The Burning Hills (1956)

Tab Hunter is Trace Jordon, a young rancher whose brother is gunned down in the film’s opening scene. Trace tracks the killers to the ranch of cattle baron Joe Sutton (Ray Teal).

Trace demands that Sutton turn over the killers. He winds up exchanging shots with the old man and being wounded.

From that point on, it’s Trace who finds himself being hunted.

His horse carries him to a spring at an old mine, where a pretty half-breed Mexican girl named Maria Christina Colton (Natalie Wood) comes to his rescue.

Soon, the Sutton men show up too, led by foreman Ben Hindeman (Claude Akins) and Sutton’s cold-blooded son Jack (Skip Homeier).

Maria helps Trace slip away, by mixing jimson weed in coffee she’s serving the Sutton men.

Once they recover, the chase is on again, this time with Sutton’s men led by a skilled tracker who nevertheless sympathizes with the man he’s tracking.

Once intent on revenge, he now has something else to live for — a possible future with Maria.

Meanwhile, Jack Sutton has something to prove too — showing his father that’s he’s man enough to deal with a troublemaker like Trace Jordan.

Tab Hunter as Trace Jordan, finding his brother dead and vowing vengeance in The Burning Hills (1956)

Natalie Wood as Maria Colton, reacting to being slapped around by Jack Sutton in The Burning Hills (1956)

Review:

A better than average and action-packed Western based on a novel by Louis L’Amour.

Okay, Natalie Wood’s Mexican accent isn’t very convincing. But she’s adorable as the spitfire just waiting for someone to stand up to the Sutton men who were responsible for her father’s death. She was just 18 when this film was released.

The characters in secondary roles turn in strong performances, too, including Skip Homeier as the slimy and self-entitled son of a cattle baron, Claude Akin as the Sutton foreman who prefers restraint, especially when it comes to harassing women to get information, and Edward Franz as the reluctant tracker who helps the Sutton men stay on Trace Jordan’s trail.

As for that action, it includes a couple of brutal fistfights — one between Trace and Mort Bayliss in a barn and another between Trace and Jack Sutton on a cliff overlooking a river.

Wood appeared in just two Westerns, both in 1956. The other was as the Indian captive being sought by John Wayne in the John Ford classic, “The Searchers.”

Skip Homeier as Jack Sutton, son of a cattle king, trying to get answers from a stubborn young woman in The Burning Hills (1956)

Claude Akins as Ben Hindeman, foreman for Joe Sutton in The Burning Hills (1956)

>Directed by:
Stuart Heisler

Cast:
Tab Hunter … Trace Jordon
Natalie Wood … Maria Colton
Skip Homeier … Jack Sutton
Ray Teal … Joe Sutton
Eduard Franz … Jacob Lance
Claude Akins … Ben Hindeman
Tyler MacDuff … Wes Parker
Earl Holliman … Mort Bayliss
Frank Puglia … Tio Perico
Hal Baylor … Braun
Rayford Barnes … Veach
Tony Terry … Vincente Colton

Runtime: 94 min.

Tyler McDuff as Wes Parker and Earl Holliman as Mort Bayliss, two of the men who ambushed Trace Jordan’s brother in The Burning Hills (1956)

Eduard Franz as Jacob Lance, the half-breed tracker hired to find Trace Jordan in The Burning Hills (1956)

Memorable lines:

Trace Jordan: “There was a sheriff.”
Sutton man: “Ain’t none. No need for a sheriff when everybody’s friendly.”
Trace: “Everybody?”
Sutton man: “‘Cept strangers sometimes. If a stranger ain’t friendly, he just ain’t around long.”
Trace: “Who looks after that?”
Sutton man: “Oh, it gets looked after.”

Trace Jordan: “Do you know where I can find this Mr. Sutton?”
Bartender: “My job is makin’ drinks, not maps.”

Trace Jordan: “I never met a girl with such spunk. You got a heap of Yankee in you.”
Maria Colton, laughing: “And a heap of Mexican, too.”

Jack Sutton to Maria: “You make some coffee. And don’t try to run away. Or you’re going to think you’ve been run over by a stampede.”

Jack Sutton, finding Mort’s body: “He can’t tell us anything now.”
Tracker Jacob Lance: “He tell you one thing. Some of you no ride back. You turn young Jordan into curly wolf. He got his back to wall. He fight like wildcat.”

Tony Terry as Vincente Colton and Frank Puglia as Tio (Uncle) Perico, fearful because Maria is helping Trace Jordan in The Burning Hills (1956)

Ray Teal as Joe Sutton, the cattle king who tries to rule all the land around Esperanza in The Burning Hills (1956)

Natalie Wood as Maria Colton, thrilled to find someone willing to stand up to Jack Sutton in The Burning Hills (1956)

Tab Hunter as Trace Jordan, finding an ally in his quest for justice in The Burning Hills (1956)