RANDOLPH SCOTT: Ridin' the High Country, 1956-1962

RANDOLPH SCOTT: The Paramount Years, 1932-1938 can be read here.

RANDOLPH SCOTT: Western Star, 1938-1945 can be read here.

RANDOLPH SCOTT: The Man in the Saddle, 1946-1956 can be read here.

In the early days violent action depended much more on the style of acting than on elaborate effects.  The early cowboys ... had to impress as men of action without the help of bloody wounds, yells and gunfire, and they tended to rely on their faces and their gestures to communicate toughness.  As sound and color moved in visually the cowboy hero became smoother and smoother ... from Tom Mix through Rock Hudson .... But most of the spare effect of silent black and white was lost.

Anthony Mann recaptured some of this sparseness.  Ford moved right away from it.  Boetticher Westerns, RIDE LONESOME and COMANCHE STATION for instance, have a certain style, helped by Randolph Scott who physically was not at all like the soft heroes of the period.  Boetticher tends to avoid towns and isolate his characters, and his heroes fairly consistently avoid involvement with women.  But in Boetticher the violence is casual, the heroes and villains continually facing a gamble on life and death which is accepted philosophically.

---- There Must Be A Lone Ranger --

       Jenni Calder

       

By the early '50's, Randolph Scott, as one of the top ten box office stars, had reached the peak of his popularity. But the best was yet to come.

From 1956 through 1960, Scott starred in seven films directed by Budd Boetticher that collectively made Western film history.  Most were produced by Harry Joe Brown, were filmed by the Scott-Brown production unit (Ranown), and four of the scripts were written by Burt Kennedy, who also did uncredited repair work on a couple of the other scripts.

In these films Scott is at his peak as an actor.  Although he was in his late fifties when the series began, he did not show it.  As the years had passed his weather-beaten features, dignified voice and manner, coupled with his improved acting, had made him appear even more authentically a man of the West.

In many ways the Scott-Boetticher films were a throwback to the silent films of William S. Hart and Harry Carey.  They were sparse, lean films with mature plots that usually found the hero embroiled in a solitary quest, avenging wrongs, and never riding around anyone or anything.

Boetticher, like Scott, launched his career in the "B's."  His first film as director was a non-Western, ONE MYSTERIOUS NIGHT (Columbia, 1944), an entry in the Boston Blackie series, starring Chester Morris; his first Western was a B-Western, THE WOLF HUNTERS (Monogram, 1949), starring Kirby Grant.

In the Western genre Boettcher followed his initial effort with THE CIMARRON KID ( UI, 1952, starring Audie Murphy); BRONCO BUSTER (UI, 1952, starring John Lund and Scott Brady); HORIZONS WEST (UI, 1952, starring Robert Ryan and Rock Hudson); THE MAN FROM THE ALAMO (UI, 1953, starring Glenn Ford); and WINGS OF THE HAWK (UI, 1953, starring Van Heflin).

SEVEN MEN FROM NOW (Batjac/WB, 1956)

DIRECTOR:  Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCERS:  Andrew McLaglen,  Robert E. Morrison, John Wayne;  WRITER:  Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER:  William H. Clothier

CAST:  Randolph Scott, Gail Russell, Lee Marvin, John Larch, Walter Reed, Donald Barry, Stuart Whitman, Pamela Duncan, John Berradino, Cliff Lyons, Chuck Roberson, Fred Graham 

The first of the Scott-Boetticher films is technically not a Ranown film, but was produced by John Wayne's Batjac Productions and distributed by Warner Brothers.

I earlier reviewed the film as one of my "Top 21 Favorite Westerns," which I rated as number 14.  Some days I think it should be rated higher.  You can read the review here.

THE TALL T (Ranown/Columbia, 1957)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher;  Writers: screenplay by Burt Kennedy based on Elmore Leonard's story, The Captives;  PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Lawton, Jr.

CAST: Randolph Scott, Richard Boone, Maureen O'Sullivan, Arthur Hunnicutt, Skip Homeier, Henry Silva, John Hubbard, Robert Burton

The second Scott-Boetticher collaboration was another top-notch Western.  The title was never satisfactorily explained -- not even by the writer or the director.  In the studio's ad campaign it implied that the "T" stood for terror, but no one seemed to know for sure.  The title of the original story, written by Elmore Leonard, was The Captives.  However, that title had already been registered and the studio stuck the other title on the picture.

Regardless of the confusion concerning the title, the film is a classic in the medium-budget category, is one of Scott's finest, and one of the best Westerns of the '50's.

Boetticher is on record as saying that in these films he wanted to give Scott's adversaries equal time and it was made easier by the fact that Boetticher also said that Scott was the most unselfish star that he knew.  It is one of the primary reasons why these films rise above most of the Westerns of that era.  And it worked especially well when the adversary was somebody like Lee Marvin or Richard Boone.
  

In the film the credo of the Scott hero is established when he tells Miss O'Sullivan that "there are some things a man can't ride around."  This was not a new theme in Westerns, of course, for many classic Westerns dealt with the theme.  But this theme, along with the revenge motif, was the basic underlying feature of the Scott characterization down through the years, but especially in the Boetticher films.

O'Sullivan, Scott, and Boone



DECISION AT SUNDOWN (Ranown/Columbia, 1957)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown;  WRITERS: screenplay by Charles Lang based on story by Vernon L. Flaharty;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Burnett Guffey

CAST: Randolph Scott, John Carroll, Karen Steele, Valerie French, Noah Beery, Jr., John Archer, Andrew Duggan, James Westerfield, John Litel, Ray Teal, Vaughan Taylor, Richard Deacon

The story for this film was not written by Burt Kennedy, but was one that the director inherited.  He was later quoted as saying that Charles Lang did his best to shape it, but that he didn't think that Lang had been entirely successful in his efforts. 

Boettcher didn't like the fact that the story is confined to the town of Sundown.  He much preferred to incorporate his characters into the landscape of the Alabama Hills out near Lone Pine, California.  He also complained that the script did not allow any clear resolution at the end.  In short, it wasn't his kind of Western. 

Despite Boetticher's reservations, Scott liked the film -- and so do I.  My own feeling is that the director was too harsh in his criticism.  It was a change of pace for the director and his star, but the result was a fascinating psychological study of a man on the revenge trail, as usual, but who finally realizes that he is in the wrong.

The plot finds Scott in search of another villain, this time portrayed by John Carroll, who was responsible for luring Scott's wife away from him, and whom Scott unfairly blames for her subsequent suicide.  There is a poignant scene when Scott's pal, portrayed by Noah Beery, Jr., apprises Scott of the fact that his wife had never been any good, anyway.  Scott is exceedingly believable as a husband who deep down knows his friend is right, but is unwilling to accept his wife's unfaithfulness.

Beery, always underrated as an actor, and much misused during his career, added a great deal to the film with his Will Rogers physical appearance and manner.  



Noah Beery, Jr.

BUCHANAN RIDES ALONE (Ranown/Columbia, 1958)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher; PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown;  WRITERS: screenplay by Charles Lang, Jr. and Burt Kennedy (uncredited) based on Jonas Ward's novel, The Name's Buchanan; CINEMATOGRAPHER: Lucien Ballard

CAST: Randolph Scott, Craig Stevens, Barry Kelley, Tol Avery, Peter Whitney, Jennifer Holden

Boetticher was much happier with this film than he was with DECISION AT SUNDOWN, partly because the landscape, the area in and around Old Tucson, Arizona, was much closer to his vision of what he wanted in a Western film.  And it is a fairly good film that deals with Scott's confrontation with a family that controls a border town.  The cast, however, was not a strong one.  It was especially weakened by the fact that Scott's main adversary is not portrayed by a Lee Marvin or a Richard Boone, or even a Forrest Tucker, but by the much too urbane Craig Stevens.

However, in comparison to what came next it was quality entertainment.

WESTBOUND (WB, 1959)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCER: Henry Blanke;  WRITERS: screenplay by Berne Giler based on story by Giler, Albert S. Vino, and Burt Kennedy (uncredited);  Cinematographer: J. Peverell Marley

CAST: Randolph Scott, Virginia Mayo, Karen Steele, Michael Dante, Andrew Duggan, Michael Pate, Wally Brown

This film was made because Scott discovered that due to an earlier contractual agreement he owed Warner Brothers a final film.  Boetticher, proud of what he and Scott were accomplishing and wanting to protect his star became involved in the project because he volunteered to direct it.  However, there was a limit to what he could do.

Warner Brothers was quite adept at making a certain kind of picture, but not Westerns. It is true that a few quality Westerns bearing the Warners' logo had been produced, but practically all of them, SEVEN MEN FROM NOW is an example, were filmed by independent production units and were then distributed by that studio.  Many of the weakest of the Scott vehicles of the past had been full-fledged Warners productions -- and such was the case with WESTBOUND.  It is the weakest of the Scott-Boetticher films, but better than those Scott had made for the studio earlier in the decade. 

Scott does what he can with the role and receives his best support from second female lead Karen Steele and from Michael Pate, who portrays a gunman leading a gang of outlaws.  Since it is a Warner Brothers film it is no surprise that it is beautifully photographed, in this case by Peverell Marley, who had been filming movies for forty years.  However, the film is done in by a clunky plot.

   

RIDE LONESOME (Ranown/Columbia, 1959)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCER: Budd Boetticher;  EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown; WRITER: Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Lawton, Jr.

CAST: Randolph Scott, Karen Steele, Pernell Roberts, James Coburn, James Best, Lee Van Cleef, Boyd Morgan, Roy Jenson, Boyd Stockman

RIDE LONESOME, the best of the Scott-Boetticher collaborations, got things back on the right track.  Although the story again features Scott in pursuit of revenge, it does so in a different fashion.

I rank it number twelve on my list of "Top 21 Favorite Westerns," and you can read a full review of the film here. 




Equal adversaries: Pernell Roberts and Randolph Scott



 

COMANCHE STATION (Ranown/Columbia, 1960)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher; PRODUCER: Budd Boetticher; EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown; WRITER: Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Lawton, Jr.

CAST: Randolph Scott, Nancy Gates, Claude Akins, Skip Homeier, Richard Rust

Scott and Boetticher concluded their association on a high note with this excellent little film.  It is a consistently taut and exciting tale with Claude Akins filling the Lee Marvin/Richard Boone/Pernell Roberts role.

I rated it number twenty-one on my "Top 21 Favorite Westerns" list and you can read the review here.

(Claude Akins and Nancy Gates) Where is Randolph Scott when you need him?

RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY (MGM, 1962)

DIRECTOR: Sam Peckinpah;  PRODUCER: Richard E. Lyons;  WRITERS: N.B. Stone, Jr. and Sam Peckinpah (uncredited);  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Lucien Ballard

CAST: Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea, Mariette Hartley, Ron Starr, Edgar Buchanan, R.G. Armstrong, Jenie Jackson, James Drury, L.Q. Jones, John Anderson, John Davis Chandler, Warren Oates, Byron Foulger, Percy Helton

With the release of COMANCHE STATION Boetticher went off to Mexico on an ill-fated venture to film the ultimate bullfight film and Scott, reportedly one of Hollywood's wealthiest citizens, decided it was time to call it quits.  Although he was in his early sixties (he did not look it), he could have continued as a star, much like John Wayne, for some years to come.  In fact, he looked more like an even more authentic Westerner in the later years than he did at the beginning, or for that matter, in the middle years of his career.

(L-R): Mariette Hartley, Randolph Scott, Joel McCrea, and Ron Starr ride the high country.

But, as fate would have it, there was one more movie in Scott's future, and RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY was his best ever.  What a way to finish a long and successful career!

I rate it number five on my list of "Top 21 Favorite Westerns" and here is where you can read my review.

After RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY, Randolph Scott unsaddled his horse and put it out to pasture. He could reflect on a film career that spanned thirty-four years, thirty as a leading man.  He appeared in sixty-three Westerns, sixty as the leading man, and one as co-star. 

In his career he appeared in fifty-two A-Westerns, starring in forty-nine.  No other Western star can match that statistic.  With few exceptions his films were tightly-knit, fast-paced, medium-budget productions -- the kind that they just don't make anymore.




(1898-1987)

TOP 21 FAVORITE WESTERNS -- RIDE LONESOME

# 12          

RIDE LONESOME (Ranown/Columbia, 1959)

DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCER: Budd Boetticher;  EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown; WRITER: Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Lawton, Jr

CAST: Randolph Scott, Karen Steele, Pernell Roberts, James Coburn, James Best, Lee Van Cleef, Boyd Morgan, Roy Jenson, Boyd Stockman

"There are some things a man just can't ride around." -- Sam Boone 

The above line was given to Randolph Scott's rival in this film, but it is an apt description of the Scott character in all of his collaborations with director Budd Boetticher and is the overarching theme in those films.  

In fact, Boetticher and screenwriter Kennedy gave virtually the same line to Scott two years earlier in THE TALL T (Columbia). 

James Stewart and Anthony Mann came close, but only one actor-director team made a consistently better group of Westerns than the team of Scott and Boetticher, and that was John Wayne and John Ford.  High praise, indeed, but justifiably deserved.

In these films, Scott was at his peak as a performer.  Although he was 53-years-old when the series began, he did not show it.  As the years had passed his weather-beaten countenance, dignified voice and manner, coupled with his improved acting, had made him appear even more authentically a man of the West.

In many ways the Scott-Boetticher films were a throwback to the silent films of William S. Hart and Harry Carey.  The best of them were austere, sparse, lean films with mature plots that usually found the Scott hero embroiled in a solitary quest, avenging wrongs, and never riding around anyone or anything. 

Harry Joe Brown, who directed B-Westerns during the silent era, was Scott's partner in a production company that filmed all but two of the Scott-Boetticher films, and had for many preceding years produced the actor's films.

Burt Kennedy, who would later become a director who specialized in Western spoofs, of which SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL SHERIFF (UA, 1969, starring James Garner) and THE ROUNDERS (MGM, 1956, starring Glenn Ford and Henry Fonda) are the best examples, provided the screenplays for the four best films in the series.  In fact, his very first movie screenplay was written for the first Scott-Boetticher film, SEVEN MEN FROM NOW (WB, 1956).

In RIDE LONESOME, after bounty hunter Ben Brigade (Scott) captures wanted killer Billy John (Best) he plans to take him to the town of Santa Cruz.  At an isolated stage way station, the two meet up with outlaw Sam Boone (Roberts) and his partner, Whit (Coburn), as well as the missing station manager’s wife, Carrie Lane (Steele).

BILLY JOHN (James Best): "I don't know how much they're paying you to bring me in, but it ain't enough.  Not near enough."

BEN BRIGADE (Randolph Scott): "I'd hunt you for free." 

Brigade discovers that Boone and Whit were also looking for Billy John, but for different reasons.  They had learned that amnesty had been offered to any outlaw who captured and brought him in and they are ready to quit the outlaw trail and settle down and Billy John is their passport to that new life.  

These circumstances set up a conflict between Brigade and Boone similar to that between Scott and Lee Marvin in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW and Scott and Claude Akins in COMANCHE STATION (Columbia, 1960).

Brigade has to accept the assistance of the two outlaws because he faces the daunting prospect of getting Billy John to Santa Cruz, and also Mrs. Lane, and there are not only Indians on the warpath in the area, but Billy John’s older brother Frank (Van Cleef) is on their trail.  Boone eventually realizes that for some reason Brigade wants Frank to catch up with them.

 

And like the other two films mentioned earlier, RIDE LONESOME is what writer Burt Kennedy called a “trek” Western.

  

In each case a small group of people, including a woman, are traveling toward a destination, with Scott as the protector who is forced to depend upon the assistance of adversaries who are as central to the story as he is and who share as much screen time and are given as many lines of dialogue as he is given.

Boetticher was quoted as saying that the only thing separating his heroes and villains was circumstance -- that if things had been different their roles might have been reversed.  

While that might be true in most cases, it is hard to accept that premise while viewing SEVEN MEN FROM NOW.  In that film it is impossible to see the Scott character ever resorting to the tactics of Marvin's greedy, remorseless killer.  But Boetticher's description does fit Roberts' Sam Boone character.

RIDE LONESOME's small cast is almost perfect.  Of course, it helped to have Randolph Scott leading the way.  But the others contributed in significant ways.

Pernell Roberts had made his film debut the year before in THE SHEEPMAN (MGM) and RIDE LONESOME was only his third screen role -- and he made the most of it.  However, he was not a novice actor for he had been acting on the stage for a number of years and had been acting in television productions since 1956.

After Roberts' effective performance supporting Scott he became a TV star that same year when he was cast as the oldest Cartwright brother in BONANZA.  He became frustrated with the restrictions and limitations that he felt commercial television in general, and the program specifically, placed on him.  As a result of creative differences, he left the hugely popular and long-running series in 1965 and went back to the stage.

Pernell Roberts as Adam, Ben Cartwright's oldest son

Pernell Roberts and James Coburn

James Coburn made his film debut in RIDE LONESOME and it was quite obvious that there would be more to come.  The following year he was cast in an important role in THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (UA) and the rest, as they say, is history.

Karen Steele appears to be miscast in her part.  She was a competent actress, but she just didn't look the part.  

For one thing, she lives at an isolated stagcoach way station that is located in the desert.  In such an environment the sun and the wind and the primitive conditions can take a toll on man and woman alike.  But when Steele makes her first appearance she looks as if she just stepped out of a beauty salon.

That isn't entirely her fault, however.  It was a common trait of Westerns in general that women in leading roles did not look as though they had ever spent a day in the West.  But that's a discussion for a later time.

Karen Steele

Boetticher liked Steele, he liked her a lot.  In fact, the two had entered into an affair two years earlier during the filming of the Scott film, DECISION AT SUNDOWN (Columbia).

Boetticher cast Steele in his next film, WESTBOUND (WB, 1959), the weakest of the Scott-Boetticher films, and the next year after that in his  gangster drama, THE RISE AND FALL OF LEGS DIAMOND (WB).

The underrated James Best, like Roberts and Coburn, is perfectly cast in what is perhaps his best screen role.  Lee Van Cleef doesn't receive much screen time, but he makes the most of it.

Budd Boetticher's first directing credit was in 1944. For years he would direct low-budget features, finally receiving some notice for THE BULLFIGHTER AND THE LADY (Republic, 1951), which was financed by John Wayne's production company, and made a star of the film's leading man, Robert Stack. 

Boetticher had a special interest in bullfighting and had spent a number of years in Mexico personally learning the skill and therefore was intimately acquainted with the sport. His original story for the film was nominated for an Oscar.

In 1956, John Wayne chose Boetticher to direct him in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW, a film to be produced by Wayne's Batjac Productions. 

However, when John Ford came calling with his offer to star Wayne in THE SEARCHERS (WB, 1956), Randolph Scott was given the starring role in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW and it became the first of the seven highly regarded films produced by the Scott-Boetticher team.

It has been written of Boetticher that he perhaps bridged the gap between the sentimental romanticism of John Ford and the detached cynicism and disillusionment of Sam Peckinpah. When one views the seven Scott films he directed, that seems to be a fair assessment.


******
REVIEWS

"...a taut little suspenser with no flesh....It's nothing profound but it's solid craftmanship and good, lean, tense suspense all the way." -- Brian Garfield in Western Films: A Complete Guide

 "A magical Western...lasting proof of the suppleness of the genre in the hands of a team of people who can exploit its opportunities with intelligence and wit." -- Phil Hardy in The Western

"...the construction and pace are tightly controlled, the action unwinding with spell-binding formal rigor...." -- Jim Kitses in Horizons West

"Scott does a good job as the taciturn and misunderstood hero, but the two standouts are Best as the giggling killer and Roberts as the sardonic outlaw who wants to get away to a new start." -- Variety

"Unusally good supporting cast; including Coburn in his film debut." -- Leonard Maltin

You can watch RIDE LONESOME on YouTube.

 

TOP 21 FAVORITE WESTERNS -- SEVEN MEN FROM NOW

# 14

SEVEN MEN FROM NOW (Batjac/WB, 1956)


BEN STRIDE (Randolph Scott):  What happened up there?

BILL MASTERS (Lee Marvin):  Payte Bodeen...I killed him.

BEN STRIDE:  Why?

BILL MASTERS:  Why not? 


DIRECTOR:  Budd Boetticher;  PRODUCERS:  Andrew McLaglen,  Robert E. Morrison, John Wayne;  WRITER:  Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER:  William H. Clothier

CAST:  Randolph Scott, Gail Russell, Lee Marvin, John Larch, Walter Reed, Donald Barry, Stuart Whitman, Pamela Duncan, John Berradino, Cliff Lyons, Chuck Roberson, Fred Graham 

SEVEN MEN FROM NOW was the first teaming of director Budd Boetticher and star Randolph Scott -- and it almost didn't happen.  

The film was produced by John Wayne's Batjac production company and it was his intention to star in it.  

The fact that he had a conflict and did not leads to one of the big "what ifs" in Western film history.  What if he had starred in the film and had been directed by Boetticher?  Who knows what that may have led to.  One possibility is that Boetticher might never have teamed with Randolph Scott to film seven outstanding Westerns, with at least four of them considered to be classics in the genre.

Beginning with the next film in the series, THE TALL T (Columbia, 1957),  Harry Joe Brown would take over as producer, and Ranown, Scott and Brown's production company that had been making Scott's pictures, would take charge of five of the final six.

The one exception, and the weakest of the Scott-Boetticher films, was WESTBOUND (1959), which was produced by Warner Brothers.

This movie is a precursor in many ways to what would follow in the Scott-Boetticher-Brown collaboration.  

It is a “journey” Western; Scott is a loner seeking vengeance who finds himself against his will forced to take on the task of protecting a woman; and the villain (in this case, Marvin) receives as much screen time and as many lines of dialogue as Scott; and it is shot almost entirely on location in the Alabama Hills near Lone Pine, California, which was Boetticher's favorite location.  

In addition, the screenwriter was Burt Kennedy, who was responsible for the four best scripts in the series.

Ben Stride (Scott) is an ex-sheriff in Arizona who is on the vengeance trail looking for the seven men who killed his wife while holding up a freight office in Silver Springs.  Stride had lost his re-election and his pride kept him from taking the job of deputy that was offered him.  His wife was forced to take a job that put her in the line of fire when the holdup and shoot-out occurred.  Therefore Stride feels partly responsible for her death.

The stage for the rest of the movie is set in its opening scene when Stride, during a torrential thunderstorm, approaches two of the men he is seeking. After that it was “five men from now.”  It was one of the two best scenes in the film.

Later he hooks up with greenhorn John Greer (Reed) and his wife (Russell), who are traveling by wagon to California.  Since it is apparent that they will never get there on their own, he agrees to travel part of the way with them.  

Along the way, they pick up more traveling companions, a couple of hardcases (Marvin and Barry) who are looking for the same men as Stride, but for different reasons.  They want the gold that the outlaws stole.

The other great scene in the movie occurs inside the Greer’s wagon, also during a thunderstorm, when Masters (Marvin) taunts both Stride and Greer in the presence of Mrs. Greer.  

It was a scene-stealing performance by Marvin, who was in the process of perfecting a screen persona that would make him one of the great villains in both Western and non-Western roles.

This was not the first time that Marvin found himself playing a badman in a Randolph Scott film.  In HANGMAN'S KNOT (Columbia, 1952), he portrays a violent character very much related to his character in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW, but without the leavening humor he brings to the latter role.  

In between the two Scott Westerns Marvin would appear in THE WILD ONE (Columbia, 1953) and BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK (MGM, 1955) in which he would receive good notices for his bad guy characterizations. 

Randolph Scott first appeared on the screen in 1929.  His first starring roles were in well-crafted, low-budget Westerns, many of which were based on Zane Grey stories. But over the years he appeared in a variety of films, including a number of Westerns.    

WESTERN UNION (Fox, 1941), also based on a Zane Grey story, was a landmark Western in which he received favorable critical reviews for his portrayal of a "good-badman."  

Beginning with ABILENE TOWN (UA) and BADMAN'S TERRITORY (RKO) in 1946, he would for the rest of his career, with only a couple of exceptions, appear only in Westerns.  

And along the way there would be some outstanding ones, such as CORONER CREEK (Columbia, 1948),  THE WALKING HILLS (Columbia, 1949), and MAN IN THE SADDLE (Columbia, 1951).  Harry Joe Brown was the producer on all three of those as well as the other Westerns that Scott starred in during the years prior to SEVEN MEN FROM NOW.

By 1956, when SEVEN MEN FROM NOW was released, Scott was 58-years-old, but he didn't look it.  Tall and lean and weathered, he looked even more like an authentic westerner than he did earlier in his career.  And he sounded like one, too.  

John Wayne could have played the role, but it is hard to see how he could have done it any better than Scott.  Furthermore, if Wayne had been the star, Marvin's role might have been reduced and that would have been a detrimental development.

Gail Russell, in her early thirties, was still beautiful in 1956; however, time had not been good to her.

Born in 1924, her first screen role came in 1943.  A few years later John Wayne chose her to co-star with him in ANGEL AND THE BADMAN (Republic, 1947) and WAKE OF THE RED WITCH (Republic, 1948).

But Russell was a troubled soul who suffered from a severe case of shyness, insecurity, and stage fright which she attempted to combat by resorting to alcohol.  As a result she became addicted.

The conflict that prevented Wayne from starring in the film was due to John Ford wanting him to star in THE SEARCHERS (WB, 1956), a deal he couldn't turn down, and the happy result was that Wayne gave his best performance in his greatest film. 

Consequently Russell found herself co-starring with Scott rather than her friend Wayne. 

She would appear in only three more films, the last in 1961.  She died that year as a result of malnutrition and liver damage brought on by her addiction to alcohol.  She was 36-years-old.

Don Barry first gained prominence by starring in the popular Republic western serial, ADVENTURES OF RED RYDER (1940).  From 1940 to 1945, he starred in a B-Western series for the same studio, always billed as Don "Red" Barry, a nickname that he hated.

After his Republic series ended he starred in low-budget films, mostly Westerns, and became an extremely busy character actor in movies and on television.  His role in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW ranks among his best.


******
REVIEWS

"Solid Western....Marvin is terrific." -- Leonard Maltin

"...it's a thrill to watch a filmmaking team that knows exactly what they wanted, and for them, practice made perfect." -- Elvis Mitchell in The New York Times

"Marvin [is] a magnetic, not-so-bad complement to Scott's not-so-good hero." -- Michael Atkinson in The Village Voice
  

TOP 21 FAVORITE WESTERNS -- COMANCHE STATION

# 21

COMANCHE STATION (Ranown/Columbia, 1960)

                                                 
DIRECTOR: Budd Boetticher; PRODUCER: Budd Boetticher; EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Harry Joe Brown; WRITER: Burt Kennedy;  CINEMATOGRAPHER: Charles Lawton, Jr.

CAST: Randolph Scott, Nancy Gates, Claude Akins, Skip Homeier, Richard Rust

Randolph Scott negotiates Nancy Gates' freedom

This is the last of the Westerns made by the Boetticher-Scott-Brown-Kennedy team.  In plot structure it owes much to the earlier RIDE LONESOME (Columbia, 1959), but is nevertheless a superior Western.

Just as the Anthony Mann-James Stewart Westerns always give us a protagonist attempting to escape a painful past, the Boetticher-Scott Westerns give us one attempting to avenge a painful episode in his past -- often one involving his wife.  

In this instance, his wife has been kidnapped by the Comanches and he has been trying to find her for several months.

He fails, but does locate another woman (Gates) who is a captive and after bartering for her freedom he attempts to return her to her home.  Along the way he is forced to contend with marauding Indians and a trio of outlaws (Akins, Rust, Homeier).

Nancy Gates, Randolph Scott, and Claude Akins

COMANCHE STATION is shot in the Alabama Hills in and around Lone Pine, California, a location that Boetticher said was his favorite.

Despite being in excellent physical condition, Scott, who by this time was in his early sixties, planned to hang up his six-gun, unsaddle his horse, and retire after COMANCHE STATION. 

If he had done so, the film would have been a fitting conclusion to the career of the individual who, with the exception of some B-Western actors, starred in more Westerns than any other actor.  

But two years later, after being lured out of retirement, he saddled up one last time to RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY (MGM, 1962).  It would be his finest performance.

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REVIEWS

"... it has that peculiar dark-side quality that the best of the Kennedy-Boetticher-Scott oaters had, and it's consistently exciting...." -- Brian Garfield in Western Films: A Complete Guide

"...a consistently taut and exciting tale which is enhanced by strong performances by Nancy Gates, Claude Akins, Richard Rust, and, in his best performance ever, Skip Homeier....Kennedy supplies a nice twist as a fitting conclusion to the gritty little film." -- Stormy Weathers in Under Western Skies

Randolph Scott and "Stardust," the dark palomino he rode to good effect in his later color films