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Tuesday, October 24, 2017

KANSAS PACIFIC (1953)

Producer Walter Wanger was still working his way out of Hollywood purgatory (for taking a shot at wife Joan Bennett’s putative lover) when he put out this large-scaled B-Western.* And it’s not oversold or half bad. Facelessly megged by Ray Nazarro, it stars a relaxed, even charming Sterling Hayden as an undercover army officer sent West to help construction boss Barton MacLane finish the new cross-Kansas rail line before the oncoming Civil War breaks out. But with half the State leaning South, work is in constant danger from sabotage within & deadly attack without. With a good supporting cast & Reed Hadley’s smooth, attractively conflicted villain on board, only love interest Eve Miller feels generic. (Fun to see hard-working bit players like bulbous Irving Bacon & saturnine James Griffith with something to chew on.) Too bad the Film Detective DVD is sourced from such a faded CineColor print. Watchable, other than in the nighttime scenes, you’d never know the process had recently improved before quickly going out of business against various EastmanColor/Tri-Pack systems.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Quite an extravagant production for a 70" Oater, with the money up on screen in men, horses, railroad ties, track & dandy explosions.

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