William “Wild Bill” Elliott is one of my favorite cowboy starts — Hellfire (1949) alone would see to that. The 11 Westerns he made for Monogram (later Allied Artists) in the early 50s have been on our collective Want List for some time. They’re smart, tough, adult takes on your typical B Western. The Longhorn (1951) is currently available from VCI. The just-released Warner Archive double feature, which I hope is the first of a series, includes Fargo (1952) and The Homesteaders (1953). Both were directed by Lewis D. Collins. And both come highly, highly recommended.
More 50s Westerns on today’s Warner Archive roster: a Wayne Morris double bill — The Marksman (1953) and The Fighting Lawman (1953). Also good stuff.
Sorry for a rather slapdash post — had to work this in around meetings (actually, put it together while in one). Thanks to John Knight for the tip.
Hi, I queried the Bill Elliott movies (Monogram & Allied Artists) with Warner archives a few months ago and was informed that they did have all 11 movies in their Vaults. They also confirmed their intention to release them. It’s great to see that the first titles are released today. Incidently there is also a 3 movie set of George O’Brien’s RKO titles released today by Warner Archives (Marshal of Mesa City / Legion of the Lawless / Triple Justice). Olive Fims also have more John Wayne Republic westerns scheduled for March 26th (Wyoming Outlaw / Lawless Nineties / Westward Ho.)
These was much rejoicing around the 50s Westerns bunkhouse over this announcement. These are really terrific little movies.
Now, if Olive would announce a Blu-ray of Hellfire!
& more good news, one of my favorite gals, Phyllis Coates (the real Lois Lane) costars with one of my favorite cowboys, the Peaceable Man, in “Fargo”. Phyllis was in a lot of Westerns in the early ’50′s, more with Elliott & several with Whip Wilson, I think she was also in a Tim Holt western or 2 too. (I could look this up on IMDB, but I feel that’s cheating.)
Er…………Sorry Toby………….Olive Films have as much chance of releasing
HELLFIRE as Sarah Palin has becoming the manager of a left-wing
bookshop!
Some of the Wild Bill Elliott, Allied Artist/Monogram, westerns were originally in “Glorious Sepiatone”. Having only seen these in dark B&W, I have always wondered what the sepiatone looked like. Sort of orange like the lower right part of the FARGO poster above or a darker browner brown like the upper right corner of the poster? Anybody know? Some of the Columbia Gene Autry’s were in sepiatone also. The Autry DVDs are in regular B&W, but oddly the menu clips are in some kind of sepiatone, probably done for the DVD menu.
Of course I expect this double-feature to be regular black and white.
Fargo has a pretty creepy scene where the badguys wrap Wild Bill up in barb-wire. One of those “why don’t they just shoot him moments”.
Myron Healey is in many of these Wild Bill Elliott Allied Artist movies. I think he was the first character actor whose name I learned, when he took over as Doc Holiday for awhile from Douglas Fowley in THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF WYATT EARP TV Series.
I did a post on the sepia Elliotts a while back —
http://fiftieswesterns.wordpress.com/2011/07/15/wild-bill-elliott-%E2%80%94-in-glorious-sepia-tone/
The sample video on the Warner Archive site is B&W — and very nice- looking. I can’t wait to see these things!