Lon McCallister is John Malvin, a judge’s son who heads to the gold fields of Montana to strike it rich.
He witnesses the murder of two prospectors and rushes to report the incident to Sheriff Henry Plummer (Preston Foster). Plummer immediately sets out in chase of the badmen.
What Malvin doesn’t know is that Plummer is secretly behind the killings and robberies that are taking place.
Wanda Hendrix plays Clair Enoch, a tomboyish young woman who helps her dad run a stage depot. Her dad, Possom, suspects Plummer’s no good, but makes it a rule to keep his nose out of such business.
But then Malvin is appointed deputy and immediately given the job of escorting a stage to Montana City. Inside the stage is Jason Waterman, one of the leaders of the community, carrying $10,000.
Possom realizes young John is being set up, and he realizes there’s a blossoming love between young John and Clair. So he warns him the two of the stage passengers are bandits.
John foils the holdup attempt, but Plummer later returns to kill Possom. That’s the last straw for the citizens of Bannock. They form a vigilante organization to track down the outlaws.
John’s dad always spoke out against mob rule, so he’s still firmly on Plummer’s side. At least until proven wrong.
Review:
A mediocre Western with an awkwardly staged climax; a fiesty, but one-note performance from Hendrix; and a male lead in McCallister who just isn’t very believeable as a gun-toting Western hero.
The one note of interest: Clayton Moore — yes, The Lone Ranger — plays Plummer’s goateed deputy and one of the ring leaders of the outlaw gang. He’d started playing the role that made him famous in 1949; the series continued until 1957.
McCallister, who got his start as a child star, was in his late 20s when the film was made. A thin 5-foot-6, he’d made just one more film (a Korean War movie called “Combat Squad” in 1953) before retiring from acting.
Hendrix had already ditched hubby number one (Audie Murphy) when she made this oater, one of a handful of low-budget Westerns in which she co-starred. She’d later marry twice more — once to actor Robert Stack’s brother — before dying in 1981 at age 52.
Directed by:
Ray Nazarro
Cast:
Lon McCallister … John Malvin
Wanda Hendrix … Clair Enoch
Preston Foster … Sheriff Henry Plummer
Hugh Sanders … Jason Waterman
Jack Elam … Gimp
Clayton Moore … Deputy George Ives
Robert Griffin .. Yeager
Myron Healey … Bill Landers
Eddy Waller … Possum Enoch
Runtime: 64 min.
Memorable lines:
Clair Enoch: “Do you have to see a rattler’s stripes to know that he’s deadly?”
Sheriff Plummer: “I have no sympathy and never will have for you men who want to substitute mob rule for the law. Do the people of a disease-ridden community throw out their doctor just because there are too many sick people for him to cure?”
Jason Waterman: “Maybe not. But if they’ve got any sense, they’d pitch in and do some doctoring themselves.”
Plummer: “Yeah, and kill more people than they cure.”
John Malvin: “I was easy to fool, wasn’t I, Plummer? You know why? I believed in what you said you stood for. The right things were being said, only the wrong man was saying them — the worst kind of a man. Somebody has got to kill you.”
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