Jeff Chandler plays Sam Christy, a former Civil War hero who lost the use of an arm during the fighting and has retreated to a small ranch near the small town of Trail City, a town definitely in a state of decline.
When four young cowpokes ride into town, order a bottle of whiskey and refuse to pay for it, Sam can sense trouble coming.
But he refuses to intervene. Before long, those four youngsters — a slick-talking leader named Jeb, a big brute nicknamed Mule, a sly Mexican named Rondo and a timid youth named Davy — have literally taken over the town.
They scare the town marshal into inaction, beat up the bartender when he tries to stand up to them and pretty much take whatever they want.
Finally, a young girl named Ellie (Dolores Hart) convinces Sam to rally the town around him in an attempt to run the youngsters out of town.
Sam decides the only way to do that is to take them on, one by one.
Review:
Nice change of pace Western, very well done, with the young cowpokes who got pushed around in Dodge — blowing six months pay in less than a week — becoming more and more brazen as they realize they can make the elders of Trail City cower before them.
Unfortunately, this marked the final Western for Chandler. He would die just two years later at age 42 from blood poisoning following surgery. This film, paired with 1959’s “The Jayhawkers,” marked two of his better Western outings.
As for Dolores Hart, she was 22 to Chandler’s 40 when they were paired romantically for this outing. She left Hollywood in 1963 to become a nun and eventually became the only nun to be a voting member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.
Directed by:
Joseph Pevney
Cast:
Jeff Chandler … Sam Christy
John Saxon … Rondo
Dee Pollack … Davy
Roger Torrey … Mule Thompson
Ray Stricklyn … Jeb Tyler
Dolores Hart … Ellie Walters
Marsha Hunt … Kate Miller
Jay Flippen … Sheriff McCauley
James Westerfield … Mike Barron
Vaughn Taylor … Jess Walters
Harvey Stephens … Doc Fuller
Joseph Hamilton … Barfly
Ray Ferrell … Billy Miller
Runtime: 94 min.
Memorable lines:
Ellie Walters: “Do you always hide in the dark?”
Rondo: “Only when there’s an angry father nearby.”
Mule Thompson: “What are we worried about? The cripple acts up, I’ll squash him down.”
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