget, another 2022 Hollywood production with a prestigious Black cast and exotic action in the Burroughs style, “The Woman King,” nearly doubled its investment with $94.3 million in revenue.

In late 2022, Sony Pictures acquired the latest screen rights to Tarzan and promised a “total reinvention” of the character. What the studio has in mind, and whether it will actually follow through, appears to be up in the air right now. Would anybody be surprised to see Tarzan “reinvented” as a role for a Black actor the next time out, if there is a next time?  Popular culture is already there. Vintage movies (“A League of Their Own”) and TV series (“SWAT”) once cast primarily with white actors are remade now, routinely, with Black stars or all-Black casts. On the hit Netflix series “Bridgerton,” actors of color portray British aristocrats in Jane Austen’s Regency-era England, in reality one of the whitest of white societies ever.   

As we wait to see what the next Tarzan, if any, will look like, The Film Detective has released “The Tarzan Vault Collection,” a three-disc Blu-ray set that includes the first Tarzan movie, “Tarzan of the Apes” (1918); “Adventures of Tarzan” (1921), a re-edited feature version of a 10-chapter serial; and “The New Adventures of Tarzan” (1935), a 12-chapter serial presented in its entirety.  The first two pictures starred Elmo Lincoln, a stocky actor who had appeared in several of D.W. Griffith’s milestone silent films, including the ambitious “Intolerance” (1916) as a Biblical strongman, “the Mighty Man of Valor.”  Although it’s said Burroughs wasn’t particularly fond of Lincoln’s casting after another actor was chosen but had to bow out, the films were relatively faithful to the source novels.   Outdoor filming locations in Louisiana for “Tarzan of the Apes” stand in acceptably for equatorial Africa, at least to the satisfaction of moviegoers in 1918 who had no idea what Africa really looked like, and certainly better than the studio backlots used in the Weissmuller films.  Actors in shaggy anthropoid costumes portrayed Tarzan’s ape friends.  Although primitive in comparison with the modern CGI in “The Legend of Tarzan,” the makeup effects aren’t bad for that early era of cinema. 

“Adventures of Tarzan,” based on Burroughs’ “The Return of Tarzan” (1913), finds Tarzan in pursuit of a villain named Rokoff, who has kidnapped Jane in a plot to find the treasure vaults of the lost city of Opar (an idea later reiterated in “The Legend of Tarzan”).  In “The Return of Tarzan” and subsequent novels, Tarzan blithely removes gold and jewels from Burroughs’ imaginary Opar to help support his African estate, reasoning that otherwise the treasure would just lie there.  In the books, the underground vaults are vast, cavernous, and sinister.  In the movie, where the 1921 budget was too low to keep up with Burroughs’ staggering imagination, they look more like somebody’s root cellar.  Good try anyway.  As an hour-long feature truncated from a much longer serial version, “Adventures of Tarzan” is a succession of chases, rescues, and fights from the final chapters of the serial.  A title card at the beginning brings the viewer up to speed on the action already in progress, much as the “Star Wars” movies do now.   

It may be confusing to watch an old serial after most of its continuity has been removed, but the third movie in the Film Detective set, “The New Adventures of Tarzan,” represents the other side of the coin as a serial presented in its original, multi-chapter format.  The serials were designed to be taken one chapter at a time each week.  That remains the best way to experience one.  Otherwise, watched in a binge, repetition becomes a problem.  It’s difficult to work up much concern when Tarzan falls into a crocodile-infested river in Chapter Seven, if, an hour earlier, he’d already escaped the same danger in Chapter Three.  Still, taken piecemeal or in one long sitting, fans will be happy for the chance to see this original version of “The New Adventures of Tarzan,” which is better known in its truncated feature version, “Tarzan and the Green Goddess,” a one-time television staple.  Co-produced by Burroughs, it introduced Herman Brix, a 1928 Olympics finalist, as the title hero.  Trimly muscular, Brix was offered as an alternative to Johnny Weissmuller’s monosyllabic Tarzan; his version, endorsed by Burroughs, spoke in whole, commanding sentences and looked equally comfortable in a loincloth or a dinner jacket.  The serial was set and filmed on location in Guatemala, where Tarzan and his friends race against the bad guys to find a Mayan statue with a valuable secret.  Fans often rank Brix with Jock Mahoney and Mike Henry as their favourite Tarzan.  He later changed his screen name to Bruce Bennett for a long career in Westerns and crime dramas.  Humphrey Bogart fans will remember him as Cody, the drifter who tries to steal Fred C. Dobbs’ gold mine claim in “The Treasure of Sierra Madre.”  

The back story of the serial is more intriguing than the plot about the Mayan statue.  Burroughs fell in love with the wife of his co-producer, Ashton Dearholt, eventually marrying her after she divorced Dearholt and Burroughs divorced his first wife.  In turn, Dearholt had carried on an extramarital affair with Ula Holt, the lead actress in the serial, and they married after Dearholt’s divorce.  It’s the kind of Hollywood story that TMZ.com would love today. 

By Lee Pfeiffer

Michael Winner emerged as a promising young director/screenwriter/film editor in the early 1960s and his career gained momentum when the mod movement of the mid-Sixties made London the go-to place for everything and everyone who was hip. Winner fit into that category very neatly. He was wealthy, charismatic, talented and very much a key member of the city's thriving social scene. He made offbeat comedies that appealed to young audiences such as "The Jokers" and "I'll Never Forget What'sis Name". Soon he was making big studio films and was accorded substantial budgets to do so. He was quite diverse in his subject matter. "Hannibal Brooks" was a WWII comedy, "The Games" a drama set at the Olympic, "The Nightcomers", an ambitious prequel to Henry James's classic ghost story "The Turn of the Screw". He made good Westerns such as "Lawman" and "Chato's Land" and his numerous collaborations with Charles Bronson were crucial in finally elevating Bronson to major star status after being regarded as a reliable character actor for many years. Winner's biggest hit starred Bronson: the 1974 urban  thriller "Death Wish" that perfectly reflected the real-life paranoia of America's soaring crime rate. The film was provocative and controversial, much to Winner's delight, and it made a ton of money. But soon after, Winner's fortunes in cinema began to decline. He seemed to have backward momentum and most of his films were poorly received by critics and audiences, even though occasionally a few proved to be underrated including his 1978 remake of "The Big Sleep" that was fittingly as confusing as the classic original.

One of Winner's least-remembered films from this era is "Firepower", released in 1979, which starred James Coburn and Sophia Loren. Like most of Winner's recent movies, it didn't light any fires at the boxoffice, but it has an impressive cast and production values that elevate the film above the embarrassing "Death Wish" sequels Winner would later preside over that gave him a resurgence of relevance. The film literally opens with a bang when a scientist opens a letter bomb and is blown to smithereens. He's the husband of Adele Tasca (Sophia Loren), who suspects the assassination was orchestrated by her husband's employer, the mysterious billionaire Karl Stegner, because he had discovered that Stegner was distributing a drug that could result in patients contracting cancer. Stegner is also wanted by the U.S. government for high-end criminal activities. There's one major problem: Stegner maintains a Howard Hughes-like lifestyle and no one even knows what he looks like. FBI agent Frank Mancuso (Vincent Gardenia) leans on crime figure Sal Hyman (Eli Wallach) to use his connections to locate Stegner in return for having pending criminal charges against him dropped. Hyman, in turn, reaches out to another man of mystery, Jerry Fannon (James Coburn), to get the job done in return for an eye-popping fee. Fannon is the ultimate Mr. Fix-It, having pulled off seemingly impossible tasks for other shady characters. Fannon enlists his trusted right-hand man, Catlett (O.J. Simpson) for the assignment and the two set off to the island of Curacao in the Caribbean, where he has learned Stegner is residing in a seaside mansion protected by an army of bodyguards who report to his top assistant, Leo Gelhorn (George Grizzard, successfully cast against type in an action role.)

Things get complicated when Adele arrives on the scene, ostensibly to find a way to expose and kill Stegner herself. But Fannon soon sees she might actually be in league with her husband's murderer. As with scenarios of this type, Fannon is welcomed into Stegner's hacienda by his prey. In this case, Stegner remains unseen but Fannon is afforded some courtesies by Gelhorn and Stegner's personal physician, Dr. Felix (Tony Franciosa). The Bond-like scenario finds heroes and villains exchanging witticisms and veiled threats very politely over drinks in a luxurious environment. Of course, the detente doesn't last long and the action becomes frequent and explosive. There's a goofy and thankfully brief subplot that finds Coburn face-to-face with his exact double, who he employs as part of his strategy but the screenplay by frequent Michael Winner collaborator Gerald Wilson affords some unexpected plot twists and genuine surprises and Winner handles the action scenes very well indeed, even if they not very original. For example, Coburn employs a bulldozer to demolish a house, which is fun to watch, but Robert Mitchum had already performed the same feat on screen a couple of years before in more spectacular fashion in "The Amsterdam Kill". The gorgeous Caribbean locations add a degree of luster to the production. The cast comes through, with Coburn especially fun to watch. Loren, who was paid $1 million to appear in the film, looks sensational but the role is somewhat underwritten and the inevitable romantic moments between Coburn and Loren's characters are rather dull and perfunctory. Eli Wallach and Vincent Gardenia are relegated to extended cameo roles and the film ends with a strange but welcome brief appearance by Victor Mature that is played for laughs.I should also mention the impressive stunt work performed by Terry Leonard and his crew.

(Warning: the video below contains spoilers!)

"Firepower" was produced by Sir Lew Grade, who originally had Charles Bronson agree to star in the film. At the last minute, Bronson pulled out and Grade considered canceling the production. However, he had already sunk a good deal of money into the project and signed James Coburn as the lead. Coburn would later recall,  "I did it for the money, the locations (the Caribbean islands) and to work with Sophia Loren. The director was Michael Winner. He’s probably one of the weirdest guys I’ve ever met. Yet, I thought he was a good guy when I first met him. But when he got on the set, he was almost like a total dictator. I found it hard to work for that way. The most fun I had was when I got to drive a bulldozer through a house in the islands." For all the effort, the film was greeted with negative reviews and a weak boxoffice take. The movie is available on Blu-ray as a collaboration between Kino Lorber and Scorpion Releasing. The transfer looks great and the disc includes the original trailer.

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By Paul Scrabo

Anne Francis was director John Sturges’ only female actor in 1955’s “Bad Day at Black Rock”, and she repeated her solo act ten years later on “The Satan Bug”. But on that production, she and many cast members felt a preoccupation, a distance, from the man who held together “The Magnificent Seven” and “The Great Escape”. Francis was certain “He was thinking about “The Hallelujah Trail”. This was Sturges’ next production, his entry into the world of roadshow presentations; a mammoth production with a huge cast and even huger backdrop: Gallup, New Mexico.

Bill Gulick’s 1963 novel, originally titled “The Hallelujah Train”, seemed a perfect story to upend all western movie conventions, with the cavalry, the Indians, the unions, and the Temperance Movement fighting over the transportation of forty wagons of whiskey. Sturges was comfortable making westerns, but this was a comedy western. He appreciated the Mirisch Corporation’s vision of straight actors trying to make sense of the silliness, but still wanted to persuade James Garner, Lee Marvin and Art Carney for major roles. Sturges knew these actors could handle comedy.

Garner passed. “The premise was too outrageous, not enough truth to be funny”, he said. The rest of Sturges’ dream cast was not available, but what he got seemed attractive: a pair of solid supporting actors, Jim Hutton and Pamela Tiffin, and Lee Remick and Burt Lancaster for the leads. Lancaster had previously worked with Sturges on “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral” and was impressed how the film turned out. The rest of the supporting cast included Donald Pleasence, Brian Keith, and Martin Landau. They were in for a tough shoot.

The weather was unpredictable (you can spot thunderstorms heading their way in the finished film) and the location had three hundred crew members miles away from the hotels. Scenes contained countless stunts, and fifty tons of Fuller’s earth was blown by several giant fans to create The Battle at Whiskey Hills. Bruce Surtees, son of Sturges’ cinematographer Robert Surtees and focus-puller on the set, recalled “All this and we’re shooting in Ultra-Panavision 70mm, which made life even more difficult!” Despite the difficulties, the director was loving what he saw on set; the film looked as breathtaking as any wide screen western ever could, the stunts were amazing, and thank God he was also laughing all through it.

The hilarity was cut short near the end of the shooting. For the sprawling wagon chase finale, stunt persons Buff Brady and Bill Williams convinced associate producer Robert Relyea to let them delay their jump from inside a catapulted coach. Permission was given, and in the attempt, Williams got tangled somehow during his planned escape. He was killed instantly. Relyea nixed including the footage in the finished film, but was overruled by Mirisch. It’s an incredible shot and it plays in every promotional trailer, probably the most famous footage from the production. Was including it a bad decision or a tribute? There is still a debate over this among retro movie fans.

“We all thought it was going to be a hit picture”, said Sturges, “until we hit an audience.” “The Hallelujah Trail” opened with a 165-minute cut that audiences and critics found “belabored and overlong”. Sturges overheard some patrons wondering if this was a straight western or a deliberate comedy. Screenwriter John Gay blamed much of the response on the performances of Brian Keith and Donald Pleasence. Gay wanted his lines played straight but the actors played it for laughs. The film was soon cut to 156-minutes (the version on this Blu-ray) and the reactions were much more positive; critics noted several inspired sight gags, audiences enjoyed the cartoonish atmosphere of the DePatie-Freleng maps, Variety found the film “beautifully packaged”, and the LA Times proclaimed “The Hallelujah Trail” as “one of the very few funny westerns ever made, and possibly the funniest.”

When the film finished its roadshow run, United Artists cut the film once more, to 145-minutes. It didn’t help. Compared to “Cat Ballou” and even “F Troop”, “The Hallelujah Trail” was unhip.Sturges was done with comedy, but not with roadshow Cinerama, though his future films would have checkered histories. He was set to direct “Grand Prix” but clashed with the original star, Steve McQueen. A year later Gregory Peck turned down Sturges’ “Ice Station Zebra’, wary of its weak third act. Rock Hudson, now middle-aged and wanting a strong lead role, came aboard for this Sturges voyage instead. The MGM release still had a confusing third act, but the film sails nicely mostly due to Patrick McGoohan and some clever dialogue.

Decades later, “The Hallelujah Trail” remains a nice memory to those who attended the Cinerama presentation; not much greatness to retain but a great experience at the movies. But that experience was tough to relive because the film remained in legacy format limbo for years: a letterboxed standard definition transfer. So when Olive Films announced a Blu-ray release in 2019, fans of comedy epics sung Hallelujah! Now this film can be viewed in 1080P! Retreat! Unfortunately, the quality of the Olive release resembled an upscaled version of the original standard definition transfer. But two years later “The Hallelujah Trail” was casually spotted on Amazon Prime, and it was a new HD transfer. And a year after that, it’s a new Kino Lorber Blu-ray release.

Any Cinema-Retro reader worth their Cinerama Chops should have this Blu-ray in their collection. “The Hallelujah Trail” is an hour too long, but you get miles of lovely landscape. My favorite portrayal? Donald Pleasence as Oracle, who predicts the future in return for free drinks. And watch for his amazing jump off a roof! Certainly, the most impressive part of the film is the finale: the runaway wagon chase. There are sections where you swear it’s Remick, Keith and Landau handling those coaches but you know it has to be well made-up stunt people, at least for most of it. You’re also realizing that this sequence, and perhaps the entire film, is performed without any process work or rear projection.

There’s a legitimate debate on how the film may have been more successful if James Garner played the role of Colonel Gearhart, though only Lancaster could have pulled off that bathtub smile scene. There’s no disagreement on the music; Elmer Bernstein’s sprawling score contains so many themes that Sturges’ biographer Glenn Lovell qualifies the film as “almost a pre-“Paint Your Wagon” musical." And here’s your tiniest “Trail” trivia: decades ago, during the production of the laserdisc version, MGM/UA discovered that a few reels were mono sound instead of multi-channel, including the main title featuring the chorus. Yours truly was working on a project for the company at the time, and I happily lent them my stereo score LP. so the main title would be in stereo. That audio track mix remains on this new Blu-ray as well. (You’re welcome, America!)

Kino Lorber is kind enough to provide some expert guides to help you along the “Trail”: the perfect pairing of screenwriter C. Courtney Joyner and filmmaker/historian Michael Schlesinger. Joyner had already provided his Sturges bonafides with his documentary on the director for the recent Imprint Blu-ray of “Marooned”, and I can verify Schlesinger’s knowledge of film comedy, having been fortunate to join him, along with Mark Evanier, for the commentary track on Criterion’s “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World”. Joyner and Schlesinger tackle and acknowledge “The Hallelujah Trail”s social and political incorrectness, but also deflate any virtue signaling by examining how the film is smartly an equal opportunity offender: the Cavalry, the Indians, the Temperance Movement, all up for farce. Thanks to this team, and the picture quality of this Blu-ray, I finally spotted the gag of the Indians circling the wagons as the cavalry is whooping and hollering. Both gents are in a fine fun mood to tackle this type of film, and It’s one of my favorite film commentaries of 2022.

“The Hallelujah Trail” now looks clearer and sharper than any previous home video release, and somehow it makes the comedy and the performances sharper as well. I think you’ll be entertained by this roadshow epic, and with Joyner and Schlesinger as your commentary companions you may indeed learn, as the posters proclaimed, “How the West Was Fun!”

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

"Gun the Man Down" is yet another Poverty Row low-budget Western shot during an era in which seemingly every other feature film released was a horse opera. Supposedly shot in nine days, the film is primarily notable for being the big screen directing debut of Andrew V. McLaglen, who would go on to be a very respected director who specialized in Westerns and action films. The movie also marked the final feature film for James Arness before he took on the role of Marshall Matt Dillon in TV's long-running and iconic "Gunsmoke" series. After failing to achieve stardom on the big screen, Arness found fame and fortune in "Gunsmoke" when John Wayne recommended him for the part. Wayne had been championing Arness for years and provided him with roles in some of his films. Following "Gunsmoke"'s phenomenal run, Arness seemed content to stay with TV and had another successful series, "How the West Was Won".  John Wayne was one of the first actors to successfully launch his own production company, Batjac, which produced this film and Wayne's influence is felt in the project. Andrew V. McLaglen was the son of Wayne's good friend and occasional co-star Victor McLaglen. The screenplay was written by Burt Kennedy, who Wayne would later hire to direct several of his own films. The movie provided young Angie Dickinson with her first role of substance and she would reunite with Wayne years later on Howard Hawks' "Rio Bravo". Speaking of which, another Wayne favorite, character actor Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez appears in both films. Also in the cast is Harry Carey Jr. , son of Wayne's idol and and personal friend, Harry Carey. The cinematography is by William Clothier, who would lens many of Wayne's later movies and the film was produced by Duke's brother, Robert Morrison. "Gun the Man Down" is very much a Wayne family affair. 

The film opens with three fleeing bank robbers: Rem Anderson (James Arness), Matt Rankin (Robert J. Wilke) and Ralph Farley (Don MeGowan), who arrive at their hide-a-way cabin with the law in hot pursuit. Rem has been seriously wounded and Rankin makes the decision to leave him behind. Rem's girl, Jan (Angie Dickinson), objects at first but Rankin convinces her to go with them in part because they have $40,000 in loot from the local bank. The law arrives at the cabin and arrests Rem. He is nursed back to health and is offered a deal for a light sentence if he helps track down his confederates. Rem refuses and does his time in prison. Upon release, he begins his mission vengeance and tracks Rankin, Ralph and Jan to a one-horse town where Rankin has used his ill-gotten gains to open a profitable saloon. Upon discovering Rem is in town, Rankin hires a notorious gunslinger, Billy Deal (Michael Emmet), to assassinate him. Jan has a tense reunion with Rem and seeks his forgiveness but her pleas fall on deaf ears. Rem emerges victorious over Billy Deal and Rankin, Ralph and Jan flee town with Rem in pursuit. Their final confrontation takes place in a remote canyon with tragic consequences.  

Given the film's meager production budget, "Gun the Man Down" is a surprisingly mature and engrossing Western with intelligent dialogue and interesting characters. (In addition to those mentioned, there is a fine performance by Emile Meyer as the town sheriff). Arness projects the kind of macho star power that Wayne had and Dickinson acquits herself very well as the stereotypical saloon girl with a heart of gold. The film, ably directed by McLaglen,  runs a scant 76 minutes and was obviously designed for a quick playoff and fast profit. It has largely been lost to time but the film is currently streaming on Screenpix, which is available through Amazon Prime, Roku, Apple TV and Fire TV for an additional monthly fee of $2.99 The movie is also available on Blu-ray through Olive Films.

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By Fred Blosser

There are two types of people in the world, and I don’t refer to young and old, rich and poor, or me and everybody else. The divide I have in mind is wider and deeper. On one side are those who would rather chew broken glass than watch Hollywood’s old costume dramas about noble knights, evil viziers, and beautiful Tahitian princesses. On the other side are those like me who enjoy such fare in the same way we gravitate to Mac ’n Cheese and other comfort food. It’s a soothing callback to our childhoods when we devoured such movies on TV and the big screen, in less strident and less cynical times—at least, they were less strident and less cynical if you were ten years old. In the 1940s, two of the reigning luminaries of the genre were Maria Montez and Jon Hall, who starred together in six Technicolor productions for Universal Pictures, 1942-45. Three of the films have been released by Kino Lorber Studio Classics on one disc, the “Maria Montez and Jon Hall Collection.” If you haven’t had occasion to discover what movie escapism looked like in the era before today’s Middle Earth, planet Tatooine, and Wakanda, the Montez/Hall triple feature provides a good introduction.

In “White Savage” (1943) directed by Arthur Lubin from an early script by future Academy Award winning writer-director Richard Brooks, commercial fisherman Kaloe (Hall) wants to harvest sharks off mysterious Temple Island. Health enthusiasts will pay well for shark liver, “a great source of Vitamin A,” he says, sounding like today’s late-nite pitchmen for dubious dietary supplements. After a meet-cute scene that wouldn’t be out of place in a 2022 romantic comedy, the island’s ruler, Princess Tahia (Montez), falls for the handsome adventurer and grants him access to the waters, only to turn against him later when she’s duped by Sam Miller (Thomas Gomez), the sleazy owner of a gambling den in nearby Port Coral. Miller has learned that the titular temple on Temple Island includes a golden pool inlaid with jewels. To plunder the treasure, he first has to get Kaloe out of the way. Given Kaloe’s name, we assume that the shark hunter is Polynesian (Hall, born Charles Felix Locher, was said to have had a Tahitian mother in real life), but he wears a generic charter-captain outfit and skipper’s cap, not a sarong. Montez, born Maria Gracia Vidal in a well to do Colombian family, doesn’t look any more Polynesian than Hall. But old movies like this are more notable for oddball charm than authenticity. This becomes even more apparent when you think about a golden, gem-encrusted pool in the South Seas. Where did the gold and the jewels come from? It’s further underlined when Kaloe, framed by Miller for murder, is imprisoned on a platform guarded below by African lions. Why not polar bears? Not that audiences in 1943 would have cared, as long as dad could ogle Maria Montez in vivid Technicolor, mom could dream about Jon Hall, and the kids could identify with third-billed Sabu as Kaloe’s mischievous younger sidekick, Orano.

“Gypsy Wildcat” (1944) shifts locale to medieval Europe, exactly the kind of setting and story parodied by Rob Reiner’s beloved 1987 comedy “The Princess Bride,” minus Billy Crystal and Andre the Giant. When a traveler is murdered near the castle of ruthless Baron Tovar (Douglas Dumbrille), Tovar imprisons a band of Gypsies camped nearby. The Gypsies harbor another stranger, Michael (Hall), who witnessed the murder and holds an important item of evidence sought by the baron. The caravan’s dancing girl, Carla (Montez), an orphan who was adopted by the Gypsies at infancy, falls in love with Michael, to the displeasure of the Gypsy chief’s son, Tonio (Peter Coe), who had hoped to marry her. Tovar, in turn, is smitten with Carla, who looks uncannily like a woman in an old portrait that hangs in his private quarters. Well toward the end of the movie, the characters in the story find out why; you’ll probably put two and two together long before then. Of the three movies on the Blu-ray disc, “Gypsy Wildcat” may be the purest example of Universal’s genius in recycling and repurposing its contract actors, directors, and sets from one film to the next across different genres in its movie-factory heyday. The director, Roy William Neill, was borrowed from the studio’s popular Sherlock Holmes series, as were Nigel Bruce and Gale Sondergaard. Bruce plays Tovar’s bumbling lackey in much the same spirit as he portrayed Dr. Watson to Basil Rathbone’s Holmes. Sondergaard, here the wife of the Gypsy king, is better remembered as “The Spider Woman” in Neill’s 1943 Holmes mystery of the same name. Neill and producer George Waggner were also associated with Universal’s iconic Wolf Man horror series, and the wagons driven by the Gypsies were probably the same ones used for Maria Ouspenskaya’s Gypsy caravan in “The Wolf Man.” Leo Carrillo, from Universal’s B-Westerns, plays Anube, the Gypsy chief; he, Sondergaard, Coe, and the rest of the troupe reflect producers’ venerable tradition of choosing ethnic-looking but non-Romani actors to play Gypsies. The script was written by James M. Cain, a surprise if you know Cain strictly as a giant of classic noir fiction with “The Postman Always Rings Twice” and “Double Indemnity.” However, it isn’t so startling when you remember that Cain was one of many celebrated novelists who made good money on the side, writing or doctoring Hollywood scripts. I met the late James M. Cain in passing in the early 1970s, when he was guest speaker one night at a public library in the Washington, D.C., suburbs, near where he lived in retirement at the time. At eighty-one, he was formidably tall, burly, bushy-haired, and bespectacled. When he amiably chatted with members of the audience, he answered several questions I asked about his career—none of which dealt with “Gypsy Wildcat,” I should note.

“Sudan” (1945), Montez’s and Hall’s final film together, is set in ancient Egypt, where the benevolent king of Khemis is murdered. The crime appears to be the work of an elusive rebel leader, Herua, who has eluded all attempts to catch him through the usual means. The grieving Princess Naila (Montez) has a better (or worse) idea. She will disguise herself as a commoner, find Herua at a fair in Sudan where he customarily buys horses for his band, and have him arrested. Here, Sudan is a colourful whirl of dancing girls and camels, not the grim wasteland of starving children we now see on the TV news. Naila doesn’t realise that her grand vizier, Horadef, who schemes to seize power, was the actual murderer. That fact is disclosed ten minutes into the story, although most of us will already have caught on, given that a) grand viziers in movies like this are always secretly masterminding palace coups, and b) Horadef is played by the great George Zucco, who filled similar roles in Universal’s horror series about the Mummy. Horadef pays slavers to kidnap Naila when she goes undercover. Two horse thieves, Merat and Nebka, come to her rescue. Merat is played by Hall, and Nebka by Andy Devine. Devine provides the same nasal-voiced comedy relief that he did in countless Westerns, only wearing robes this time instead of suspenders. When a handsome stranger shows up (Turhan Bey), he and Naila fall in love with each other, before the princess discovers that the stranger is Herua. Ably written by Edmund L. Hartmann and directed by John Rawlins, the film could almost serve as a G-rated modern sequel to “Disney’s Aladdin,” except for a scene where Naila is branded on the arm by the slavers, and another where she and Herua retire to his tent for a night of passion. The Egyptian sets were ported over from two earlier Middle Eastern fantasies starring Montez and Hall, “Arabian Nights” (1942) and “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves” (1944). It hardly mattered that the Egypt of the Pharaohs and the Baghdad of Ali Baba were two separate historical periods a thousand years apart, since audiences’ apathy to such details “made little practical difference where the story was set,” as critic Ian Cameron noted in his 1973 book, Adventure in the Movies. 1945 was a pivotal moment in Universal Pictures’ history as the year it dropped the Montez and Hall series, along with its B-horror films and Sherlock Holmes pictures. When the studio returned to the genre in the early 1950s as Universal-International, it did so with a new generation of young contract players like Rock Hudson and Yvonne de Carlo. Montez appeared in a few more pictures and died in 1951 at 39. Hall had a long career of Westerns, period adventures, and TV guest appearances through the early 1960s, including baby-boomer fame as television’s “Ramar of the Jungle” in the ‘50s.

Although the Montez and Hall movies ran widely on TV during the same era as “Ramar of the Jungle,” they were broadcast in grainy black-and-white, robbing them of their lustrous big screen Technicolor. The Kino Lorber Blu-ray restores their original sharpness and rich palette, supplemented by engaging audio commentary from Phillipa Berry for “White Savage” and “Sudan,” and David Del Valle for “Gypsy Wildcat.” Theatrical trailers and subtitles for the deaf and hearing-impaired are also included.

“Maria Montez and Jon Hall Collection” can be ordered from Amazon HERE.

Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

By Doug Oswald

Audie Murphy plays himself in “To Hell and Back,” available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber. When I was a kid, the name Audie Murphy was very familiar to me and my friends as the most decorated American soldier of WWII. And if that wasn’t enough to make me an Audie Murphy fan, he was also the star of countless movie westerns which I watched on repeat airings on TV. When “To Hell and Back” made the rounds on TV, all other activities stopped so we could watch his Medal of Honor exploits on the small screen, and then replay them in our minds in the weeks that followed. We imagined killing Nazis on our way to and from grade school. Thoughts and countless discussions about driving Jeeps with mounted .50 caliber machine guns, jumping sand dunes ala “The Rat Patrol,” and driving half-tracks and Sherman tanks while firing rounds on the enemy.

The film, which was released in 1955, opens with an introduction by retired four-star General Walter Bedell Smith setting the stage for meeting a young Audie at home in rural northeastern Texas in 1937. Born in 1925, he was part of a large family, abandoned by their father and left alone after their mother died, leaving his younger siblings in foster care. Murphy left school to work and help care for his family at the age of 12. His skills at hunting and using a gun would aid him during his military service. Underage after the attack on Pearl Harbor, his older sister helped falsify his records so he could enlist in the Army. After basic training at Ft. Lewis, Washington, Murphy shipped to North Africa, but he saw no action as the enemy had just surrendered. Murphy isn’t thought of too highly at this point in the story, by his peers or his commanding officers.

The story shifts to the invasion of Sicily followed by the invasion of Italy and then combat in France where Murphy distinguishes himself in battle and receives America’s highest military honor, the Medal of Honor. The movie moves along at a brisk pace but we never really get to know his buddies and the bonds they created, as the focus is oncus on the action set pieces and deaths of his friends. Murphy is promoted from private to platoon sergeant and then to a field commission to second lieutenant. The movie depicts the highlights from his real life exploits including when he singlehandedly takes on an army of advancing German soldiers by firing the machine gun on a burning Sherman tank and halting the German advance, thereby saving the lives of many Americans. Murphy was severely wounded and suffered the rest of his life from what is now commonly known as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Murphy is credited with killing an estimated 240 German soldiers and wounding and capturing far more. It’s almost too much to expect so much can be told in a movie with a running time of 106 minutes.

Murphy released his autobiography, “To Hell and Back,” in 1949 which became the basis for this film. Murphy declined the offer to attend the Military Academy at West Point, but remained an Army Reserve officer and served in the Texas National Guard, retiring with the rank of Major. Murphy did accept the call to Hollywood, along with fame, fortune and a gambling addiction. His successful movie career began in 1948, mostly in Westerns, ending in 1969 after featuring in 44 movies. He also starred in a troubled 1961 TV series “Whispering Smith” which some deemed too violent for television. Murphy died in a plane crash on 28 May 1971. He’s buried in Arlington National Cemetery and his grave is the second most visited after President John F. Kennedy.

“To Hell and Back” was a Universal production filmed at Universal Studios and on location in California in widescreen CinemaScope. It’s a pity the production didn’t do actual location filming in Italy and France, but this was uncommon at the time. The movie was directed by Jesse Hibbs with a screenplay by Gil Dovel based on Murphy’s best selling biography of the same name. Music was supervised Joseph Gershenson making use of common Army songs and an otherwise sparse score. It would be great if Hollywood saw fit to remake this story. The movie became a huge hit and was Universal’s most successful film until the release of “Jaws” in 1975.

The disc features an entertaining audio commentary by Steve Mitchell and Steven Jay Rubin. It’s worth watching the movie twice, the second time with the commentary track which is like hanging out with a couple of buddies sharing anecdotes and facts about the film. Their audio commentaries are always insightful and entertaining and this one contributes greatly to this Blu-ray release which is a worthy upgrade from previous DVD versions released over the years. The other extras are the trailer for this and other Kino Lorber titles. I highly recommend this disc for Audie Murphy fans and fans of military movies.

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By Lee Pfeiffer

The 1970 Western "Cannon for Cordoba" is yet another film that was written off as "run of the mill" at the time of its initial release but probably plays far better today when Westerns are scare commodities. The film is clearly designed to capitalize on movies such as The Professionals and The Wild Bunch, and while it certainly isn't in the league of those classics, it's a consistently engrossing and highly entertaining horse opera.  Set in 1916, when the US was embroiled in assisting the Mexican government in suppressing "revolutionaries" who were really bandits, the plot centers on a crime kingpin named General Coroba (well played with charm and menace by Raf Vallone), who launches an audacious raid on American General Pershing's troops and succeeds in stealing a number of valuable cannons that will make him almost invulnerable to attack once they have been installed at his remote mountaintop fortress retreat. George Peppard is Captain Douglas, a hard-bitten and insolent cavalry officer in Pershing's command who is sent on a virtual suicide mission to infiltrate Cordoba's compound, blow up the cannons and kidnap the general. Imagine The Guns of Navarone with sombreros. He takes along the standard rag-tag team of tough guys which includes Peter Duel and the always-reliable Don Gordon, seen here in one of the most prominent roles of his career. That old chestnut of a plot device is introduced: Gordon has sworn to kill Peppard at the end of the mission for allowing his brother to be tortured to death by Cordoba.

The group pretends they are American sympathizers to the revolution and succeed in infiltrating the compound with the help of Leonora (comely Giovanna Ralli), who intends to seduce the general and then betray him in revenge for having raped her years before. The film is as gritty as it gets, and as in the Sergio Leone Westerns, there is a very thin line that separates the villains from the heroes. Peppard is in full Eastwood mode, chomping on omnipresent cigars and saying little. He betrays no sentiment and is almost as cruel as the criminal he seeks to bring to justice. 

Director Paul Wendkos keeps the action moving at a fast clip and there is at least one very surprising plot device that adds considerable suspense to the story. The action sequences are stunningly staged and quite spectacular, and it's all set to a very lively and enjoyable score by Elmer Bernstein. Cannon for Coroba may not be a classic, but it's consistently well-acted and will keep you entertained throughout. 

The film is currently streaming on Screenpix, which is available for a separate subscription fee of $2.99 a month through Amazon Prime, Roku, Apple TV and Fire TV. 

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By  Lee Pfeiffer

When movie fans think about films related to the battle of the Alamo, the most obvious reference that comes to mind is John Wayne's epic 1960 production, "The Alamo". There are two others from the modern era of filmmaking that are largely forgotten to all but Alamo history buffs: the 1955 film "The Last Command" and the ill-fated, but underrated 2004 production, also titled simply "The Alamo". Less obvious is the 1987 NBC-TV presentation of "The Alamo- Thirteen Days to Glory" based on Lon Tinkle's book of the same name. Tinkle presented a historically accurate depiction of the legendary battle, at least in terms of what was accepted by historians at the time. However, facts about the battle continue to be fluid and hotly debated among historians. The TV production has not been widely seen since its initial airing. It was released on VHS tape and research has shown an obscure DVD release as part of a double feature with "High Noon II: The Return of Will Kane". However, the movie is now being streamed on Amazon Prime. Not having seen it since its broadcast in 1987, I felt it was time revisit the production, which was widely panned by fans who obsess over all things relating to the Alamo. Their main complaint was the casting of the pivotal roles of Jim Bowie and Davy Crockett, who were played by popular TV stars James Arness and Brian Keith, both of whom were not only long-in-the-tooth but were sporting tusks. The role of Crockett was particularly a thankless one to play. Fess Parker had become an American phenomenon when he played the role in Walt Disney's telecasts. Disney only made a handful of episodes and even he was shocked when the show generated a massive fan movement and became the most successful film/TV tie-in  up to that time. Parker knew he was on to something so in the mid-1960s, free of Disney's edicts, he simply put on a new buckskin jacket and raccoon hat and starred in a hit TV series, "Daniel Boone". When John Wayne was negotiating with United Artists to produce and direct the big screen version of "The Alamo", he had to be forced to play Crockett as the studio's insistence. They wanted his name upfront to draw in his legions of fans. Wayne acquitted himself well enough, but the shadow of Parker loomed over his performance. The choice of Brian Keith was a bizarre one. He was 66-years old at the time and nothing about his appearance suggests the popular image of Crockett (he doesn't even wear the signature cap.) I'm second-to-none in my admiration of Keith's talents and recently praised his portrayal of Theodore Roosevelt in "The Wind and the Lion" on the forthcoming Imprint Blu-ray, but this was a rare case of his judgment in roles being off-course. Arness was also too old to play Bowie, but since the popular conception of the historic figure wasn't ingrained in modern society the way Crockett was, Arness's performance proved to be a bit more tolerable. The only agreement seemed to center on young up-and-coming Alec Baldwin, who delivers a fine and believable performance as Col. Travis, though it's a less interesting one than presented by Laurence Harvey in Wayne's film. Lorne Greene makes a very brief cameo as Sam Houston, showing frustration at his inability to raise an army in time to save the defenders of the Alamo. Greene is generally a commanding screen presence, but his role is so limited he can't make an emotional impact, as Richard Boone did in the role in the Wayne production.

In favor of the TV production, it was filmed on location in Brackettville, Texas, where the massive and convincing sets from Wayne's movie still stood. Behind the scenes, the film benefited from a seasoned pro in the director's chair, Burt Kennedy, an old hand at making good Westerns ("Support Your Local Sheriff", "The War Wagon"). I'm not an expert on the history of the battle, but it's been pointed out that the TV production gets certain things more accurately than the feature films but certain other factors are clearly the invention of the screenwriters. In attempt to appeal to younger viewers, the screenplay provides a completely superfluous subplot about a young Mexican girl in love with one of the Caucasian defenders of the Alamo. It's pretty dreadfully presented, with the young lovers looking like they'd be more suitable for "The Breakfast Club" gang than the besieged Texas mission. Faring a bit better are Kathleen York and Jon Lindstrom in the key roles of Captain Dickinson and his wife, who was one of the few inhabitants of the Alamo to survive. There are some familiar faces among the defenders, but most of them don't register strongly because their roles are under-written. (John Wayne's son Ethan has a minor role.) This version of the Alamo saga differs from Wayne's by presenting Santa Ana as a major character, whereas in the Wayne film he is only a minor presence. As played by Raul Julia, the legendary historic figure is presented as Snidley Whiplash-type, leering at young women and devoid of any human qualities. Julia brings some gusto to the role but a more nuanced characterization is called for. There is also the distracting presence of David Ogden Stiers as a Mexican army officer, which is justified by having him described as an adviser from the British army. If such individuals did exist, it's news to me but in any event, Stiers' presence seems more like a casting gimmick than an attempt to portray an obscure historical fact.

 

Things are fairly turgid through much of the film but as the battle scenes finally arrive they are well-handled with impressive stuntwork on display. The problem is that the spectacular climax of Wayne's big-budget production looms over the relatively skimpy assets that director Burt Kennedy has as his disposal. The TV battle attempts to add some spectacle by cribbing battle footage from Wayne's film. Much of it is set to Peter Bernstein's serviceable score, though at various times during the production, he shamelessly copies the work of another Bernstein (Elmer), with similar music to that found in the latter's classic score from "The Magnificent Seven".

In summary, "The Alamo-Thirteen Days to Glory" is undeniably flawed, but it has enough positive aspects to merit viewing, if only for comparison to other films that depict the battle and the events leading up to it. The source material used by Amazon leaves a lot to be desired, but it's still a positive development to see the production get some exposure. It deserves a Blu-ray release with a commentary track by Alamo historians, who could decipher its truths and fabrications far better than this writer can.

By Fred Blosser

If you fear losing your energy and creativity (among other things) as soon as you enter your sixth decade, just consider John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Henry Hathaway, and take heart. Ford worked until age 71 (his last Western was “Cheyenne Autumn, 1964, and his final film, “7 Women,” 1966), Hawks until 75 (“Rio Lobo,” 1971), and Hathaway until 76. Hathaway’s final Western was “Shoot Out,” which opened on October 13, 1971, when he was 73. In the movie, Clay Lomax (Gregory Peck) is released from prison after serving a seven-year sentence for bank robbery. Lomax’s eyes have a steely, distant glare as he buckles on his six-shooter. “You hate me, but there’s someone out there you hate more,” the warden guesses. “Someone” is Lomax’s former partner, Sam Foley (James Gregory), who betrayed Clay and shot him in the back as the pair fled with their stolen money. Clay was captured and Sam got away. Lomax intends to find Foley, who now lives comfortably on their loot, passing himself off as a retired businessman. In turn, learning that Lomax is a free man again, Foley hires three loutish gunmen to trail his

former friend. The leader of the trio, Bobby Jay (Robert E. Lyons), offers to kill Clay, but Foley says no; just keep an eye on him and let me know if he comes this way. Does Foley hope that Clay will just go away? Will he try to make amends if Lomax pays a visit? Or will he use the pistol hidden in his desk drawer? It isn’t exactly clear, and maybe Sam himself doesn’t know.

On the other hand, there’s no doubt about Lomax’s lust for revenge. But first, leaving the penitentiary, he has to stop at the railroad depot in nearby Weed City, where he has arranged to meet a former girlfriend, a prostitute, who holds a sum of money in safekeeping for him. The money arrives but not the girlfriend, who died on her way from Kansas City. Instead, the woman’s now-orphaned daughter, six-year-old Decky (Dawn Lyn), steps off the train. To claim his money, Clay has to take Decky too. The stymied ex-convict tries to hand the little girl off to a succession of people, without any luck. Orphaned, abandoned children are about as welcome in the fictitious Weed City as they are in real life.

Clay doesn’t know where to find Foley, but a mutual acquaintance, Trooper (Jeff Corey), does. The crusty, wheelchair-bound saloon owner agrees to divulge Sam’s current location—for $200. Bobby Jay and his friends also show up Trooper’s establishment, keeping tabs on Clay. You’d think they’d try to draw as little attention to themselves as possible, but they’re as stupid as they are malicious. When they provoke a fight with Lomax, he cleans the floor with all three. The louts later tangle with Trooper after they damage his property and refuse to pay the abused saloon girl they spent the night with, Alma (Susan Tyrell). They murder Trooper, but the saloon-keeper manages to disclose Foley’s whereabouts before he dies. Lomax heads out to find his quarry, several days’ ride away in Gun Hill, with Decky in tow. Along the way, having bonded after a gruff start, they find shelter from a rainstorm at a ranch owned by a lonely widow, Juliana (Pat Quinn). Juliana’s ranch hands are away in town for the night, giving her and Clay a chance to strike up a romance. But the isolation also puts Juliana, her young son, Lomax, and Decky in danger when the volatile Bobby Jay and his friends turn up and invade her house.

“Shoot Out” was produced by Hal B. Wallis and written by Marguerite Roberts. Both had collaborated with Hathaway on the wildly popular “True Grit” two years before. The three hoped to repeat that success with a similar story about a growing attachment between a flinty old gunfighter and a spunky girl, even costuming Dawn Lyn’s Decky in a smaller replica of Kim Darby’s outfit from “True Grit.” But the strategy backfired when critics measured “Shoot Out” against the 1969 Western and found it wanting. They might have been kinder if they had known that well-written, briskly directed, unpretentious Westerns like “Shoot Out” were approaching the end of their shelf life in the 1970s. Ford and Hawks had become favorites of younger critics like Peter Bogdanovich and Robin Wood, but appreciation for Hathaway’s considerable talents lagged, and still does.

Marguerite Roberts had worked in Hollywood for nearly as long as Hathaway. He started in the prop department in 1919 and directed his first feature, a Zane Grey Western, in 1932. She began as a studio secretary in 1927 and sold her first screenplay in 1934, beginning a long career as a screenwriter that was interrupted from 1952 to 1962. During those ten years, she was blacklisted for refusing to name names before the House Un-American Activities Committee. A scene in “Shoot Out” suggests that Roberts retained painful emotions from the experience. Having burst into Juliana’s house, the unhinged Bobby Jay terrorizes his hostages when he proposes to display his marksmanship by shooting a cup off of the widow’s son’s head. Juliana argues the gunman out of putting her son in danger, but doesn’t resist when he orders her to move the cup to Decky’s head instead. The credits for “Shoot Out” cite Will James’ 1926 memoir, “Lone Cowboy: My Life Story,” as the source for Roberts’ screenplay, but the real inspiration seems to be George Eliot’s “Silas Marner.” The sentimental 1861 novel was once the bane of 15-year-olds for whom it was required reading in high school English classes, before it was replaced by more contemporary fare like “Catcher in the Rye.”

A new Blu-ray edition of “Shoot Out” from Kino Lorber Studio Classics presents the film in a sharp hi-def transfer that looks equally attractive in its sunny outdoor scenes, filmed in New Mexico, and in the rich, masculine red and green lampshades and upholstery in Sam Foley’s private office. In a fine audio commentary, critic Nick Pinkerton notes that the production punches up its standard revenge story with the violent, sexually frank revisionist elements common in the Westerns of the early 1970s, a trend that Hathaway himself helped pioneer with “Nevada Smith” in 1966. Gone is the old B-Western

pretense that saloon hostesses did no more than serve drinks and dance the can-can. Trooper’s four prostitutes are sad, alcoholic women with impoverished pasts, who suffer physical and verbal mistreatment from the men they solicit. If the fate of Decky’s mother is any indication, their life expectancy from illness, alcoholism, and exploitation will be short. The train conductor who delivers Decky to Clay’s care (played by Paul Fix, one of several Western old-timers in the supporting cast) asks Clay how old her mother was. “Thirty,” he responds. “She looked fifty,” the conductor says. “Shoot Out” was rated “GP” (the short-lived precursor of “PG”), classifying it as suitable for general audiences, but advising “parental guidance.” The newly instituted MPAA ratings system was tricky to figure out. I wonder how many parents interpreted GP to mean “bring the kids,” on the assumption that a movie with Gregory Peck and a little girl couldn’t be any saltier than the watered-down TV Westerns of the era.

Pinkerton calls the subplot about the embittered gunman and the orphaned child “cloying,” but it’s a matter of opinion. Dawn Lyn’s role is crafted and performed with a nice balance of feistiness and vulnerability, and she and Peck play off well against each other. Is Lomax the biological father of Decky, as we infer from her mother placing her in his care . . . or not? The question becomes academic once each develops a soft spot for the other. In addition to the Nick Pinkerton commentary, the Blu-ray also includes the theatrical trailer and previews of other 1970s Westerns from KL Studio Classics.

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Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

BY JOHN LEMAY

Though this author has seen many Italian Westerns, for years I had avoided watching Navajo Joe because I had wrongly assumed it was an American Western due to its star: Burt Reynolds. Happily, I discovered that Navajo Joe is a solidly entertaining film. Reynolds stars as the title character, out for revenge after a gang of cutthroats massacres his tribe and scalps his wife. The rest of the film shows Reynolds hunting down the bandits and killing them one by one. Naturally, as this is a Spaghetti Western, Joe has a few anti-hero traits. When the same outlaw gang begins terrorizing the town of Esperanza, Joe dupes the townspeople into paying him to kill the gang, thus managing to profit from an act he was intending to carry out anyway (hence the film's Italian title A Dollar a Head). Though a solid film produced by Dino de Laurentiis, directed by Sergio Corbucci (Django) and scored by Ennio Morricone, Burt Reynolds often puts the movie down, stating that it could only be shown in prisons and on airplanes to truly captive audiences that couldn't escape. Supposedly the bad blood began when Reynolds misunderstood that he was to be working with Sergio Leone rather than Sergio Corbucci, and vice versa Corbucci initially hoped to cast Marlon Brando. Due to the mutual disappointment the director and his star didn't get along terribly well. The film was shot between two of Corbucci's other westerns, Johnny Oro (1966) and Hellbenders (1967). The camera work and direction for the action scenes are top notch and Reynolds himself was said to have done his own stunts, in addition to overseeing the stunt work on the entire film. Ennio Morricone (under the alias of Leo Nichols) composes another good score, with the main theme being the most memorable.

The picture quality on the Blu-ray, though not flawless, is good overall. Included in the special features is a commentary track by the Kino Lorber Senior Vice President of Theatrical Releasing, Gary Palmucci. In addition to the usual cast and crew backgrounds, Palmucci also offers up some interesting insights into running a company such as Kino Lorber and how they acquire their various titles. The Blu-ray also comes with a trailer for Navajo Joe and other Reynolds MGM/UA action films White Lightning, Gator and Malone.

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John LeMay is the author of several western non-fiction titles, among them Tall Tales and Half Truths of Billy the Kid. Click here to order from Amazon.

By Lee Pfeiffer

If you are a subscriber to Amazon Prime, you already know that the service is a goldmine of retro movies and TV shows that are included in the annual subscription fee. You have probably also noticed that there are independent movie screening services that you can subscribe to for separate fees and these can be played conveniently through the Amazon Prime app. These separate streaming services are usually built around a niche such as horror films, westerns, foreign films, etc. One of the apps I recently discovered is Screenpix and for a paltry $2.99 a month, you can access a wide range of retro movies that are not included in Amazon Prime's catalog. The service gives you a 7-day free trial and is also available through Roku, Apple TV, Fire TV and Playstation. Here are just some of the titles I glimpsed in browsing through the service:

• "Shout at the Devil"
• "The Professionals"
• "Fail Safe"
• "The Innocents"
• "Red River"
• "Marooned"
• "Bus Stop"
• "To Catch a Thief"
• "The Blob" (original)
• "Rollerball" (original)
• "To Catch a Thief"
• "Stagecoach" (original)
• "Born Losers"
• "The African Queen"
• "Return of Sabata"
• "Attack on the Iron Coast"
• "The Wild Angels"
• "Billion Dollar Brain"
• "Where's Papa?"
• "Witchfinder General" (aka "The Conqueror Worm")
• "Attack!"
• "The 1,000 Plane Raid"
• "Woman of Straw"
• "House of Usher"
• "The Longest Day"
  

By Hank Reineke

In his collection of 1997, Who the Devil Made It?: Conversations with Legendary Film Directors, Peter Bogdanovich, trumpeted that no one in the film industry, “had ever made good pictures faster or for less money than Edgar Ulmer. What he could do with nothing (occasionally in the script department as well) remains an object lesson for those directors, myself included, who complain about tight budgets and schedules.” Bogdanovich, who befriended Ulmer when the latter was in his seventies, reminded readers the director of such gems as Detour (1945) and The Black Cat (1934) was rarely given more than six-days to shoot any of his features.

Ulmer was an interesting character, an oft-cited ego-centric with high aspirations and boundless energy. Indie Hollywood producers found Ulmer a dependable craftsman who made the most of what he was given – which too often was a pittance. He occasionally made great films. To his credit, he never delivered anything less than an efficient film. In a 2014 study, Edgar G. Ulmer: A Filmmaker at the Margins, biographer Noah Isenberg, conceded his on-set mission of seeking “clear-cut answers” was futile: Ulmer’s personal and professional life was nothing if not a bewildering “straddle [of] truth and fiction.”

Though Isenberg exhumed every interview with the director he could find, he acknowledged one couldn’t “accept without qualification what Ulmer himself presented as the truth when he was still alive.” According to film historian Gary D. Rhodes, Robert Clarke, the actor/producer of Beyond the Time Barrier – one of a trio films included here on Kino’s new Blu ray issue of the Edgar G. Ulmer Sci-Fi Collection - considered the writer-director “something of a genius, but also a troubled, difficult person.”

Ulmer was, inarguably, partly responsible for some of his travails. Working at Universal as an art director and set designer in the early ‘30s, Ulmer was given the opportunity to direct the studio’s art-deco atmospheric horror The Black Cat with Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. But opportunities to helm future pictures for up-market Hollywood studios were derailed. Though married, Ulmer entered into a scandalous affair with a studio script supervisor – one already married to the nephew of Universal’s c0-founder, Carl Laemmle. The retribution for Ulmer’s affair-of-the-heart was his blacklisting from working at any Hollywood major. But as a filmmaker Ulmer was nothing if not resilient. He worked for the next thirty-odd years as a director-for-hire by independent producers and poverty-row studios.

As Bogdanovich noted, Ulmer was an able craftsman. He was a utilitarian director, successfully cranking out films in nearly every popular-market genre: westerns, gangster films, mysteries, adventure yarns - even the occasional comedy. Though the film noir classic Detour might be his greatest achievement, he is also beloved by fans of classic horror and sci-fi for a string of engaging pictures. He never approached films in the horror genre as toss-a-ways, stories unworthy of his talent. Though none of his subsequent horror pictures would ever match the iconic status anointed to The Black Cat, his occasional dabbles in “fantastic films” were solid efforts.

Some films were better than others. One especially well done was Bluebeard (1944, featuring John Carradine). Sometimes the films were simply off-the-charts exploitation fare as was Daughter of Dr. Jekyll (1957 with John Agar). His films tended to be, whatever their budgetary shortcomings, memorable. This new set from Kino offers fans a trio of his best sci-fi efforts: a well-regarded effort and two of the last films directed before his departure from the film business.

The “pick” of the set is, arguably, Ulmer’s The Man from Planet X (1951), a very early entry into the Silver-Age sci-fi film sweepstakes. It’s September 1950 and astronomers are puzzled by the sudden surfacing of “a strange astronomical phenomenon” which they describe as “Planet X.” The problem with Planet X is that its trajectory suggests it might be on a collision course with earth. The space craft lands somewhere in the gloomy, foggy moors of Scotland, not too far from the ancient, spooky watchtower where scientists Dr. Elliot and Dr. Mears (Raymond Bond and William Schallert, respectively) and journalist Jack Lawrence (Robert Clarke) just happen to be tracking Planet X’s path. Dr. Elliot’s daughter Enid (Margaret Field) is the unlucky first one to come face-to-face with the Man from Planet X, describing the alien as having a “ghastly caricature” of a human face. But now that he’s arrived on earth the question is why he’s here – and whether he’s friend or foe.

The Man from Planet X received a modicum of press interest in the last months of 1950. There were reports writer-producers Aubrey Wisberg and Jack Pollexfen’s modest Mid-Century production company was taking on a David vs. Goliath challenge. They were, after all, competing against a Hollywood big dog studio with their modest upstart picture. One month prior to the start of the filming of Planet X at Culver City’s Hal Roach Studio, Howard Hawk’s production of the iconic ‘50s sci-fi thriller The Thing was already in mid-production at RKO. Though tackling the same sort of space-invader subject matter, Planet X was scheduled to be shot – Ulmer-style – in six scant days with a budget of less than $50,000. As one Los Angeles daily noted the threadbare budget allotted “wouldn’t rate you a thing at RKO or any other film factory.” Perhaps not, but the hasty shooting schedule ensured The Man from Planet X would hit cinema screens long before than The Thing.

The producers of Planet X didn’t deny they had proceeded with budgetary economic caution since - they were two of the film’s principal investors and had a lot to lose. “As writers,” Wisberg defended to the L.A.’s Daily News, “we recognized and anticipated the time and budget limitations in our script in advance and are now able to cut corners on the set.” One such frugal measure was their re-using the “standing scenery” left erected of Ingrid Bergman’s Joan of Arc (1948) featuring Ingrid Bergman. (Much of the background scenery and effects in the film are comprised of impressionistic matte paintings and miniatures).

Following the film’s release, Pollexfen conceded while the film’s script was laden with a lot of scientific jargon, there was probably more fiction than science embroidered within. For starters, there was never a mention of exactly how far the visitor from Planet X had traveled to get his spaceship to earth. “We did it on purpose, he admitted. “If we had mentioned the distance some 12-year old with a slide rule would prove we were bums.” With its tight, seventy-one minute running time, The Man from Planet X proves to be a very serviceable thriller.

The scenario of the second film of this collection, Beyond the Time Barrier (1960) exploitatively springboards off the popularity of George Pal’s version of H.G. Well’s The Time Machine. The film was scripted by Arthur C. Pierce who brought us such other 50s and 60s low-budget sci-fi fare as The Cosmic Man (1959), Invasion of the Animal People (1959) and The Navy vs. the Night Monsters (1966). I really wasn’t expecting much from this film, but was surprised that, all things considered, it was actually a pretty decent futuristic adventure.

On March 5, 1960 Major William Allison (Robert Clarke), a research test pilot for the USAF, sets off on a jet that will straddle the border of earth’s atmosphere and outer space. The craft accidentally strafes the speed of light, catapulting Allison through the time barrier to the Citadel, a fortress protecting the inhabitants from a mutant population. The non-mutant population of the Citadel are all deaf and dumb – with the exception of the grandfatherly supreme leader (Vladimir Sokoloff) and his belligerent Captain (Boyd Morgan). Most of communication of the residents of the Citadel is done telepathically – a bit of bad luck for the bewildered test pilot trying to plot an escape.

Allison learns the year is now (gasp!) 2024. The residents are survivors of a plague brought on by cosmic radiation from too many nuclear explosions on earth. They are also part of a dying race. There have been no newborns in the Citadel in twenty-years since the plague left all of the men sterile. Among the last born were the supreme leader’s granddaughter Trirene (Darlene Tompkins), a nicely-formed ingénue. There’s a sort of cockeyed plan for Trirene to mate with Allison to promulgate the species. But that idea goes bust when double-crosses and carnage follow in the wake of the scheming scientists and rampaging mutants. There’s also a bit of a Twilight Zone twist to keep things interesting in the end. Despite the film’s low budget, Ulmer’s talents in art direction allows the film’s futuristic sets – all triangles, diamond-shapes and inverted pyramids – to give the film a glossy, moneyed appearance.

Clocking in a little more than 58 minutes, the final film of the set, The Amazing Transparent Man (1960), ties things up in perfunctory fashion – the running time adequate, I suppose, to tell its slim story. In 1959 the film’s screenwriter, Jack Lewis – whose previous scripting work was mostly of adventures and westerns – decided to try his hand at writing a science-fiction tale. His script, originally titled Search for a Shadow, was initially picked–up by indie Pacific International Pictures. Ulmer was tapped to direct the film – this time involving a master safe-cracker who is “sprung from prison by a ring of international spies.”

The spies are seeking copious amounts of atomic material X-13 so they can develop a ray that will transform an army invisible for the purpose of military supremacy. To that end Major Paul Krenner (James Griffith) and Laura Matson (Marguerite Chapman) orchestrate the escape of safe-cracker Joey Faust (Douglas Kennedy) to – under the cloak of invisibility - break into the government’s highly protected stores of fissionable material. Krenner is an unlikeable sort, manipulative and cold. It’s not clear whether he’s acting on behalf of a secretive U.S. agency or as a double-agent for a foreign power.

He’s assisted, under duress, by Dr. Peter Ulof (Ivan Triesault), an “eminent nuclear scientist” and developer of the special X-ray machine that turns both guinea pigs and escaped convicts invisible. Ulof is acutely aware of Krenner’s dark intentions, but is unable to do anything about it: his reasons for dutifully assisting in the Major’s schemes becomes evident as the film unspools. In the meantime, Faust incurs Krenner’s ill-will by enjoying an unsanctioned - but predictable – return to bank robbery – a side-benefit of his now being invisible. There are a few hand-to-hand combat tussles but little suspense as the tale unfolds. The story hastily wraps with Ulof’s breaking of the “third wall” with an earnest morality plea/request.

Lewis’s conjured invisible man/spy-ring scenario was intriguing but not without precedent. Curt Siodmak had already written a more successful variant of the idea for Universal during WWII. That film, Edwin L. Marin’s Invisible Agent (1942), didn’t cheat on the special effects as would The Amazing Transparent Man. Universal’s especial effects team (including the illustrious John P. Fulton) earned an Academy Award nomination for their work on this earlier project. The invisibility tricks as provided by special effects supervisor Roger George in Transparent Man are passable but not breathtaking.

To be fair, the script would undergo numerous tweaks. Ulmer and producers John Miller and Robert L. Madden liked the premise, but were not enamored with the script’s original title. Lewis reportedly offered them no fewer than twenty-three alternate titles, the filmmakers initially settling on The Invisible Invader. But this title too was tossed when Edward L. Cahn’s Invisible Invaders (1959, with John Agar and John Carradine) beat them to market. Other titles were bandied about (“The Invisible Thief,” “The Invisible Gangster”) until the whole “invisible” campaign was dropped in favor of The Amazing Transparent Man. Lewis’s script called for Faust’s character to - intriguingly - cast no shadow even when not in his invisible state. The screenwriter contended this element was quickly – and sadly - dropped when the filmmakers ordered him to “Take out the shadow part. The budget won’t stand all that special effects work.”

This new Kino Lorber Blu-ray set will obviously be of great interest to fans of Ulmer and 1950s/early 1960s vintage sci-fi. If you are a fan or collector of commentaries in particular then this release provides you with a bonanza of them. There are no hoary hack commentators present, these are folks who know what they’re talking about. The Man from Planet X features no fewer than three separate commentaries featuring the likes of Tom Weaver, David Schecter, Dr. Robert J. Kiss, Joe Dante, Gary D. Rhodes, Richard Harland Smith and Ulmer’s Daughter Arianne Ulmer Cipes. Weaver, Schecter and Rhodes do double-duty on Beyond the Time Barrier, with David Del Valle going it alone on The Amazing Transparent Man.

All three films are presented in their original black-and-white in 1920 x 1080p with DTS audio, Planet X in 1.37:1 and Time Barrier and Transparent Man in 1.85:1. The set also features the theatrical trailers for all three of the films and an option for removable English sub-titles. The films generally all look great, The Amazing Transparent Man looking a bit soft-focused in parts, but still better than anything we’ve seen so far of this title. Totally recommended.

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Klubb Super 8/ Eken Press

384 pages

Hardback

Published 2021

ISBN:? 978-9198677201

RRP: £25

BY ADRIAN SMITH

If cinema made us believe anything back in the mid-twentieth century, it was that those Europeans were getting far more sex than the rest of us. From Brigitte Bardot to Sophia Loren, from I – a Woman to I am Curious, films from Europe were somehow more adult, more daring and sexier. There was an “Ooh La La!” factor when it came to European cinema, and audiences did not always differentiate between a challenging black and white French New Wave film or a ‘commedia sexy all'italiana’. If it came from the continent there was an assumption that you would get to see far more than in British or Hollywood films. Post-war it was primarily French and Italian films that dominated this market, but gradually Sweden took the crown and Stockholm became the sexy film capital of Europe. Whereas the sophisticated French and Italian women all wore heavy makeup and expensive lingerie and looked glamorous and unattainable, Swedish girls seemed to be fresher, down-to-earth and more natural. There was something of the girl next door about them, perhaps becoming a more realistic prospect for the average man in the audience.

Although Rickard Gramfors is keen to point out in this excellent new collection of film posters that Swedish cinema was not all with angst and existential anxiety, Ingmar Bergman’s Summer With Monika in 1953 was one of the first to make the rest of the world aware of this sexy northern European nation. This is perhaps because it was distributed in America under the title Monika – the Story of a Bad Girl. Swedish films increased in popularity throughout the fifties and sixties, although it was a change in censorship law in 1971 that finally saw Sweden become one of Europe’s most prolific hardcore pornography production centres. The country became so synonymous with sex that the word ‘Sweden’ would often be inserted into film titles from other countries to spice them up, from Bob Hope’s I’ll Take Sweden to the Italian mondo documentary Sweden Heaven and Hell (now best remembered for the origin of the ‘Mah-na-Mah-na’ song later used in The Muppets). This book features many such examples.

Do You Believe in Swedish Sin? also demonstrates that it was not all just sex: Sweden’s growing film industry also produced action films, westerns (known as Lingonberry westerns!), horror, sword-and-sandal, comedies and even the occasional ninja epic.

As has been remarked upon before in Cinema Retro, the art of the film poster is not what it used to be, and this fabulous collection from the archives of Klubb Super 8, a Swedish vintage distribution company, shows us many great examples of just how good poster art was. As well as Swedish posters there are also examples from around the world, from fantastic hand-painted Italian locanda that manage to make everything look like a gothic masterpiece to eye-catching posters from the grindhouses of 42^nd Street. This is a book that will have you seeking out many of the fabulous-looking films covered. Fortunately for you, Klubb Super 8 have recently established a new streaming service called Cultpix, where indeed many of these films can now be viewed at the click of a mouse, from classics like Anita - Swedish Nymphet to sex education films such as The Language of Love. Cultpix also has cult films from all over the world in a range of genres, and it is growing all the time. It is a must-have subscription for anyone looking for something a bit different from the safer options on Netflix or Disney +.

With hundreds of posters and written commentary in English, Do You Believe in Swedish Sin? is an eclectic and engrossing poster collection for any serious movie buff. This glossy hardback book will add a touch of colour and Scandinavian glamour to any top shelf.

You can order a copy of Do You Believe in Swedish Sin? here: https://super8.merchants.se/en/article.php?art=181506235

You can explore what Cultpix has to offer here: https://www.cultpix.com/

BY FRED BLOSSER

John Sturges’ “Last Train from Gun Hill” was released in 1959 as one of several high-profile Westerns of its era, designed to lure audiences away from their television sets and back to their neighborhood movie theatres. Against TV’s advantage of free programming that you could enjoy from the leisure of your easy chair, films like “Last Train from Gun Hill,” “Warlock,” “The Horse Soldiers,” and “The Hanging Tree” countered with A-list stars, widescreen CinemaScope and VistaVision, Technicolor, and sweeping outdoor locations. The studios wagered, correctly, that viewers would welcome a change from the predictable characters, cheap backlot sets, and drab black-and-white photography of “Gunsmoke,” “Wagon Train,” and “Cheyenne.” The approach was successful, sporadically continuing through the next decade with expensive epics like “How the West Was Won” (1962), “Custer of the West” (1967), and “MacKenna’s Gold” (1968) before it collapsed from dwindling returns, scaled-back studio budgets, and changing popular tastes at the end of the 1960s.

As Sturges’ movie opens, two loutish cowboys chase down, rape, and murder a young Indian woman. Although the rape and murder occur offscreen, the lead-up is viscerally terrifying. In a bizarrely poor choice of words, Bosley Crowther’s review in the New York Times referred to the murderers as “scallywags.” At least in my lexicon, scallywags are mischievous kids who make prank phone calls, not perpetrators of a horrendous sexual assault. When the pair flee in panic after realizing what they’ve done, they inadvertently leave behind a horse and saddle. The murdered woman’s husband is Matt Morgan (Kirk Douglas), the marshal of the nearby town of Pawley, who immediately identifies the letters “CB” branded on the saddle. They’re the initials of Craig Belden (Anthony Quinn), a powerful rancher who controls Gun Hill, a community further down the railroad line. One of the murderers was Belden’s hired hand Lee (played by Brian Hutton, later the director of “Where Eagles Dare” and “Kelly’s Heroes”), and the other was Belden’s son Rick (Earl Holliman). When Morgan arrives in Gun Hill with arrest warrants, Belden first tries to convince him to go easy by reminding him that he and Craig were once good friends. After that doesn’t work, he resorts to intimidation. The cowardly local marshal refuses to help Morgan, unashamedly admitting that he fears the boss man’s wrath more than he respects the rule of law. (I’ll leave it to you to decide if you see a similarity to recent political controversies.) The other townspeople are chilly if not hostile, and when Morgan finally subdues Rick and handcuffs him in a hotel room, waiting for the arrival of the train back to Pawley, Belden surrounds the building with his army of hired guns.

The only person sympathetic to Morgan is Belden’s battered girlfriend Linda (Carolyn Jones). Even she believes the determined marshal faces overwhelming odds:

“You remind me of Jimmy, a fella I used to know,” she remarks. “Stubborn as a mule.”

“Next time you see Jimmy, say hello,” Morgan answers dryly. “We seem to have a lot in common.”

“More than you know. He’s dead.”

“Last Train from Gun Hill” originated with a story treatment by writer Les Crutchfield, expanded by James W. Poe with an uncredited assist from Dalton Trumbo, whom Douglas brought in to sharpen the dialogue. The exchanges between the characters, like the one quoted above, crackle with Trumbo’s signature style. Crutchfield contributed scripts regularly to “Gunsmoke,” and “Last Train from Gun Hill” unfolds like a traditional episode of the long-running series, dressed up with a little more complexity, a rape-murder that would never have passed network censorship, and a striking climactic scene that also would have run afoul of the censors. Standing up, Morgan drives a wagon slowly down main street to meet the arriving train. Rick stands beside him, handcuffed, with the muzzle of Morgan’s borrowed shotgun pressed up under his chin to keep Belden and his gunmen at bay.  When Dell Comics adapted the movie as a comic book at the time of the film’s release, it chose that scene as the cover photograph. As far as I know, the graphic come-on of imminent shotgun mayhem didn’t raise the ire of parents, educators, child psychologists, or media pundits in that distant year of 1959. Back then, of course, pervasive gun violence wasn’t the social catastrophe that it is today. In 2022, the comic book would surely raise a firestorm of controversy on social media and cable news.

“Last Train from Gun Hill” falls just short of a true classic, since the plot mostly relies on ingredients that we’ve seen many times before in other Westerns—the incorruptible lawman, the overbearing cattle baron, his bullying but weak-willed son, the old friends now at cross-purposes, the unfriendly town, the tense wait for a train—but Douglas, Quinn, and supporting actors Carolyn Jones, Earl Holliman, Brian Hutton, and Brad Dexter are at the top of their form, and Sturges’ no-nonsense direction keeps the action moving at a tense pace. The Blu-ray edition of the film from Paramount Pictures’ specialty label, “Paramount Presents,” contains a sharp, remastered transfer, an appreciative video feature with Leonard Maltin, and theatrical trailers. Even though “Last Train from Gun Hill” ran frequently on local TV channels in the 1970s and ‘80s, its visual quality there was seriously compromised by the broadcast format. Worse, endless commercial breaks disrupted Sturges’ masterful mood of mounting tension. Revisiting the production in its original, intended form, we may better appreciate its merits as classic Hollywood professionalism at its finest. Highly recommended.

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Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

The Power of the Social-Problem Programmer

By Dana Polan

Film historians like to connect Jack Arnold’s Man in the Shadow (1957) to Orson Welles’s Touch of Evil from the same year, produced both at Universal-International by Albert Zugsmith. Each revolves around a murder somewhere in the South or Southwest that ensues when a rich and prejudiced gringo capitalist tries to prevent a romance between his daughter and a Mexican man. Each involves an intrepid squared-jawed he-man law enforcement figure investigating that murder and fightin the obstructions of a racist megalomaniac played in both cases by Welles.

But the differences are instructive. For instance, in Touch of Evil, the Welles figure is, like the hero, a lawman, but in this case corrupt yet often getting the job done even as he bends the law to do so. In Man in the Shadow, in contrast, Welles’s character Renchler is an imperious cattleman (Virgil Renchler) whose ranch was the site of a killing he oversaw. He’s unremittingly corrupt from beginning to end. Touch of Evil then is about moral ambiguity – Welles’s Hank Quinlan is good cop and bad cop rolled up into one. Man in the Shadow is more certain of its morality: if, at the film’s beginning, Sherriff Ben Sadler (Jeff Chandler) has a somewhat jaded attitude to his job (he clearly couldn’t care a whit about the presumed killing of a Mexican bracero), he nonetheless pushes on in his inquiry and stands finally for ethical uprightness against the unambiguous immorality of Renchler. If Jeff Chandler once played Native Americans (Cochise in three films), thus crossing or confusing racial and ethnic lines, here he is the all-American, initially disdainful of the lowly Mexican workers but coming ultimately to defend their rights against fascistic Anglo over-reachers. Conversely, in Touch of Evil, the good cop, played by sculpted macho man Charlton Heston, is himself Mexican, a casting decision that has never made sense even as it adds to the weird fun of Welles’s film. And indeed Touch of Evil is weird in so many ways – curious acting, baroque editing, overwrought compositions, convoluted plot, and on and on.

Man in the Shadow in contrast is a straightforward 80 minute programmer shot in a generally sober style: after an initial act of excessive violence (the murder of the bracero in the shadows), the film settles down to offer a taut and tight morality tale played often in daylight (until a final battle that is dark in look but clear in moral stance) and in long takes that, instead of meandering like the ones in Touch of Evil often do, frequently remain implacably fixed on the action in order to take in the verbal sparring of Sadler and everyone who wants to prevent him from getting at the truth.

In this pared-down narrative of one intrepid man against the world, Man in the Shadow is in a lineage of other such films that came out the complex context of the 1950s. For instance, Sadler’s casting off of his badge when virtually no one in the town comes to his defense seems inspired by High Noon while the paranoid atmosphere of a modern Western town where deadly realities of racial violence are being hidden away by the villagers reminds one of John Sturges’s man-against-conspiratorial-community-nightmare, Bad Day at Black Rock. Yet, when an Italian barber announces his allegiance to Sherriff Sadler and explains that over in Italy, they tried to install a dictator in the 1920s and that’s why he prefers America, we can readily see that Man in the Shadow is going in a different direction than the paranoid narratives of the hunted hero alone against corrupt society. The barber is the first crack in the mindless devotion to fascistic conformity. Like, say, the Frank Sinatra Western Johnny Concho from the year before, Man in the Shadow ultimately shows itself devoted to the cause of liberalism as the townsfolk convert in their convictions and come to Sadler’s defense. This liberalism against a conspiratorial conformity takes on new relevance and resonance in today’s fraught political context as we see the townsfolk initially disdaining the Mexican workers as undocumented and othering them through xenophobic stereotypes while imagining whiteness as a fundamental decency. That the white commonfolk can evolve ideologically and overcome prejudice might well link the progressivism of Man in the Shadow to a key earlier film by director Jack Arnold, It Came from Outer Space, another liberal intervention into Cold War Culture that, similarly, is all about turning fear of the other into inter-cultural tolerance.

Filmed in CinemaScope black-and-white (like some other programmers just around this time), Man in the Shadow looks great on Kino Lorber’s Blu-Ray edition. The only special features are the original trailer (which, interestingly, pinpoints Sherriff Sadler and not Orson Welles’s seemingly respectable but fundamentally corrupt capitalist as the “man in the shadow”) and a breathless commentary track from movie critic Troy Howarth. To my mind, Howarth is a bit too enamored of character actors’ filmographies, enumerating at length the career and date of death for virtually anyone from within the film’s secondary cast, but he does offer helpful insights about the film’s genre affiliations: for example, Horwath’s perception that violence around a seemingly alien otherness insinuating itself into arid small towns is common to a number of Jack Arnold films enables us to see the xenophobia at issue in both Arnold’s Westerns and science-fiction.

Long unavailable (or available only in pan-and-scan), Man in the Shadow in Kino Lorber’s fine Blu-Ray edition offers anew a strikingly suspenseful social-problem film that offers a trenchant glimpse of the politics of its time.

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(Dana Polan is the author of "Dreams of Flight: 'The Great Escape' in American Film and Culture". Click here to order from Amazon

BY LEE PEIFFER

"The Rounders", the contemporary 1965 Western comedy, is available on Blu-ray from the Warner Archive. The film is primarily notable for the teaming of Glenn Ford and Henry Fonda, two estimable Hollywood stars who could be relied upon to play convincingly in both dark, somber dramas and frolicking comedies. "The Rounders" was directed and written by Burt Kennedy, who adapted a novel from by Max Evans. Kennedy was a veteran of big studio productions who worked his way from screenwriter to director. If he never made any indisputable classics, it can be said that he made a good many films that were top-notch entertainment. Among them: "Support Your Local Sheriff", "The War Wagon", "Hannie Caulder" and "The Train Robbers". While Westerns were Kennedy's specialty, he did have a prestigious achievement with his screenplay for Clint Eastwood's woefully under-praised 1990 film "White Hunter, Black Heart". It's not an insult to state that most of Kennedy's directorial efforts could be considered lightweight. They were not concerned with social issues and generally had a Hawksian emphasis on heroes who engaged in good-natured bantering ("The War Wagon" is the best example of this.) Those elements are in full display in "The Rounders" but the film never rises above the status of resembling an extended episode of a TV sitcom from the era. That isn't meant as a knock, considering how many good TV sitcoms were on the airwaves in 1965, but there is a rather lazy element to the production and one would suspect that an old pro like Kennedy probably knocked off the script over a long lunch. 

The film, set in contemporary Arizona, finds Ford and Fonda playing Ben Jones and "Howdy" Lewis (his real name is Marion, but he's too ashamed to admit it, which is a nice inside joke aimed at Fonda's old pal John Wayne, whose real name was Marion Morrison.) The two are middle-aged wranglers  who make ends meet by "breaking" and taming wild horses. It's a rough-and-tumble profession that inevitably results in them being tossed around like rag dolls as they ride atop bucking broncos. However, Ben and "Howdy" are still the best in their profession, although their meager wages have left them with no tangible assets beyond a beaten-up pickup truck. Local land baron Jim Ed Love (Chill Wills) hires them to spend the winter in a dilapidated cabin in the mountains in order to round up stray horses and keep them safe until spring. The assignment means enduring harsh weather and complete isolation, but the pair need the money so they accept. Since Fonda and Ford are the stars, there's no chance of this evolving into a "Brokeback Mountain" scenario and the two spend time gazing at a poster that depicts a ridiculously sanitized hula girl, a symbol of Ben's long-time dream of moving to a tropical island. Much of the script centers on their trials and tribulations in attempting to break a particularly rebellious roan horse that defies conforming to their commands. It gets personal with Ben, who decides that at the end of winter, he will buy the horse from Love for the simple pleasure of taking him to a soap factory. The two men survive the winter and head off (with roan horse in tow) to the big rodeo, a stop they make every year in order to supplement their income by winning bucking bronco riding contests. Along they way they have a chance encounter with two sisters who happen to be exotic dancers (Sue Ane Langdon and Hope Holiday). They are amiable bubbleheads but after the men have been in the mountains sans female companionship for many months, they can't resist attempting to woo them. The family-friendly  screenplay is quite timid when it comes to depicting adult sexual behavior. Ben and "Howdy" are understandably enticed by the vivacious sisters but they seem satiated by inducing them to join them in a moonlight skinny-dipping session, which is interrupted by a police raid. The climax finds the two partners attempting to use the unbreakable roan horse as a gimmick to lure local wranglers and riders to bet money they can best him. There's a bit of a con in their scheme, but as one might suspect, their plans go awry and they don't benefit from any ill-gotten gains. As you might also suspect, the roan horse earns Ben's respect and never makes it to that dreaded soap factory. 

That's pretty much the entire plot of "The Rounders", which is lightweight enough to resemble a celluloid wisp of smoke. If it's never boring, it's also never very engaging, as we keep expecting the script to provide some kind of creative or engaging plot device that never arrives. Still, it has its pleasures and Fonda and Ford exude real chemistry that elevates the proceedings substantially. There is also the wonder of the magnificent Arizona locations, a jaunty musical score by Jeff Alexander and a marvelous cast of reliable and familiar character actors that, in addition to the incomparable Chill Wills, includes Edgar Buchanan, Kathleen Freeman, Barton MacLane, Doodles Weaver and Denver Pyle. 

When the film was released, even MGM felt the production was rather lacking in commercial appeal. Village Voice critic Andrew Sarris, who gave the film some faint praise, justifiably took issue with the fact that the studio had buried "The Rounders" by placing it at the bottom of a double-feature with a forgettable teeny bopper musical, "Get Yourself a College Girl".  He said it must have been depressing for all involved to have a film headlining Glenn Ford and Henry Fonda play second fiddle to a movie that starred Mary Ann Mobley and Nancy Sinatra. He also praised Burt Kennedy, acknowledging that his often estimable contributions to the film business were generally overlooked. Unexpectedly, however, "The Rounders" proved to be a hit in its own right. It drew devoted fans in rural areas and on the drive-in circuit and ended up overshadowing the top-of-the-bill feature. It would even later be made into a television series starring Patrick Wayne, Ron Hayes and Chill Wills, reprising his role from the film. 

The Warner Archive Blu-ray does justice to Paul Vogel's impressive cinematography by providing a truly impressive and all-around gorgeous Blu-ray transfer. The release also includes the original trailer.  

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By Todd Garbarini

Film director Paul W.S. Anderson, not to be confused with film directors Paul Thomas Anderson or Wes Anderson, hails from Wallsend, North Tyneside, England and, like so many of his contemporaries, began shooting movies on Super-8mm in his youth. In his mid-twenties, he enjoyed professional success as a writer on the British series El C.I.D. Following the end of the show, he and producer Jeremy Bolt founded their own company, Impact Pictures and, after much toil, financed Shopping, which was released in the United Kingdom in 1994 and in the States in 1996. This put them on the map and brought him Mortal Kombat in 1995, a film based upon the popular video game of the same name. This led to the sci-fi/horror film Event Horizon, which is now available on 4K UHD Blu-ray, and it’s this film that I discussed with Mr. Anderson recently while he was promoting the release.

Todd Garbarini: I want to thank you for taking the time to speak with me and thank you also for the Resident Evil films. I enjoy those very much.

Paul W.S. Anderson: Me, too!

TG: How did you first see Ridley Scott’s Alien and what was the effect that it had on you?

PWSA: I saw [Sir] Ridley’s Alien when I was at school, and I saw it when I was far too young, and it terrified the living daylights out of me. I also had a real crush on Sigourney Weaver. So, it was a big, big impact. I had never seen a movie like it. I mean it was amazing, and the look of the alien and the alien spaceship, which I later realized was the work of [Swiss artist H.R.] Giger, was just spectacular. It was really like nothing I’d ever seen in cinemas before.

TG: I feel the exact same way. I was ten and-a-half years-old when Alien was released here in the States, two years to the day that Star Wars was released here…in fact, the financial success of Star Wars bankrolled Alien…and I was shocked to see that it was restricted to just adults! My parents would not take me to see it. Kenner had produced toys, games and puzzles in the stores based on the film. It took me another four years to see it on home video, but the power of that movie came through tremendously, even on a six-year-old 13” Sylvania television.

PWSA: I didn’t see it with my parents either. Like you, I had loved Star Wars and I thought, Wow, another space movie! Boy, was I wrong! (laughs)

TG: Was there one particular film that, or filmmaker who, compelled you to become a director?

PWSA: I can tell you that certain filmmakers have had a huge influence on me. Ridley Scott and Tony Scott in particular because I love their movies. I love the look of their movies and what their movies are about and how they are put together. They came from the same part of the Northeast of England as I did. I never knew anyone in the film industry, and no one made movies in the North of England. So, wanting to be a film director when I was growing up seemed like an impossible dream. But there were these two brothers who somehow managed to do it and they were very inspiring to me because of that. They didn’t know anyone in the film industry either. They built themselves from the ground up. I felt like I could do it as well.

TG: You derived inspiration from them.

PWSA: Exactly. Now, in terms of wanting to become a filmmaker, I used to watch a lot of westerns when I was a little kid. They used to have these things called “Saturday morning pictures” wherein your parents would drop you off at a cinema that was full of about 350 kids without any parental supervision. This would never happen today, and you would be there for about four hours to basically run riot while your parents went and did some shopping or went and had sex or did whatever they did on a Saturday afternoon without the kids around. Most of the kids were running around throwing popcorn at one another and beating each other up. I think I was one of the few kids who just sat and watched the movies. They showed a couple of Laurel and Hardy shorts because they were cheap and then some old westerns. I must have seen every John Ford western. John Wayne was my favorite actor because I watched all these westerns with him in them. I recall at the end of either The Searchers or Rio Bravo, I saw his name in the credits as they rolled and I suddenly made the link that he wasn’t a real cowboy, but rather an actor pretending to be a cowboy. Once I realized that movies were not reality and just recorded by a cameraman, that they were artifice, they were awesome and that’s what I wanted to do with my life. I had no idea how I was going to achieve that. I just knew that that’s what I wanted to do after seeing those amazing images on the big screen. That was the inception of me wanting to make movies.

TG: Do you consider yourself to be a genre director?

PWSA: Yes, I have worked almost exclusively in the sci-fi/horror genre. But like every director in the world, I want to direct a western. No studio wants to make a western, unfortunately, because they are just so uncommercial nowadays. I’m about to make a movie called In the Lost Lands based on a story by author George R.R. Martin [of Game of Thrones fame]. At its heart, it’s very much a western as it has all the iconography that one would associate with a western. It’s set in a post-apocalyptic land, so on the surface it’s not a western, but at its heart it is most definitely a western. It deals with a lot of western tropes and storytelling and imagery, so I am very excited to be doing that.

TG: I interviewed John Carpenter in 2010 and he is a big fan of westerns like yourself. When he came out of film school in the early 1970s, he really wanted to make one, but nobody was doing them in this country at the time. So, needless to say, he was very disappointed.

PWSA: Yes, but if you take a look at Assault on Precinct 13, the obvious influence of westerns is in that film.

TG: Yes, absolutely. I love how that film was edited by “John T. Chance” [the name of the sheriff that John Wayne plays in Rio Bravo]!

PWSG: Exactly! (laughs) And also people like Walter Hill, who was a big influence on me. I absolutely loved, loved The Driver and 48 Hours. But specifically, what I really liked about Walter Hill was when he was basically redoing the kind of Jean-Pierre Melville vibe of those French gangster movies. So, they had imported the American movies, and they did the French twist on them making them very existential, and then Walter Hill kind of reimported them back into America and didn’t bother giving the characters any names, which I absolutely love. So, for me Walter Hill is somebody who pretty much, with every movie he makes, is a western. Ironically, the films that work the least are actual westerns, but the ones that tend to work the best are these urban movies that are really westerns in disguise. So, I’m sort of hoping that it’s a “lightning strikes” moment for me when I do In the Lost Lands. It’s basically my western, but nobody will realize it!

TG: Event Horizon pits a lot of terrific actors in an ensemble piece, among them Sam Neill, Lawrence Fishburne, Jason Isaacs, and Kathleen Quinlan. Were they your first choices for their respective roles?

PWSA: Yes, it was a movie where I was very lucky that the studio was kind of willing to go with my personal choices. They never insisted that we absolutely had to have somebody who was a movie star who carried very big movies before. They were on board for doing the ensemble casting. I was very, very happy about it. It allowed me to get some really terrific actors together, playing roles that they didn’t traditionally play as well. Sam Neill at that point was very much in the minds of audiences as the heroic guy who saved the children from the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. He was up there with Tom Hanks as probably the actor whom the audience could trust the most.

TG: Yes. I recall seeing Michael Mann’s Collateral wherein Tom Cruise completely plays against type.

PWSA: Exactly. Sam Neill was still sort of the guy who could look after your kids. So, the idea that he would be the one who goes insane and tears his own eyes out, at that point in time it’s probably the type of role that you would have expected Laurence Fishburne to play. And then Fishburne playing sort of the heroic Captain as well, that was not really a role that he had played before. So, both of them are amazing performances but both of them were kind of stretching, but in a good way.

TG: Have you ever seen Sam Neill in a film by Andrzej Zulawski called Possession?

PWSG: No, I haven’t.

TG: It was shot in the summer of 1980 in Germany and was released the following year internationally. It made its way here to the States in a highly butchered version in 1983, but it’s one of the most bizarre, cinematic experiences that I’ve ever seen. You should catch up with it if you can. The uncut version is readily available now.

PWSA: I will!

TG: What are some of the challenges that you encountered in making Event Horizon that you hadn’t foreseen?

PWSA: It was just the compacted time that we had to actually make the film. That was a big challenge. You know, I was young, and I hadn’t made many movies so I didn’t really know what I was doing. I was up for a challenge at the time, but nowadays I would probably say, “Hey, wait a second, I don’t know if that’s really a good idea.” I had another movie to make right after Event Horizon and it was with Kurt Russell [Soldier (1998)] with Warner Brothers, so I had to finish Event Horizon on a certain date, so we had to start shooting early. So, for such an elaborate movie with so many big builds, and really complicated things, like the third containment being a real spinning, gyroscope that was thirty-five feet high, I mean, this was really complicated stuff to do in the time frame allotted. Then the production got even more compressed when Titanic fell out of the summer and Paramount announced that Event Horizon would be taking its place, and then suddenly I had only three to four weeks to actually do my first cut of the movie before we started testing it. Those were the logistical challenges. The actual making of the movie was just a delight. I loved being with those actors on those sets. I didn’t even mind the challenges, to be honest. Like I said, now I would think twice about doing certain things in the movie, but back then I was just up for it.

TG: Thank you for your time and best of luck to you with In the Lost Lands!

PWSA: Thank you!

(Thanks to Deborah Annakin Peters for her help in arranging this interview.)

BY JOHN M. WHALEN

Quentin Tarantino has said he thinks the worst American movies were made in the 50s and the 80s. He dislikes 50s movies because of their blatant censorship and 80s movies because the central character always had to be likeable. On the Joe Rogan Experience he pointed out the difference between a Bill Murray movie and a Chevy Chase movie made in the 80s. Bill Murray’s characters always started out as assholes but became likeable by the end of the film. “Chevy Chase movies don't play that shit,” Tarantino said. “Chevy Chase is the same supercilious asshole at the end of the movie that he is at the beginning.” He also decried the way movies in the 50s hardly ever cast Native Americans in Westerns.

All this is to say I’d bet Tarantino most likely would hate Kino Lorber’s Blu-Ray release of Universal International’s “Foxfire” (1955), starring Jeff Chandler and Jane Russell. Chandler was a hunky heart throb who rose to fame and fortune playing Cochise opposite Jimmy Stewart in “Broken Arrow” (1950), and again with Rock Hudson in “Taza, Son of Cochise.” Chandler was Jewish, but the public bought him as a Native American and even as half-Native American, which he plays in “Foxfire.” His character, Jonathan Dartland, is a mining engineering working in a copper mine in Lodestone, Ariz., who is ashamed of the fact that while his father was white his mother is an Apache. He hasn’t spoken to her in years even though she lives in a nearby Apache Reservation, where she conducts guided tours.

One day a tall brunette bombshell named Amanda Lawrence arrives in Lodestone from New York and gets picked up by Dartland and his alcoholic doctor friend Dr. Hugh Slater (Dan Duryea) when her car has a flat out in the desert. Despite the fact that Russell was 34 years of age when the movie was made, and you’d think would have more sense than a 17-year old, Amanda falls head-over-heels gaga in love at first site with Dartland. Which is hard to understand, since he’s such surly, morose guy who doesn’t interact well with others, especially if they get nosey about his Apache background. But Amanda will have her way and the day after a night of dancing and who knows what else, SHE proposes to HIM!. At first he tells her it couldn’t possibly work but next thing you know they’ve gotten hitched. Everybody’s there at the wedding, except of course his Apache Mama.

I guess they had to go through with it, even though is seems unbelievable that these two crazy kids would tie the knot so suddenly, but Universal International had been promoting the movie with the tag line: “JANE’S GOT JEFF!”. Which I suppose was a 50s version of the tag line that was used when Clark Gable came back to the movies after serving in WW II to star in “Adventure” (1945): “Gable’s back, and Garson’s Got Him!” With that line, “JANE’S GOT JEFF!”, there had to be a wedding, and of course all the plot that would come after it

One of the most bizarre twists in the plot comes when Amanda decides to take the bus tour out to the Apache village to meet Jonathan’s mother. She finds her with a group of tourists, giving them the historical lowdown on Apache customs. She speaks in a beautiful voice that has a nice Viennese accent! Saba, the Apache Princess, is played by Celia Lovsky, the Austrian actress whom you may best remember as T’Pau, the Vulcan matriarch in the famous Star Trek episode “Amok Time.”

“Foxfire” was directed by Joseph Pevney, who directed 14 episodes of “Star Trek,’ including the “Amok Time” episode. I guess Lovsky’s performance as Saba years earlier in 1955 made a lasting impression on the director, or maybe they were just good friends.

Also in “Foxfire” are Mara Corday, as Dr. Slater’s jealous nurse, who has a crush on Dartland; Robert Simon as Ernest Tyson, the man who owns the copper mine Dartland works in; Barton MacClane as Dartland’s foreman, and Frieda Inescort as Amanda’s mother. Dan Duryea give his standard booze-gobbling performance as the alcoholic doctor, who vies for Amanda’s attention.

Other than the love story, “Foxfire’s” secondary storyline concerns Dartland’s belief that the copper mine they’re working on has a shaft that could lead to a hidden Apache gold mine. Amanda helps Dartland convince Tyson to come up with the money for the exploratory work, which leads the film to one of those predictable mine cave-in disasters.

“Foxfire” has a couple of interesting factoids associated with it. First, it was the last film to be shot on three-strip Technicolor film, and the photography out in the Arizona desert by William H. Daniels is well transferred to Kino Lorber’s Blu-Ray disc. Second, although Frank Skinner composed the score for “Foxfire” the main theme played during the title credits was written by Henry Mancini, with lyrics written and sung by Chandler. And in case you want to know, “Foxfire” is what they call the phosphorescent glow that rise up at night from the rotting timbers in the mine shaft.

The disc comes with a theatrical trailer, and an audio commentary by film historian Kat Ellinger. It’s not a bad film. It has its flaws, but if you’re not as finicky as Tarantino, it’s always interesting to see these artifacts from a different era. “JANE’S GOT JEFF!”

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John M. Whalen is the author of "Tragon and the Scorpion Woman...and Other Tales". Click  here to order from Amazon

By Fred Blosser

Every career starts somewhere. In 1948, Rock Hudson’s began under contract at Universal International Pictures with bit roles like “second lieutenant” and “detective.” By 1953, thanks to his good looks, ambition, an influential agent, and shrewd beefcake publicity, he progressed to star billing in the studio’s assembly line of budget-conscious but colorful Westerns and costume adventures. By and large those productions are little remembered today, but they served two immediate purposes as they were designed to do. For Universal International, they made modest profits in movie theatres where weary working-class families flocked on weekends for splashy Technicolor entertainment. For Hudson, a novice actor, they provided valuable on-the-job training and popular visibility—prerequisites for better paying, more prestigious film credits to come.

Three of those journeyman films were “Seminole,” “The Golden Blade,” and “Bengal Brigade,” available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber Studio Classics, in a boxed set as a “Rock Hudson Collection.” If you’re a younger viewer who wonders what Grandma and Grandad did for movie escapism before Marvel Comics and Tom Cruise, these will give you a good idea. Viewers with the time and stamina may decide to watch the entire set in one binge sitting of 255 minutes. If so, one thing will become apparent. Even spread across three genres, the storylines and casts don’t differ much. In the studio system of the early Eisenhower years, Universal International could make its B-movies quickly and cheaply by rushing its contract players like Hudson from one backlot set to another in formulaic scripts.

In “Seminole” (1953), the actor stars as Second Lt. Lance Caldwell, an Army officer who hopes to avert a war with the Seminole Indians of 1835 Florida. But his superior officer, Major Degan (Richard Carlson, effectively cast against type as a bristly martinet), has other ideas. When Degan and Caldwell lead an expedition into the swamp to confront the Indians, the troop is ambushed. Captured, Lance finds that the Seminoles have their own split between pacifists and war-mongers. Lance’s friend, Chief Osceola (Anthony Quinn), wants to sign a treaty even if it means uprooting the tribe. An influential warrior, Kajeck (Hugh O’Brian), won’t settle for anything less than armed victory over Degan and his troops. With the Army routed, the territory’s white settlers will clear out fast.

Like most 1950s Westerns, the plot is generic. Except for the Everglades setting, the Seminole might as well be Apache, Cheyenne, or Sioux, played by white actors in body paint. Indian wars are the fault of hot-heads on both sides, not the result of orchestrated land-grabs by the U.S. government as was usually the case in real life. The swamps are a combination of on-location footage in the Everglades and a backlot set where Hudson dutifully slogs through bogs and creeks with supporting players James Best, Russell Johnson, and another actor who started small and ended big, Lee Marvin. Those scenes give director Budd Boetticher and his cast a chance to flex some macho muscle, even though the studio swamp looks about as sweltering and nasty as a Magic Kingdom theme park. Hudson and Boetticher would go on to better Westerns, Hudson with Robert Aldrich’s “The Last Sunset” and Boetticher in five iconic pictures with Randolph Scott.

“The Golden Blade” (1953) puts Hudson in familiar Arabian Nights

surroundings as Haroun, a merchant’s son from Basra who travels to Baghdad to avenge his father’s death in an attack by bandits. In fact, the “bandits” were assassins secretly dispatched by Jafar (George Macready), the caliph’s scheming vizier, to provoke a war between the two cities. This is part of a scheme by Jafar that also includes promoting a marriage between his loutish son Haji (Gene Evans), the captain of the palace guard, and Princess Khairuzan (Piper Laurie). Once Haji becomes regent, agents from “Basra” will murder the caliph and the princess, and Haji will inherit the throne as Jafar’s puppet. Haroun is under-matched against Haji, the greatest swordsman in Baghdad, until he finds a magic sword in the medieval Baghdad equivalent of a Goodwill thrift shop.

Given that Piper Laurie had recently made two almost identical films with Tony Curtis, “The Prince Who Was a Thief” (1951) and “Son of Ali Baba” (1952), “The Golden Blade” was already familiar material by 1953. Some scenes were lifted from an even earlier Universal production, 1944’s “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves,” a common cost-saving tactic by the studio in the early 1950s. Minus the sword fights, there isn’t a lot of difference, either, between “The Golden Blade” and your eight-year-old's favourite, “Disney’s Aladdin”; even the villainous viziers in both movies are named Jafar. It’s easy to make fun of old-fashioned B-level swashbucklers like this, but the director, Nathan Juran, mounts the action scenes well, and the Technicolor reds, greens, purples, and blues are sumptuous in their hi-def clarity. Casting Gene Evans as the secondary bad guy may seem like an odd call, since most of us fondly remember the veteran character actor for scores of Westerns and war dramas, but Evans’ bullish persona gives the character a knowingly humorous edge. When Piper Laurie’s spirited princess complains, “Men are able to roam freely, while we women are trapped in the harem,” the harried housewives of 1953 probably agreed.

Hudson landed the starring role in “Bengal Brigade” (1954) after Tyrone Power turned down the part; Power had already played a similar character in 20th Century Fox’s “King of the Khyber Rifles.” At a siege of a rebellious native fort in 1856 India, British Captain Jeffrey Claybourne disobeys an order by Colonel Morrow (Torin Thatcher) to retreat under heavy fire, attacking instead. Claybourne’s company of native Indian soldiers had walked into an ambush, and the captain’s action saves their lives at the cost of his military career and his engagement to the colonel’s daughter (Arlene Dahl). Claybourne resigns and knocks around India as a big-game hunter (on a jungle set likely repurposed from the swamp in “Seminole”), when he’s approached by a devious Indian rajah (Arnold Moss). The rajah is gathering a private army for an uprising against the British, and he offers the disillusioned Claybourne a well-paid commission to train his recruits.

Although British rule in India ended in 1947, the movies continued to celebrate the “sun never sets” colonial tradition into the 1950s and even beyond. If you expect that “Bengal Brigade” will cue the opening notes of “Rule Britannia” from the studio’s stock library of music, you’ll be right on the money, and you won’t have to wait long. Given today’s wide availability of Indian actors, the old practice of hiring whites to play native Indians seems outdated and demeaning, but you’d have come up empty in 1953 to find a Priyanka Chopra or Irrfan Khan in central casting. The only exceptions here are performers Sujata and Asoka Rubener in a brief, non-speaking dance routine. At that, Arnold Moss as the rajah and Michael Ansara as Claybourne’s native sergeant offer more nuanced performances than the Rule Britannia music might suggest. Anyway, before you attack old Hollywood for its insular ways, just remember that even today, few Steven Spielberg fans wince at the unvarnished chauvinism of “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.”

The “Rock Hudson Collection” includes theatrical trailers for all three films and fine audio commentary on two of them by Nick Pinkerton (“Seminole”) and Phillipa Berry (“The Golden Blade”).

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

"Young Billy Young" is the kind of film of which it can be said, "They don't make 'em like that anymore". Not because the movie is so exceptional. In fact, it isn't exceptional on any level whatsoever. Rather, it's the sheer ordinariness of the entire production that makes one pine away for an era in which top talent could be attracted to enjoyable, if unremarkable, fare such as this. Such films, especially Westerns, were churned out with workmanlike professionalism to play to undemanding audiences that didn't require mega-budget blockbusters to feel they got their money's worth at the boxoffice. Sadly, such movies have largely gone the way of the dodo bird. In today's film industry, bigger must always be better and mid-range flicks such as are no longer made. However, through home video releases such as Kino Lorber's Blu-ray of "Young Billy Young" and streaming services such as Amazon Prime, it's possible to still enjoy the simple pleasures that such movies provide.  

The story opens with botched robbery in Mexico committed by Billy Young (Robert Walker) and some cohorts including Jesse (David Carradine). The plan to steal horses from the Mexican military goes awry and Billy is forced to split from his fellow robbers with the army in hot pursuit. Making his way back across the border to New Mexico, he is penniless and desperate. He has a chance encounter with Ben Kane (Robert Mitchum), a tough, sarcastic older man who he encounters again in a nearby town. Here, Billy is being cheated at cards by the local sheriff, who goads him into a gunfight. Billy ends up killing him but stands to be framed for the sheriff's death. He's saved by Ben, who rides along with him to another town where Ben has agreed to take on the job of lawman. Ostensibly he is there to keep order and collect back taxes from deadbeats but in reality, he is on a mission of revenge. Some years before, Ben's son had been gunned down by a criminal named Boone (John Anderson) and Kane has learned that Boone is a presence in the new town and that he is being protected by a local corrupt businessman, John Behan (Jack Kelly). Ben makes his presence known immediately by enforcing the law in a strict manner. He's confronted by Behan, who tries to intimidate him. This results in Behan being slapped around by Kane. Behan also grows to resent the new lawman because he is flirting with his mistress, saloon entertainer Lily Beloit (Angie Dickinson). When Behan abuses her as punishment, he gets another beating from Kane. Meanwhile, Billy runs into Jesse and accuses him of having deserted him in Mexico. The two men fight it out and Jesse is later involved with the accidental shooting of the town's beloved doctor while in the employ of Behan. Kane learns that Jesse is Boone's son and holds him in jail as bait for Boone to come out of hiding. The plan works all too well. Boone turns up with a small army and lays siege to the jailhouse where Kane and Billy are holed up.

"Young Billy Young" was compared to a TV show by New York Times critic Howard Thompson on the basis that it contains so many standard elements of westerns from this time period. There is the bad girl with the heart of gold, the evil business tycoon, the brash young gun and his wiser, older mentor, the heroes outnumbered by superior forces and a lovable old coot (played against type by Paul Fix in full Walter Brennan/Gabby Hayes mode.) Yet somehow it all works very well, thanks mostly to Robert Mitchum's stalwart presence. With his trademark ramrod stiff walk and cool persona, Mitchum tosses off bon mots like a frontier version of 007. Even the Times acknowledged that "Mitchum can do laconic wonders with a good wise-crack". He has considerable chemistry with Dickinson, though the action between the sheets is more implied than shown. Robert Walker Jr. acquits himself well in the title role and David Carradine makes an impression even with limited screen time. The film was directed by Burt Kennedy, an old hand at directing fine westerns in reliable, if not remarkable, style and it all culminates in a rip-snorting shoot-out that is genuinely exciting. The fine supporting cast includes Willis Bouchey, Parley Baer and Deanna Martin (Dino's daughter) in her acting debut.  One oddball element to the film: Mitchum croons the title song over the opening credits. If this sounds strange, keep in mind that Mitchum improbably once had a hit album of calypso music. 

The film is currently streaming on Amazon Prime

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Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

First 4K Ultra HD in the Paramount Presents Line Debuts May 17, 2022
with New and Legacy Bonus Content

One of the greatest Westerns in cinematic history arrives for the first time ever on 4K Ultra HD with High Dynamic Range (HDR) as part of the Paramount Presents line when THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE debuts May 17, 2022 from Paramount Home Entertainment.

Four-time Academy Award®-winning^* director John Ford brought together an all-star cast for what is considered by many critics to be a quintessential—and yet pioneering—Western late in his storied career.  Starring James Stewart and John Wayne (together for the first time), alongside Vera Miles, Lee Marvin, John Carradine and Lee Van Cleef, THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE tells the engrossing story of a senator (Stewart), his old friend (Wayne), and a despicable outlaw called Liberty Valance (Marvin). 

THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE was selected in 2007 for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”  Adapted from a short story by Dorothy M. Johnson, the screenplay by James Warner Bellah and Willis Goldbeck gave us the often-quoted line “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”

Meticulously remastered in stunning 4K Ultra HD for its 60^th anniversary this year, THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE is presented in collectible packaging featuring a foldout image of the film’s original theatrical poster and an interior spread with key movie moments.  The release also includes access to a Digital copy of the film and a Blu-ray Disc™ with a new Filmmaker Focus featuring film historian Leonard Maltin discussing John Ford, the film, and its legacy.  The Blu-ray™ also includes legacy bonus content as detailed below:

· Filmmaker Focus - Leonard Maltin on The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance—NEW!

• Feature commentary by filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich, along with his archival recordings with John Ford and James Stewart                                  
• Selected scene commentary with introduction by Dan Ford, along with his archival recordings with John Ford, James Stewart and Lee Marvin                                  
• The Size Of Legends, The Soul Of Myth                                 
• Chapter 1: Changing Of The Guard                                           
• Chapter 2: The Irascible Poet                                     
• Chapter 3: The Hero Doesn't Win, The Winner Isn't Heroic                                            
• Chapter 4: Most Things Happen By Accident                                       
• Chapter 5: The Great Protector                                 
• Chapter 6: Spotlight - Lee Marvin                                             
• Chapter 7: Print The Legend                                       
• Original Theatrical Trailer           

About Paramount Presents

This collectible line spans celebrated classics to film-lover favorites, each from the studio’s renowned library.  Every Paramount Presents release features never-before-seen bonus content and exclusive collectible packaging.  Additional titles available in the Paramount Presents collection on Blu-ray include: Fatal Attraction, King Creole, To Catch a Thief, Flashdance, Days of Thunder, Pretty In Pink, Airplane!, Ghost, Roman Holiday, The Haunting, The Golden Child, Trading Places, The Court Jester, Love Story, Elizabethtown, The Greatest Show on Earth, Mommie Dearest, Last Train From Gun Hill, 48 HRS., Another 48 HRS., Almost Famous, A Place in the Sun, Nashville, Bugsy Malone, Breakdown, The Sheik, Vanilla Sky, Ragtime, Harold and Maude and Ordinary People.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

It isn't often that you might expect to read the word "delightful" in a review of a Charles Bronson movie but "From Noon Till Three" is just that: a delightful 1976 send-up of the traditional Western genre. In fact it seems like this was the year in which numerous revisionist Westerns were released. They included "Buffalo Bill and the Indians", "The Outlaw Josey Wales", "The Missouri Breaks" and John Wayne's final film, "The Shootist". By 1976 Charles Bronson was an established screen presence for about two decades.He was a familiar face to American movie-goers who liked his work as a supporting actor but it was the European market that elevated him to star status. Bronson finally began to get top-billing in Westerns and action films and became reasonably popular in America. But it was the 1974 release of his smash hit "Death Wish" that saw him soar to the level of superstar. The film was a mixed blessing. Bronson made some good films in the following years but eventually succumbed to the lure of a quick pay check, cranking out low-end urban crime movies that were often as absurd as they were over-the-top. "From Noon Till Three" allows Bronson and his real life wife and frequent co-star Jill Ireland a rare opportunity to flex their comedic muscles, which they do impressively. 

Bronson plays Graham Dorsey, a member of small time gang of bandits who are riding into a one-horse town to rob the bank. The film's opening is quite eerie as the bandits become unnerved when they discover there isn't a single living soul anywhere in the town. This sets in motion a "Twilight Zone"-like beginning that is quickly explained as a nightmare Dorsey is suffering, but is nonetheless quite effective for grabbing the viewer's attention.  When the gang nears the actual town, Dorsey's horse goes lame and must be shot. He rides double with another bandit until they reach the opulent mansion house of Amanda (Jill Irleand), an attractive widow who resides in the countryside with only a maid and servant as companions. When the bandits arrive on her doorstep, she is home alone and is understandably filled with anxiety being in the company of the men, who demand she give them a horse. She lies and says she doesn't have one- and Dorsey validates her story, opting to stay behind at the house while the robbery takes place. He finds Amanda very desirable but none-the-less acts like a gentleman- though as her tough facade fades, she becomes susceptible to his charm. Dorsey claims he suffers from incurable impotence, a ploy that works when Amanda finally volunteers to "cure" him. This results in the pair spending several heavenly hours together enjoying sexual adventures and falling in love. When word reaches Amanda that Dorsey's fellow bandits have been captured, she implores him to try to save them from hanging. Dorsey pretends to ride to their rescue, but instead bushwhacks a traveling con man and adopts his identity. The other man is mistaken for Dorsey and shot dead by a posse. Dorsey is ironically arrested because the man he is impersonating is also wanted by the law. Got all that? Things get really complicated when Dorsey spends a year in prison, studying (ironically) how to be a banker. He intends to return to Amanda and live their dream of moving to Boston, where he can get a job as a bank manager. When he returns to the woman he has been obsessing over for the last year, the reception he receives from her is something less than welcoming. Seems that since she believed Dorsey was dead, she set about memorializing him in a memoir titled "From Noon Till Three", a scandalous record of the hours in which they made love and fell in love. In the book, Amanda relates tall tales about Dorsey's crime exploits that he had previously bragged about...and she takes a bit of intentional creative license by describing him as an elegant, dashing man when, in fact, he looks like what he is: a saddle tramp. To say much more would spoil the fun. Suffice it to say that the film really kicks into gear when Dorsey discovers that Amanda's memoir has become an international sensation and she is idolized worldwide by both men and women. She doesn't have much incentive to now admit that Dorsey is not only alive and well but also falls considerable short of the handsome hunk the world has come to imagine.

"From Noon Till Three" is stylishly directed by Frank D. Gilroy and its based upon his novel of the same name. Gilroy had the magic touch in terms of bringing out the best in both Charles Bronson and Jill Ireland, both of whom rarely had an opportunity to demonstrate their flair for light comedy and they are both terrific. Gilroy, who also penned the screenplay, took advantage of a new era of cynicism in major films and "From Noon Till Three" proved to be far ahead of its time in predicting how the general public can be bamboozled into believing urban legends if they are marketed creatively enough. (Coincidentally, Paddy Chayefsky's "Network", released the same year, took an equally cynical view of the current day  TV news industry.)  The movie is a wealth of small pleasures and unexpected plot turns and boasts a fine score by Elmer Bernstein and impressive camerawork by Lucien Ballard, not to mention an impressive mansion house set by Robert Clatworthy. I don't want to overstate the merits of the film but I do want to point out that even if you're not a Bronson fan you should give this one a try.

"From Noon Till Three" is currently streaming on Amazon Prime. 

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BY JOHN M. WHALEN

Northrop Frye’s “Anatomy of Criticism” maintains that all stories are about a quest for identity. Identity, he maintains, is derived from one’s position in society and in stories with a happy ending. A character starts out in isolation but eventually finds his place in society. That’s the story of the young hero who rises from obscurity, finds the girl of his dreams, overcomes obstacles and lives happily ever after. Tragic stories are about characters who start out with an established identity but lose it for one reason or another and end up totally isolated or dead. Like Macbeth or Hamlet.

Kino Lorber Studio Classics recently released a double feature on Blu-Ray of a couple of low-budget westerns from the 50’s starring Anthony Quinn that surprisingly, despite their humble origins, demonstrate pretty clearly what Frye meant. “The Man from Del Rio” (1956), and “The Ride Back” (1957) are not your typical westerns.

“The Man from Del Rio” is the story of two people more or less isolated from society. David Robles (Anthony Quinn) is a Mexican gunslinger newly arrived in the town of Mesa, Kansas. When we first see him he’s drunk and waiting on a bench on the side of the street until a man named Dan Ritchy (Barry Atwater) rides into town. Robles kills him in revenge for Ritchy killing his family five years ago down in Del Rio. Robles is wounded and taken by Sheriff Jack Tillman (Douglas Spencer) to the doctor’s office. Robles has “a flesh wound” and is bandaged up by Estella (Katy Jurado), a Mexican woman who works for Doc Adams’ (Douglas Fowley). She’s more or less established her identity as the doctor’s assistant and housekeeper, but feels some sense of isolation nonetheless because she’s a Mexican.

Dirty and unshaven, Robles tries to put some moves on her, but she rejects him. He leaves the doctor’s office and encounters Ed Bannister (Peter Whitney), the owner of the only saloon in town. He takes him to the saloon and buys him drinks, telling him he ought to be angry with him. He had just hired Ritchy as part of an armed force he wants to use to take over the town. Dodge and Abilene aren’t the wild towns they used to be, he says, and he figures to turn Mesa into a new Sin City with him in charge. He offers Robles Ritchy’s job. Robles demurs but then three more desperadoes that Bannister sent for ride into town. Billy Dawson (John Larch), his brother George (Mark Hamilton), and Fred Jasper (Guinn “Big Boy” Williams), come into the saloon and invite Robles to drinks when they learn he killed Ritchy.

Robles whoops it up with the three outlaws who treat him like an old friend, but after a while he tells Bannister he’s leaving. On his way to his horse he spots Estella outside the doctor’s office and decides he needs the doc to take another look at his gunshot wound. The doctor is out so Robles tries again to get her to warm up to him but she’s having none of it. There’s a commotion out in the street. They go outside and Estella reacts in horror as she sees the Dawson brothers and Jasper throw a rope around Sheriff Tillman and hoist him up on a rafter in front of the saloon. Estella runs to help the sheriff, but Billy Dawson grabs her, throws her across his saddle and starts to ride off with her. Robles tries to stop them and Billy draws his gun and Robles kills him and the other two as well.

This is where the film gets interesting. Left with no lawman to protect them and with Bannister threatening to hire more guns and ruin the town for his own benefit, the townspeople offer Robles $100 a month and a place to live in the back of the jail if he’ll take the sheriff’s job. Robles sees the offer as a way to continue his pursuit of Estella and accepts. For the moment it appears the outcast has found a place in the community. Even Estella is kinder to him after he’d rescued her. However, she allows him to get no closer to her. When he tells her he’s a better man now. He’s got a job, money and a place to live. But she reminds him of his real place in Mesa. “Have you ever gotten rid of rats in a house?” she asks. “You throw a snake into it and lock the door. But when the rats are gone do you keep the snake around?”

The turning point in the story comes when the town holds a dance. Everybody is enjoying themselves until the new sheriff shows up, all clean and slicked up. First they stop him at the door and tell him to check his gun and hat. There’s an awkward silence as everyone watches him and moves away from him as he approaches. He asks one of the women to dance and she runs for the punch bowl. Estella watches as the community gives Robles the cold shoulder. He finally gets his hat and gun and goes outside to share a bottle with Breezy (Whit Bissell), the town drunk.

Estella comes out from the dance and asks him why he doesn’t leave. “Have you no pride?” she asks.

Robles tells her that she is the only reason he has stayed in Mesa.

“You think I want you?” she asks.

“Don’t you?” Robles replies.

The scene ends with Robles slapping her and lurches off in a drunken rage to have a final confrontation with Bannister.

“Man from Del Rio” was made in 1956 and in these scenes with Katy Jurado we see both the savage side of Quinn, reminiscent of his performance as Zampano in Fellini’s “La Strada”, as well as the vulnerability he displayed in “Requiem for a Heavyweight.” I’m not saying “The Man from Del Rio” is a film of that caliber, but it is fascinating to watch these two performers bring a level of intensity to what could have been a run-of-the-mill B-movie western or TV movie. Directed by Harry Horner, who mostly directed episodes of TV series like “Gunsmoke” and “Lux Playhouse,” and written by Richard Carr, who spent 30 years grinding out scripts for episodes of TV shows from “Richard Diamond, Private Detective,” to “Johnny Staccatto,” “The Man from Del Rio” manages to transcend its TV show origins and achieve something better. It’s a fascinating film. Do Robles and Estella manage to find a place for themselves in this world? Come on now. That would be telling.

“The Ride Back” is the second low budget Anthony Quinn western presented on this KL Blu-Ray double bill, and is another story that fits Frye’s definition of story as the quest for identity. In this case Quinn plays Bob Callen, a half-Mexican outlaw wanted for the killing of a man in Texas. William Conrad, best known as the heavyset star of the “Cannon” TV series, plays Chris Hamish, the sheriff sent South of the Border to arrest him and bring him back for trial. That’s a pretty commonplace storyline, except that in this case Hamish is anything but the usual lawman. The fact is he doesn’t really want to go to Mexico. As we find out in the ensuing story, Hamish has been pretty much a failure all his life. He’s never been successful at anything, has no friends, even his wife hates him. But he took the job to prove once and for all that there was at least one thing he did right in his life. He was going to bring a killer back from Mexico and make him stand trial.

Callen on the other hand has no such self-doubt. He’s got a strong sense of who he is and what he can do. He’s popular and has friends and when Hamish catches up with him, he finds him shacked up with a hot Mexican beauty named Elena (Lita Milan), who’s so crazy about him she tries to kill Hamish. Failing that she stalks them on the way back to the border and tries to set her man free when they camp for the night. Hamish prevents that from happening, puts her in the custody of a border guard and proceeds north with Callen in shackles.

On the way they encounter Apaches and come upon a ranch house where an elderly couple and their daughter are found dead. After they bury the dead, Hamish discovers another survivor, another little girl (Ellen Hope Monro) the twin of the dead one. Her purpose in the story is to show how quickly she responds to Callen’s emotional personality, while running away from Hamish, whose anger only frightens her. Needless to say there comes a point in the story where the two men have to face themselves for the first time, and make life or death decisions that affect not only themselves but the nameless little girl as well. Are they really the men they think they are?

“The Ride Back” was a Robert Aldrich production, directed by Allen H. Miner, veteran of hundreds of television series episodes, include five episodes of the classic “Route 66” series. (In fact, do yourself a favor and find copies of “Route 66” episodes “Cries of Persons Next to One,” starring Michael Parks,” and “The Stone Guest,” possibly two of the best dramatic stories to ever air on commercial television.) “The Ride Back” may sound a little like “3:10 To Yuma” but it was originally written by Antony Ellis as a script for the “Gunsmoke” radio series, which featured Conrad as Matt Dillon. Conrad produced the film. It was obviously a passion project for him and Quinn and Cannon give two strong, masculine performances. Lots of action and lots of emotion.

This KL Studio Classics Blu-Ray has no bonus features other than the original trailers and trailers for other KL releases. The black and white prints for both films are very good, presented in 1080p with a 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The mono soundtracks are clear and tight. Recommended.

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John M. Whalen is the author of "Hunting Monsters is My Business: The Mordecai Slate Stories" . Click here to order the book from Amazon)

BY FRED BLOSSER

“Binge-watching” is a relatively recent addition to our vocabulary, thanks to 24/7 streaming TV channels, but the concept itself isn’t new. On summer weekends in the 1970s, drive-in theatres offered the same opportunity for immersing yourself in cheap, all-night entertainment. There, you’d binge not on multiple episodes of “Peacemaker” or “Walking Dead” but instead on their Disco-era equivalent: triple or quadruple features of B-Westerns, soft-core sex comedies starring ex-Playboy Centerfolds, Kung-fu imports, and populist vigilante dramas.

Back then, one film on the bill in scratchy, tinny celluloid might have been “God’s Gun,” starring Lee Van Cleef. In the 1976 Western, now available on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber, an outlaw gang led by Sam Clayton (Jack Palance) sweeps into town, demolishes the saloon owned by pretty Jenny (Sybil Danning), and kills a man at the poker table. Jenny is furious when the cowardly sheriff (Richard Boone) refuses to go after the outlaws as they ride out. The local Catholic priest, Father John (Van Cleef), follows instead, and brings back the murderer, Clayton’s nephew Jess, on his own. This provokes more mayhem as the outlaws return, break Jess out of jail, gun down Father John, and go on a further rampage of rape and murder. The sheriff still prefers to keep a low profile, so Jenny’s son Johnny (Leif Garrett) sets off for Mexico. There the boy intends to find Father John’s twin brother Lewis, a retired gunfighter, and bring him back to restore peace in Juno City. Those scenes give Leif Garrett nearly as much screen time as Lee Van Cleef. This was probably welcomed by the young actor’s rising fan base of thirteen-year-old girls in 1976. By Van Cleef’s leathery old fans, not so much.

“God’s Gun” was designed to look like a Spaghetti Western, still a viable if fading genre in the mid-'70s, even to the extent of reuniting Lee Van Cleef with director Gianfranco Parolini (alias “Frank Kramer”) from “Sabata” and “Return of Sabata.” Parolini employs many of the stock techniques from his earlier Westerns, including sudden close-ups when characters are shot, skewed camera angles from the victims’ perspective as they fall dead, and noisy saloon brawls. In reality, the movie was produced in Israel by Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who would later head the Cannon Group in the 1980s. Golan and Globus followed a simple, commercially successful formula — take a popular genre, commission a marginally functional script with plenty of action, headline two or three well-known actors, hire an experienced B-list director, and keep the remaining overhead as low as possible. Many B-movies try to finesse their cheap budgets, but “God’s Gun” doesn’t bother. The Western costumes look like remainders from the Party Store, Van Cleef is burdened with a bad toupee and goatee, one exterior set doubles as two towns, and it’s painfully obvious that neither Van Cleef nor Boone dubbed themselves in post-production. The secondary casting is comparably haphazard. As Alex Cox notes in his audio commentary for the Blu-ray, Palance’s skinny, curly-haired bad guys look more like “a bunch of hippies” than bloodthirsty frontier desperadoes. Not that any of this would have mattered in your 2 o’clock stupor as you watched “God’s Gun” at the bottom of a drive-in triple-feature in 1976.

Kino Lorber presents “God’s Gun” in a remastered 2K edition at a 1.85:1 aspect. The picture looks a little soft, but it’s probably the best the studio could do with the materials at hand. Besides Alex Cox’s droll, savvy commentary, the Blu-ray includes reversible cover art from the original movie posters, as well as the vintage theatrical trailers for “God’s Gun” and other Lee Van Cleef Westerns on Kino Lorber’s backlist. If you’re in a nostalgic mood for a 1970s drive-in experience, you could do worse than select “God’s Gun” and two or three others from the KL catalog.  Augment with a couple of stale hot dogs and watery Cokes, fill your TV room with the heady scent of week-old popcorn, and then sit back and enjoy.

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Fred Blosser is the author of "Sons of Ringo: The Great Spaghetti Western Heroes". Click here to order from Amazon)

With the passing of each year, movie lovers must come to grips with the loss of so many film industry professionals. However, 2021 was especially harsh when it came to alumni of the Western movie genre. The YouTube channel A Word on Westerns presents a moving tribute to 26 talented professionals who were associated with the genre. Sadly, they all left us in 2021 but their memories will live forever through their fine work.

By John M. Whalen

It’s a story line that’s been used in dozens of Western films. Two long-time friends who grew up together, later split up and take different paths—one follows the straight and narrow and becomes a lawman and the other turns into an outlaw. Fate decrees that one day they will have to meet in a showdown. It usually ends with the outlaw lying face down in the dirt and the sheriff sad and bitter about it all, wondering if it was all really worth it.

In 1973 two films with that plot were released within a month of each other. In May, Universal released “Showdown” starring Rock Hudson and Dean Martin, the last film directed by veteran helmsman George Seaton (“Miracle on 34^th St.,” “Airport”) and the last western that Martin (“Sons of Katie Elder,” “Rio Bravo”) would star in. A month later, in June, MGM released “Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid” directed by Sam Peckinpah, starring Kris Kristofferson and James Coburn. It would be Peckinpah’s last turn at a western. While the two films have similar stories, they couldn’t be more different in tone, style, and execution. “Garrett” is a revisionist masterpiece that, along with Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” changed the western forever. “Showdown,” on the other hand, is a remnant of, and a kind of elegy for, a bygone era of Hollywood moviemaking. Kino Lorber has released a Blu-Ray edition of the film.

“Showdown” tells the story of Chuck Jarvis (Rock Hudson) and Billy Massey (Dean Martin), two guys who grew up together in Cumbres, New Mexico. Chuck is the straight and narrow one, and Billy is something of a gambler and a pretty fair hand with a gun. He likes to play the ocarina too. They get along fine until Kate (Susan Clark), who runs an eatery in town, enters the scene. Screenwriter Theodore Taylor throws a touch of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid into the mix by showing them in a series of flashbacks as three good friends, hanging out, enjoying each other’s company, just like Butch, Sundance and Etta. But when Chuck and Kate decide to get married, Billy packs up his ocarina and splits the scene, eventually winding up on the old Outlaw Trail. Chuck and Kate settle down on the ranch that they bought with money Billy won in a sharpshooter contest, and Chuck eventually becomes the sheriff in Cumbres.

Years later, unaware that Chuck is now the Sheriff in Cumbres, Billy rides back into the territory as part of a gang that robs a train. There’s trouble when the gang divides up the loot and they try to cheat Billy out of his fair share. Billy is forced to kill the brother of gang leader Art Williams (Donald Moffett) and rides off with all the loot. Williams vows to track him down. Back in Cumbres, when Chuck is told that Billy has robbed a train he reluctantly sets out with two Indian guides to track him down. While he’s gone, Billy shows up at the ranch. Kate still has a warm spot for old lovable Billy, and she hides him from the Williams gang until Chuck gets back. In an odd bit of dialogue for a western, at one point Billy tells Kate he thinks she thinks that he doesn’t like her. Kate winces a bit.

“It isn’t that,” she says. “I just stepped in between Damon and Pythias.”

“Who are they?” Billy asks.

Kate replies: “A vaudeville act. They play the better saloons.”

The reference to the Greek legend about two friends who face the ultimate test of friendship seems to go over Billy’s head, but given Dean Martin’s own personal experience of a long term friendship with a certain famous comedian, and the rumors that the reason they split up was because their wives didn’t get along, the theme strikes a strange chord. When Chuck tracks Billy back to his own ranch, the friends are briefly reunited. They concoct a half-baked plan that they think will keep Billy from going to prison and the next morning Chuck takes him to town and locks him up temporarily. Things might have worked out except for an ambitious prosecutor (John McLiam) who is determined to see Billy hang.

“Showdown” wasn’t very well received when it was released. Most critics wrote it off as a tired, cliché-ridden western with two stars who had seen better days. It’s true that both Martin and Hudson are a little long in the tooth for their parts, and they don’t seem to put much energy into their performances. But Martin, at least, had excuses. He was going through a painful divorce during the filming and one of the beloved Andalusian horses that he raised had recently died. So who could blame him if he wasn’t up to par in this film? Hudson was busy with his “MacMillan and Wife” TV series. (He actually filmed an episode of the series on the “Showdown” location with director George Seaton playing himself.) The weariness of the two leads actually gives “Showdown” weight and  significance. It’s like witnessing a Tinseltown version of the twilight of the gods, the end of the old way of making movies and telling stories. This was the end of an era when we had movie stars and big lavish productions in widescreen and stereophonic sound playing on huge neighborhood movie screens all over the country—big movies filmed in real places, not a special effects factory.

Lazlo Kovacs’s cinematography is magnificent. Using Todd-AO 35 cameras, he fills the screen with wide vistas, bright, colorful sweeps of the northern New Mexico scenery, with the Sierra Madre Mountains looming in the distance. Every frame, except some interior shots, is in deep focus with distant mountains and foreground figures in clear, sharp detail. The 2.35:1 aspect ratio makes you feel like you can breathe deeper just looking at it. This is why Blu-Rays matter. This film plays quite often on the Encore Westerns Channel. But it is cropped to 1.85:1. In that format, it makes no impression at all.

The climax of the film is set in a forest fire, with Chuck and Billy and the outlaw gang in pursuit of each other, finally ending in a totally burnt-out, black and charred landscape. What more fitting setting for the death of a genre? It can be argued that the traditional western declined and fell during this period of filmmaking. “Showdown” was one of the final casualties of the genre, however  there would still be a few classics released including "The Outlaw Josey Wales and "The Shootist". 

Kino Lorber’s transfer of “Showdown” to Blu-Ray is excellent. This is a disc you want to own if you just want to show off what your big-screen 4k High Definition TV can do. Colors are rich. None of that monochrome palette that Ridley Scott is so fond of. The sound on the disc is mono, which is too bad. David Shire’s score, featuring a repeated theme played on an ocarina, is wistful, alternately peppy and lonesome. Extra features include an informative audio commentary by film historians Howard S. Berger and Steve Mitchell, and a trailer for “Showdown” and half a dozen other features available on KL discs.

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John M. Whalen is the author of "Hunting Monsters is My Business: The Mordecai Slate Stories" . Click here to order the book from Amazon)

“WONG FEI-HUNG AND THE CRITERION TREASURE”

By Raymond Benson

What character in cinematic history has appeared in the most films? Our friend the Internet says that Sherlock Holmes holds the record, followed by Dracula. However, most people outside of Asia might not realize that possibly third on the list is a Chinese martial arts practitioner and physician named Wong Fei-hung, who was a real person who lived mostly in the Canton area from 1847-1925. Wong became a cultural folk hero in his native country, spawning literature, comics, television series, and many, many films.

Wong Fei-hung (Wong is the surname, so in the West he would be Fei-hung Wong) has been known in fictional settings as Huang Fei-hong, Huang Fei Hong, Wong Fei Hong, and in this recent series as Wong Fei-hung. The actor most associated with the character in China is Tak-Hing Kwan, who made over 75 films between the 1940s and 1980s. Kwan is to Wong Fei-hung as Sean Connery is to James Bond. For many, Kwan is Wong. The titles to these movies invoke those of old serials, and they always begin with Huang Fei-hong… (e.g., Huang Fei-hong and the Courtesan’s Boat Argument or Huang Fei-hong’s Fight at Foshan).

However, other actors have portrayed the character in more recent years—Gordon Liu, Andy Lau, and Jackie Chan. Most recently, the actor Jet Li is associated with the role in director Tsui Hark’s extremely popular film and television series produced in Hong Kong in the 1990s.

Tsui (again, his surname) is one of the giants of the Hong Kong film industry. He began his career in the 1970s and worked on many films as director, writer, producer, and other capacities. He eventually started his own film company and became a major player in the region. In the early 90s Tsui decided to resurrect Wong Fei-hung in an updated, more politicized series of pictures that reflected a subtext of the anxiety felt by the Hong Kong people about the upcoming handover from Britain to China in 1997.

Thus, Once Upon a Time in China, as it was known in the West (in Cantonese the title is simply Wong Fei-hung), was unleashed in 1991 and proved to be a huge success. Jet Li, who was already a star on the Chinese film scene, moved to Hong Kong and solidified his standing along the likes of other martial arts superstars like Jackie Chan. The film’s triumph was such that the green light was given to make a sequel in 1992, Once Upon a Time in China II, followed by III in 1993. Jet Li dropped out of the series for the next two, IV (1993) and V (1994), and was replaced by Vincent Zhao (credited on screen as Zhao Wen Zhuo). Tsui Hark co-produced and co-wrote all five pictures, and he directed the first, second, third, and fifth. IV was directed by Yuen Bun. The five movies were then followed in Hong Kong by a five-episode television series called Wong Fei-hung, also starring Vincent Zhao as Wong. For a coda, a sixth film, Once Upon a Time in China and America was made in 1997, was directed by Sammo Hung, and Jet Li returned to the role of Wong one last time.

The overall theme in the series is one of nationalism. Unlike most high-action martial arts films produced in Hong Kong in the 90s, the Once Upon a Time series is overtly political, emphasizing how foreigners (i.e., Britain, the U.S., Europeans) invaded China and corrupted centuries-old cultures and traditions. Hence, in most cases, the villains in the films are the foreigners, although often the bad guys are also Chinese religious cults aiming to undermine not only foreigners but the current government.

The Criterion Collection has released a magnificent box set of the six feature films, plus a ton of supplements. Each movie takes place in the late 1800s (early 1900s in the last film) during the Qing Dynasty. Wong lives in a town called Foshan and runs a martial arts and Chinese medical clinic. He is surrounded by recurring characters who, while adept at martial arts and participate in the amazing action sequences, are there mainly for comic relief. A major recurring character is Leung Foon, played in the first picture by Yuen Biao, and from then on by Max Mok. Both Wong and Leung’s love interest is Yee Siu-kwan, more commonly addressed in the series as “13th Aunt” because of a complicated familial relationship to Wong. She is always played by Rosamund Kwan throughout the series. Wong himself is a serious guy who is honest, patriotic, and loyal. As played by Jet Li (and by Zhao as well), he is a dynamo at kung fu. For this reviewer’s money, he could take on Jackie Chan any day of the week and it would be troubling to decide upon whom to bet.

The films in the set:

Once Upon a Time in China (1991; Directed by Tsui Hark). A superb picture that won several of the Hong Kong Film Awards (their equivalent to the Oscars) of its year—Best Director (Hark), Editing (Marco Mak), Action Choreography (Yuen Cheung-yan, Yuen Shun-yee, Lau Kar-wing), and Original Score (James Wong). The main title theme song, based on a Ming Dynasty folk song, “A Man of Determination,” became the running theme for the entire film series and a popular hit tune. The song has long been associated with Wong Fei-hung, even before Tsui’s series. Here it is sung by George Lam (in the second feature it is sung by none other than Jackie Chan over the end titles). The film was nominated for Best Picture, Cinematography, Art Direction, and Supporting Actor (Jacky Cheung, as “Bucktooth”). The story involves Wong and his team battling a gang that operates like a mafia, terrorizing businesses in Foshan, as well as the corrupt American officials who plan to kidnap Chinese women and export them back to the U.S. as slaves (i.e., prostitutes). Although this first feature in the series is a little too long (134 minutes), it introduces all the ongoing characters, establishes the mix of action, comedy, and melodrama, and is full of visual spectacle.

Once Upon a Time in China II (1992; Directed by Tsui Hark). This reviewer ranks the second feature as the absolute favorite among the bunch. Replacing Yuen Biao with Max Monk as Leung Foon, who is Wong’s main sidekick, is an improvement. The story is tighter and not so all over the place as it was in the first picture. Wong and company travel to Canton to attend a medical conference, where they meet real-life political figure. Dr. Sun Yat-sen (Zhang Tielin). A dangerous religious cult, the White Lotus Sect, threatens not only the foreigners in the region, but also any Chinese who believe in progress or moving away from outdated traditions. Everything in the movie works, and the fight scenes are especially inventive and exciting. The historical perspectives involving Sun Yat-sen are also engaging. While there is no evidence that the real Wong Fei-hung ever met the real Sun Yat-sen, it’s entirely possible because their lives overlapped.

Once Upon a Time in China III (1993; Directed by Tsui Hark). This one provides a change of scenery as Wong and his team travel to Beijing to participate in a “lion dance” competition. Although made in Hong Kong, the film’s art direction convincingly creates landmark locations in Beijing, such as the Forbidden City. A Russian acquaintance of 13th Aunt, Tomanovsky (John Wakefield), supplies romantic conflict as well as antagonist duties. There are also rival gangs in the competition who aim to cheat to win, and Wong must dispel these challenges to his honor. It’s not as engaging as the first two—it feels as if we’ve seen much of it before. It’s also not surprising that Jet Li decided to leave the series after this production. Still, for fans of the films, it provides enough of the goods to entertain.

Once Upon a Time in China IV (1993; Directed by Yuen Bun). Vincent Zhao replaces Jet Li as Wong, but the rest of the cast remains the same. Rosamund Kwan and her character is absent, but she is replaced by her sister, “14th Aunt,” played by Jean Wang. In this one, Wong participates in an international lion dance competition, and there’s another fanatical religious cult, the Red Lantern Sect, this time made up entirely of women. In many ways, IV is a repeat of III, and the production values seem cheaper. Most interesting is the new dynamic of the romantic trio between Wong, Leung, and 14th Aunt.

Once Upon a Time in China V (1994; Directed by Tsui Hark). Hark must have decided to direct again due to the disappointing IV. Rosamund Kwan is also back as 13th Aunt, but Wang as 14th Aunt is still present, creating an even more romantic whirlwind conflict among the characters. A big improvement over IV, this picture features Wong and company moving to Hong Kong, where they join forces with the local government to battle pirates who are cutting off supply routes.

Once Upon a Time in China and America (1997; Directed by Sammo Hung). This one seems like an afterthought, although it is unique and entertaining in its way. Jet Li returns to the role of Wong Fei-hung, and this time the team travel to America and the Wild West in the early 1900s. Think Back to the Future Part III, as the Chinese characters are fish out of water, dealing with cowboys, outlaws, and Native Americans. The movie was made in the U.S., too, and there are scenes in Monument Valley and other locations identified with Hollywood westerns. It’s mindless hokum, but different enough from the others that it’s still enjoyable.

The first two films in the Criterion Collection set have 4K digital restorations, and new 2K digital restorations for the others, all presented in original Cantonese theatrical-release sound mixes in uncompressed monaural or stereo (the latter available as a choice for the first two films). Supplements abound on each of the six disks in the box. There are too many to list here; suffice it to say that there are new interviews with Tsui Hark, editor Marco Mak, and others, as well as vintage interviews with Jet Li and Tsui. A new interview with critic Tony Rayns is essential viewing for a background to the Wong character and the series. There is much more, including a master class given by martial arts choreographer Yuen Wo-ping, making of featurettes, behind-the-scenes footage, and deleted scenes. Essays by film critic Maggie Lee and novelist Grady Hendrix are included in the booklet.

The final word—Criterion’s Once Upon a Time in China—The Complete Films is a must-have package for fans of Hong Kong cinema, Jet Li, Tsui Hark, and martial arts extravaganzas.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

In Cinema Retro's never-ending quest to analyze relatively inconsequential movies, the trail takes us to Dirty Dingus Magee, one of Frank Sinatra's last starring feature films. The movie shocked critics when it opened in 1970 due to the trivial of the production. Time has done nothing to enhance its reputation and one can only wonder what possessed Sinatra to star in this tepid Western comedy. In reality, Sinatra's passion for movie-making was also tepid. He always preferred to concentrate on his singing career and regarded acting as a time-consuming sideline. His penchant for rarely approving a second take became legendary. Nevertheless, he was undeniably one of the cinema's great icons. Prior to Dirty Dingus Magee, Sinatra had shown good judgment with the majority of the films he made during the mid-to-late Sixties. There were some misguided efforts but Von Ryan's Express, Tony Rome, Lady in Cement and The Detective were all quality productions in which he acquitted himself very well. All the more puzzling as to what attracted him to the MGM Western that seemed cursed from the start. 

Seldom has so much talent been squandered on one modestly-budgeted movie. The film was directed by Burt Kennedy, an old hand at bringing highly entertaining Westerns to the silver screen. (i.e The War Wagon, Support Your Local Sheriff, The Train Robbers, Hannie Caulder.) The screenplay was co-written by Catch-22 author Joseph Heller and the talented cast includes George Kennedy, Michele Carey, Anne Jackson, Jack Elam, Lois Nettleton and Harry Carey Jr. Yet it all adds up to a lively but inconsequential trifle that would have been designed for the bottom of double feature bills at drive-ins had it not been for Sinatra's name above the title. He plays the titular character, a low-rent outlaw who engages in an endless cat-and-mouse game with newly-appointed sheriff Hoke Birdsill (Kennedy). The two men relentlessly track each other down and alternately deceive and rob the other. The razor-thin plot has something to do with local madam Anne Jackson trying to start an Indian uprising to prevent the local U.S. Cavalry unit from relocating, thus ensuring the demise of her bordello.

It's unconscionable that as late as 1970 Native Americans could be portrayed in such a racist fashion on screen. The dialogue afforded them is of the "Me-Tarzan, You-Jane" variety and the tribe is presented as a bunch of childish imbeciles. Michele Carey is cast as Dingus's Indian maiden love interest but she is relegated to prancing around in a short buckskin outfit and enduring endless interrupted attempts to get it on with Dingus. The "palefaces" don't fare much better. Anne Jackson is channeling Shelly Winters as the obnoxious madam who spends more time screamin' than screwin'. Even old stalwart Jack Elam is completely wasted, as are a number of other generally reliable old coots who populated Westerns during this era. Sinatra seems uncomfortable throughout. Adorned by a distracting Beatle-type wig, he is constantly upstaged by George Kennedy, who provides whatever modest pleasures the film affords. Kennedy has a knack for playing broad, slapstick comedy that Sinatra never acquired.The movie's cheap production values extend to some of the worst rear screen projection I've ever seen in a major movie, and that includes Marnie.

At this point in his career Sinatra said he had grown bored with show business. He even went into self-imposed retirement for a couple of years before re-emerging and admitting that doing nothing was even more boring. He enjoyed remarkable success in the ensuing years and won a new generation of fans. Sadly, his work in films all but evaporated. After the poor reception accorded Dirty Dingus Magee, he only had one other starring role- ten years later in the underrated thriller The First Deadly Sin. His fine performance in that film stands as a stark reminder of what he could have accomplished in films in the latter part of his career had he concentrated on challenging projects. Dirty Dingus Magee is worth acquiring on DVD- but only to witness one of the most misguided ventures of Old Blue Eyes' career.

Them region-free DVD contains the original trailer.

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BY JOHN M. WHALEN

We all know Roy Rogers, King of the Cowboys, as famous for his colorful fringed shirts and hand-tooled boots as he was for his ability with his fists, guitar and shooting iron. He was the epitome of Hollywood’s concept of a fantasy hero in a west that never was, as far from reality as director William Witney and writers like Sloan Nibley and Gerald Geraghty could make him. He made over 80 feature films basically playing himself, and became an icon that will live on beyond the memory of any of us. He stopped making feature films in 1952, but spent five more years turning out over 100 episodes of the Roy Rogers TV Show. He sort of retired after that, making occasional appearances on TV and at rodeo shows, but in 1975, at age 64, in what may have been an attempt at a comeback, he returned to movie making and turned out a film far removed from any of those he’d done before.

He said he wanted to make a movie in a modern setting with a more realistic character but one who lived by the same values he’d always upheld. The movie was called “Mackintosh and T.J,” and was a bold departure for Roy. No fancy shirts, no Trigger, the smartest horse in the movies, no more songs around the campfire with the Sons of the Pioneers. The title character, Mackintosh, is a 64-year-old former rodeo cowboy, a drifter, traveling the country in a broken down pickup truck, a loner looking for work of any kind wherever he can find it. He’s like Sam Peckinpah’s Junior Bonner (Steve McQueen), only older and with fewer options. He’s no longer able to work the rodeo circuit, but he’s not angry about it and doesn’t feel sorry for himself. He takes life as it comes and deals with it best he can, without bitterness or regret.

The action of the story begins when Mackintosh stops in the town of Dickens, Texas, pop. 300, to put water in his truck’s leaky radiator. He spots a 14-year-old boy being run out of town by a local cop. He later runs into him down the road in a market where a grocer is about to catch him trying to steal some apples. On an impulse he steps in, telling the grocer they’re together and pays for his groceries as well as the apples. Screenwriter Paul Savage doesn’t provide much background information at this point about Mackintosh to explain why he decides to protect the boy, but it’s apparent he sees something of himself in the lad. T.J. (Clay Obrien) tells him that he is on his own on his way to “see the Pacific Ocean.” Mackintosh offers to take him at least part of the way, if he wants a ride.

As they travel, we learn that T.J. has been pretty much on his own for most of his young life. He’s got a cocky attitude, and tells Macintosh he always pays his own way. He seems to have a pretty cynical view of life for a kid. Mackintosh tells him, “What you see depends on how you look at it.” When a truck honks at them while passing, T.J. tells Mackintosh he doesn’t like being passed by anybody. He wants to be number one. But Mackintosh tells him those who get there first usually spend a lot of time just waiting for the rest of us to catch up. “That’s what time does to you. Waters down the vinegar in your bite.”

They split up temporarily when Mackintosh’s truck has a breakdown in the middle of nowhere and T. J. accepts a ride from a passing stranger. They meet up a few days later in a bar, where Mackintosh stops for a steak, and is surprised to see T. J. working as a bus boy. “Making fifteen dollars washing a stack of dishes higher than your hat,” the boy tells him. There’s trouble when a tough, drunken cowboy named Cal (Luke Askew) accuses T.J. of stealing money he’d left on his table. When Cal tries to rough him up, and make him pull out his pockets to prove he didn’t take the money, Mackintosh steps in between them. He tells Cal to back off and asks T.J. if he didn’t take the money why doesn’t he prove it by doing what he asks.

“I don’t have to,” the boy says. “I told him I didn’t and that ought to be enough.” Cal grabs the boy but Mackintosh knocks him to the floor. The drunk pulls a switchblade, and the next thing you know Mack has a ketchup bottle in his hand and smashes it against the cowboy’s head!

Hold on a minute! Roy Rogers just got into a bar fight and smashed a drunk in the head with a ketchup bottle!!? What?? I told you this wasn’t your usual Roy Rogers movie. There are several other themes that are dealt with in “Mackintosh and T. J.” that must have raised the eyebrows of more than a few Roy Rogers fans back in 1975. The story also deals with Maggie (Joan Hackett) a battered wife. Mack’s concern for her turns her husband Luke (Billy Green Bush) into a jealous maniac, which becomes a plot element further on. Also in the mix is Coley (Andrew Robinson) one of the ranch hands where Mack and TJ find jobs. He’s a pervert, a Peeping Tom who gets his kicks climbing up the side of Maggie’s house at night and watching her undress. Robinson has played his share of weirdos in his career and is best known as the killer Scorpio in “Dirty Harry”. You take a jealous husband and a peeping Tom and throw Roy Rogers into the middle of it and you’ve got a set up for some real trouble.

Perhaps it’s the mix of these unusual story elements and casting choices that resulted in “Mackintosh and T.J.” never really being given decent distribution. It only played in a few theaters south of the Mason-Dixon Line. I doubt if many people reading this review have ever heard of this movie much less seen it. And actually it’s too bad. Because it’s a very good movie—one that should have been given a chance to find an audience. Rogers’ performance as Mackintosh is low key and solid, and you never doubt for a minute that he’s real. Clay O’Brien, who was only 14, grew up to be a ProRodeo Hall of Famer and had already starred in two John Wayne westerns, “The Cowboys,” (1972), and “Cahill: U.S. Marshall,” (1973). Askew and Green are the quintessential “gold ol’ boys” you’d find in any good western, and James Hampton (The Longest Yard) as Cotton is decidedly nasty as a ranch hand with a gossip’s tongue who spins the various plots elements together into a vicious web with Mackintosh caught in the middle. Perhaps the biggest surprise in the film is the appearance of Joan Hackett in the cast. Her part is not quite developed enough for her to do much with, but she adds a quiet dignity to the film.

Director Marvin Chomsky, best known for his work in television, particularly “Brotherhood of the Rose,” (1989) and “Holocaust,” (1978), made some excellent choices in the way he and director of photography Terry K. Meade shot “Mackintosh and T.J.” Filmed entirely on location around Guthrie, Texas and on the famous 6666 ranch, the camera really captured the wide expanse of the ranch and the surrounding country, while at the same time focusing in close on the characters and the drama that unfolds. Another plus is the soundtrack, written and played by Waylon Jennings with an assist on one tune by Willie Nelson.

MVD Entertainment Producer Steve Latshaw deserves credit for rescuing “Mackintosh and T.J.” from obscurity. The film is presented in a beautiful 4K restoration that does justice to the images as they were captured on film. The color is rich and textured. It’s a pleasure to watch.

“Mackintosh and T.J.” is a film worth seeing, and the Blu-ray disc, which is loaded with extras, including interviews with some of the cast members by C. Courtney Joiner, is a keeper. Too bad Roy never got to do another “realistic” western after this one. But at least it’s good that this one time we get to see the King of the Cowboys as he was in his later years. The same as he ever was. Highly recommended.

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BY DOUG OSWALD

Rock Hudson is a former World War II fighter pilot struggling with a crisis of conscious and faith in “Battle Hymn,” released on Blu-ray for the first time by Kino Lorber. Hudson is Lieutenant Colonel Dean Hess, a minister in a small town in Ohio haunted by his accidental bombing of an orphanage in Germany before the end of the war which killed dozens of children. He resigns as the church minister and returns to active duty at the start of the Korean War in 1950 as commander of a squadron training Korean pilots. There he believes he’ll find meaning in what he knows best, flying military aircraft, and perhaps make amends for the death of innocent children which has haunted him for the past five years. Deacon Edwards (Carl Benton Reid) tries to convince him he’s needed at the church. His wife, Mary (Martha Hyer) is not happy, but he assures her he’s only training Korean pilots, not fighting in the war.

Colonel Hess meets the members of his squadron and we get to meet familiar faces from movies and television starting with his cigar chomping First Sergeant, Master Sergeant Herman (Dan Duryea), who’s able to scrounge up anything they need to provide them with all the amenities starting with a road grater to prepare the old runway for the ten P-51 fighter planes about to arrive. Other members of the squadron include his WWII wing man, Captain Dan Skidmore (Dan DeFore), Major Frank Moore (Jock Mahoney who is probably best remembered as Tarzan in two films in the 1960s), Lieutenant Maples (James Edwards who may be most familiar to readers as General Patton’s military aid, Sergeant William George Meeks, in “Patton”) in the first portrayal in a movie of an African-American fighter pilot, Major Chong (James Hong as the leader of the Republic of Korea pilots and uncredited in the movie) and the Mess Sergeant played by Alan Hale Jr. (The Skipper on “Gilligan’s Island” in the 1960s).

While getting the squadron ready, Hess comes across a group of orphans being cared for by En Soon Yang (Anna Kashfi) in a bombed out building. Hess convinces Soon to continue to care for the orphans with the promise he and his men will help fix up the place and provide the with food and supplies. Hess also enlists the help of Lu Ahn (Philip Ahn), an old man on his way to the shop where he sells statues he creates. En Soon learns Hess is married and it’s clear she has feelings for him. The large number of orphans swell as the squadron moves from training to being drawn into the fight as the North Koreans advance on both the runway and the orphanage. This movie is about redemption and fighting personal demons. Hess deals with loss and is able to comfort the dying as well as relate to a pilot who accidently kills innocent people on the ground during a fire fight with the North Koreans. The redemption for everyone involved is the evacuation of over 400 orphans and refugees to a safe location. This real life event is known as Operation Kiddy Car when the United States Air Force provided airlift for the orphans to an island of the South Korean coast. In real life there is some controversy regarding just how much involvement Dean Hess had in this airlift, but it makes for a great story.

The movie was filmed with the cooperation of the United States Air Force with the use of the Texas Air National Guard’s P-51s for the flying sequences. It was shot on an Arizona Air National Guard base and in Hollywood with terrific aerial footage and close ups of the actors in sound stage cockpits. Today all of this would be recreated using CGI and be blended more realistically. Shot in CinemaScope, the movie makes great use of the wide screen. The orphans in the movie are the actual orphans from Operation Kiddy Car brought to the United States to play the orphans in the movie.

Based on the bestseller by Dean Hess, the movie was directed by Douglas Sirk with a screenplay by Charles Grayson and Vincent Evans. Sirk was a director who retired from Hollywood features in 1959 at the top of his game, having directed many movies now considered classics. Born in Germany, he became a popular director in the 1930s until he was forced to leave Germany in 1937 because his wife was Jewish. They came to America in 1941 and Sirk’s first movie for Hollywood was the anti-Nazi propaganda thriller, “Hitler’s Madman,” in 1943. However, he really came into his own in the 1950s with his high melodrama look at American life which he made for Universal, often collaborating with Rock Hudson and others behind the scenes. Some critics refer to his work high gloss soap operas, but I think they are much more than that. My favorite Sirk film is “The Tarnished Angels” from 1957, filmed in black & white and CinemaScope (and also available from Kino Lorber). All Sirk’s movies are entertaining and range from westerns to high drama, thrillers and comedy. He even dipped his toes into musical territory and swashbucklers. He and his wife moved to Switzerland in 1959 where he remained until his death in 1987.

Hudson is believable in his portrayal of a man torn in his attempts to make amends for a terrible accident of war. He was good in generally every movie he appeared in whether it be romantic comedy, heavy drama or military adventure. Hudson served in the Navy during WWII as an aircraft mechanic and he carries the role of military leader very well indeed. Dan Duryea nearly steals every scene he’s in as the cigar chomping sergeant and scrounger in a departure from his many tough guy roles. Dan DeFore rounds out the three main military members of the squadron as Skidmore, Hess’ former WWII wingman. The most interesting member of the cast is Anna Kashfi as the female lead, En Soon Yang. She had parts in this and three other movies between 1956 and 1959, but is probably best known as Marlon Brando’s first wife and the mother of their son Christian. She’s good in what would have ordinarily been the romantic lead, but Hess was a married man and this was the 1950s. Interestingly, the great James Hong is uncredited in a substantial supporting role as the commander of the Korean pilots. Oddly, character actor Philip Ahn has a substantial supporting role as Lu Ahn, Soon’s assistant at the orphanage, but gets credited as Old Man.

Released in February 1957, “Battle Hymn” is a rare example of a Korean War era movie. The movie clocks in at 108 minutes and is very entertaining. I first discovered “Battle Hymn” while visiting the United States Air Force Museum at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base Ohio where there was an exhibit on Colonel Dean Hess and Operation Kiddy Car. The Kino Lorber Blu-ray is an improvement over the previous DVD releases in both picture quality and sound. Extras include an informative audio commentary by Nick Pinkerton which is filled with interesting anecdotes about the real life Dean Hess and trailers for this and other Kino Lorber releases. Highly recommended for fans of Rock Hudson, Douglas Sirk and military movies.

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BY LEE PFEIFFER

Catlow is a fun MGM Western from 1971 with broad comedic overtones in addition to some fairly brutal violence. The film was directed by Sam Wanamaker and produced by Euan Lloyd, an old hand at bringing good action movies to the big screen (i.e. Shalako, The Wild Geese). The film is based on the novel by Louis L'Amour. Yul Brynner plays the titular hero, a charismatic, free spirit who travels with an entourage of vagabond cowboys and sex-crazed hot number, Rosita, played by Daliah Lavi, who is cast against type as a wild, unsophisticated character. The somewhat meandering plot has Catlow accused, perhaps erroneously, of stealing cattle. He is pursued half-heartedly by Marshall Cowan (Richard Crenna), an old army buddy who spends more time socializing with Catlow than making any real attempt to bring him back to a kangaroo trial. The scenes of the two men engaging in endless attempts to outwit each other are quite amusing. Leonard Nimoy's bounty hunter Miller poses a more realistic threat, relentlessly hunting Catlow and his men down to the wilds of Mexico where everyone ends up facing both the army and Apaches.

There are some solid, suspenseful action sequences such as when Cowan finds himself wounded and surrounded by Indians. There is also a neat double cross that results in Catlow and his men having their guns stolen just as they are about to face off with the Apaches. The inspired supporting cast includes Jeff Corey as the requisite sidekick that was played by Walter Brennan and Gabby Hayes in earlier Westerns. Jo Ann Pflug provides some glamour as a sexy upper class seniorita. The chemistry between Brynner and Crenna is the main pleasure of the film but Nimoy scores well in his limited role as a ruthless villain- and the site of him bare-assed fighting with Brynner beside a bathtub is one for the books.

The Warner Archive region-free DVD includes the original trailer.

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