John Wayne is U.S. Marshal J.D. Cahill. He returns to the town of Valentine after a manhunt to find a sheriff dead, a bank robbed and his oldest son (Gary Grimes as Danny) in jail.
Danny’s being held on a disorderly conduct charge along with a small group of other men, Abe Fraser (George Kennedy) included. When Danny is freed, Cahill’s takes him out on the hunt for the bank robbers.
Soon enough, he has five men in custody and he’s taking them back to town to face possible hanging. They were caught with money on them; they claimed to have robbed a Mormon drover in New Mexico. Between criticizing his dad for being an absentee parent, Danny warns him they might not have been responsible for the bank holdup.
What Cahill doesn’t know is that Danny and younger brother Billy Joe (Clay O’Brien) helped Fraser (George Kennedy) and his gang pull the bank robbery, starting a fire as a diversion.
Now Billy Joe has hidden the money, forgotten precisely where he buried it, and Frazer is threatening to kill both boys if he doesn’t get the loot soon.
Review:
A delight, from catchy theme song to a smart, fresh-sounding script to a well-handled, though-rather brutal finish, likely influenced by the more violent Westerns being made in Europe.
Just try to forget the unlikelihood that an outlaw would take an 11-year-old boy in on a holdup, especially the U.S. Marshal’s son.
Neville Brand, who never seemed very impressive in his numerous 1950s Westerns, is enjoyable here as Cahill’s half-breed tracker friend. And Kennedy turns in one of his better performances as a truly menacing villain. Both youngsters are believable in their roles, especially Clay O’Brien, who had made his film debut a year earlier in John Wayne’s “The Cowboys.”
As for director McLaglen – he overdoes the humor in many of his films, but displays a more subtle touch here.
Directed by:
Andrew V. McLaglen
Cast:
John Wayne … J.D. Cahill
Gary Grimes … Danny Cahill
Clay O’Brien … Billy Joe Cahill
George Kennedy … Abe Fraser
Neville Brand … Lightfoot
Marie Windosr … Hetty Green
Morgan Paull … Struther
Dan Vadis … Brownie
Royal Dano … MacDonald
Scott Walker … Ben Tildy
Denver Pyle … Denver
Jackie Coogan … Charlie
Rayford Barnes … Pee Wee Simser
Dan Kemp … Joe Meehan
Harry Carey Jr. … Hank
Runtime: 103 min.
Memorable lines:
Cahill, to outlaw gang at opening of film: “Any of you want to surrender?”
Outlaw: “Now, what did you say?”
Cahill: “I said, ‘Any of you want to surrender?’
Outlaw: “Five of us and one of you. I’ll say one thing for you J.D. — you got style. Yes sir, you got style.”
Shots ring out.
Cahill, to complaining prisoner: “You call the tune and you pay the piper. Meaning — you don’t like that treatment, don’t rob banks.”
Billy Joe Cahill: “You’re bleeding again, Pa.”
Danny Cahill: “One thing I hate more than a Comanche is half of one.”
Cahill: “His name is Lightfoot. And I wouldn’t call him, ‘Breed’ to his face if I was you. Not if you want to reach maturity.”
Cahill, to suspected bank robber: “Mister, I ain’t got a bigoted bone in my body. You don’t drop that axe and I’ll blast you to help as quick as I would a white man.”
Cahill, to a potential lynch mob: “Well, there’s no use prodding around. I’ll willing to die trying to keep ’em. Question is: Are you willing to die trying to take ’em. Now I’m cold and hungry and wet and tired and short-tempered. So get on with it.”
There’s no response.
Cahill: “Oh, hell, get out of my way.”
Cahill, when told Billy Joe will recover from illness: “You sure, doc?”
Doctor: “I’d bet my brand-new, Chicago-made leg amputator on it.”
Fraser to Billy Joe: “Where’s the money? Now we killed two men to get it. What you need to understand boy is we ain’t gonna hang any longer or be any deader if we kill two more.”
Cahill: “How’s the leg?”
Lightfoot: “If you’re asking me as a war chief of the Comanche nation, I don’t feel a thing. If you’re asking the white part of me, it hurts like hell.”
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