Decent chamber Western, if not as good as it might be. Scripted by vet specialist Borden Chase and directed by fast-rising John Sturges in an early go at the form, it opens mean & lean, like a Budd Boetticher/Randolph Scott Western, well grounded in bleak terrain. (That famous series also starting this year.) Here, it’s Richard Widmark at some ruined desert structure bumping into Donna Reed. Strangers, she immediately sends him into harms way, bait to uncover a sniper. A fine opening; if only the rest of the film continued in this tough/enigmatic vein. Instead, a revenge tale, with Reed assuming Widmark’s out to find a missing fortune in gold when he’s really hunting for a ‘Sixth Man,’ a killer within that gold hunting group who murdered five partners, including Widmark’s own father, a man he never knew. Chase’s script holds back on its few character & story surprises, and while you won’t be surprised by the guessable twists, you may be by some pretty sloppy camera angles Sturges should have fixed to better cover punches, slaps & action that seems to miss by a mile. Sturges really could phone it in at times. Maybe he was hoping for a script that would stay as brutally concise & bleak as that opening. Or maybe he was just looking ahead to his next, a big budget/big star Western with Burt Lancaster & Kirk Douglas, GUNFIGHT AT THE O.K. CORRAL/’57.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: In spite of O.K. CORRAL and MAGNIFICENT SEVEN/’60, Sturges’ best Western is a modern one, BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK/’55. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2011/07/bad-day-at-black-rock-1955.html
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