Throwaway Western from Warner Brothers barely tries to hide its inadequacies. Though our poster does hide second-billed Patricia Neal, finishing her contract before heading off to 20th/Fox . . . and film immortality via DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL later this year.* Neal plays a wicked adventuress who grabs opportunity in a small Western town owned & operated by the land-owning Challons, father & son. So, Goodbye shady traveling companion Steve Cochran whose past gets him kicked out of town; Hello Challon scion Dennis Morgan, prematurely rumpled with the wary look of a contract actor expecting the ax to fall. (And it would next year.) Back on screen, Neal marries scion, then quickly takes charge with help from big city lawyer Scott Forbes (the only interesting guy in here) while Morgan & Dad are out of town. Duped, Morgan lets himself be bought out of his own inheritance, but plans to get it all back and take Neal down along with that Cochran fellow, back on the scene as trigger-happy enforcer. Laughably transparent & consistently unbelievable under Edwin L. Marin’s sloppy helming (some close action work exceptionally poor), best guess production head Jack Warner was purposefully making a stinker to help him ‘clean house’ as the post-war slump began decimating the studios. Especially sad to see the old gang of Warners contract players missing, replaced by second-raters like Basil Ruysdael, a sorry substitute as the elder Challon.
WATCH THIS, NOT THAT/LINK: *It took but a single line for Neal in THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL: ‘Gort! Klaatu barada nikto!’ But will she be too frightened to get the words out. Yikes! OR: For a better contempo Western along somewhat similar lines: Anthony Mann’s THE FURIES/’50. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2011/03/furies-1950.html
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