50s Westerns DVD News #121: Showdown At Boot Hill (1958).

John Knight just brought this to my attention. Olive Films has announced Showdown At Boot Hill (1958) for DVD and Blu-ray release in June. For me and many of you out there, a widescreen presentation of a Regalscope picture is a dream come true. To be able to enjoy every bargain-basement, black-and-white Scope detail in high-definition is icing on the cake.

Showdown stars Charles Bronson, Robert Hutton, John Carradine, Carole Mathews and Argentina Brunetti. It’s a very early lead for Bronson — his TV show Man With A Camera would debut in late 1958. Director Gene Fowler Jr. worked as an editor for the bulk of his career, cutting everything from Sam Fuller’s Forty Guns (1957) and Monte Walsh (1970) to Gilligan’s Island and The Waltons. The screenplay is by Louis Vittes, who also wrote I Married A Monster From Outer Space (1958) and a number of episodes of Rawhide.

Olive Films also has the rights to Ambush At Cimarron Pass (1958), a Regalscope starring Scott Brady, Margia Dean and Clint Eastwood. Let’s hope it’s not far behind.

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50s Westerns DVD News #113: Cole Younger, Gunfighter (1958).

Warner Archive has announced another wagonload of Westerns, and there are a few good 50s ones in there.

Cole Younger, Gunfighter (1958) is an Allied Artists CinemaScope concoction with Frank Lovejoy as the famous outlaw. The always capable R.G. Springsteen directed.

Fort Vengeance (1953) is a Cinecolor Canadian Mountie picture from Lesley Selander, starring James Craig and Rita Moreno.

Hiawatha (1953) is an adaptation of the Longfellow poem from Kurt Neumann. John Knight pointed out that this was the last film to bear the Monogram logo.

The Boy From Oklahoma (1954) stars Will Rogers, Jr., Lon Chaney, Wallace Ford and Merv Griffin. Michael Curtiz directed. It was the basis of the Sugarfoot TV series.

The Gun Hawk (1963) isn’t a 50s Western but with Rory Calhoun and Rod Cameron in it, it might as well be. A quick glance at the still below will tell you where some of it was filmed.

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Screening: Gunman’s Walk (1958).

There’s nothing like seeing a film, on film, with an audience. And here’s a screening I’d sure love to attend: Phil Karlson’s Gunman’s Walk (1958) at Chicago’s Portage Theater — in 35mm CinemaScope.

A terrific 50s Western that’s very hard to see, a personal favorite and maybe your only chance to see Bert Convy fall off a cliff, the Northwest Chicago Film Society is presenting it January 21 at 7:30PM.

Tab Hunter is terrific and Van Heflin is as incredible as ever. Make that more incredible. And make a point of seeing it if at all possible.

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50s Westerns DVD News #106: From Hell To Texas (1958).

There’s been some speculation on this one. Is it actually coming? Will it be widescreen? Has Fox dumped it MOD program? Movies Unlimited now has it listed for pre-order with a release date of December 16. And they say it’ll be widescreen — good news, since the CinemaScope picture is unwatchable pan-and-scan.

From Hell To Texas (1958, also known at The Hell Bent Kid and The Manhunt) is a very good late-50s Western from Henry Hathaway, one that has never received the attention it deserves. Don Murray is excellent as the young man on the run, and he’s backed by a terrific cast: Diane Varsi, Chill Wills, Dennis Hopper, R.G. Armstrong and Jay C. Flippen.

This is the film that lead to Dennis Hopper being blackballed in Hollywood for nearly 10 years.

Dennis Hopper: “[Hathaway]’d give you line readings. I was now trying to ‘live in the moment’ and doing things without preconceived ideas, and I walked off the picture three times on location. He’d beg me to come back… So the last day on the picture… He said ‘We’re gonna do this scene till you do it my way’… we started about eight o’clock in the morning. Around eleven at night, after 85 takes, I finally cracked, and said ‘Okay, tell me what you want to do.’ I did it, then I walked out. It wasn’t like somebody sent a black ball around after that, but word got around that I wasn’t somebody you wanted to work with. Soon after that, I was dropped from my contract at Warner Bros. I went back to New York and I studied with Strasberg for five years. I didn’t have another major role in a studio picture for nearly 10 years, until Hathaway hired me again for The Sons Of Katie Elder in ’65.”*

* From an interview that appeared in Venice magazine.

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50s Westerns DVD News #95B: Masterson Of Kansas (1954).

Yesterday, I complained about the DVD packaging for The Oregon Trail (1959). So today, it’s nice to feature something a little more pleasing to the eye, the upcoming and highly recommended Masterson Of Kansas (1954) from the (renamed?) Choice Collection. This new template has been put to use for all their Western releases for October 2, such as Buchanan Rides Alone (1958).

Speaking of Buchanan, Laura recently wrote on the film, and found it the weakest of the Scott/Boetticher pictures. While I agree to a point — it’s certainly not as strong as, say, The Tall T (1957), seeing it as a kid might have been the beginning of my 50s Westerns obsession.

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Happy Birthday, Clayton Moore.

Clayton Moore
September 14, 1914 – December 28, 1999

Clayton Moore spent so much time saying hello to kids and signing autographs, and I never got to meet him. What a drag.

To me, The Lone Ranger TV show and the features (The Lone Ranger, 1956, and 1958′s The Lone Ranger And The Lost City Of Gold) are pure joy. There are so many ways you could criticize them, yet they’re all perfect.

Clayton Moore (from his autobiography, I Was That Masked Man): “The greatest thing about working on the feature was that the pace was much more leisurely. On the series, we would shoot at least 12 pages of script a day, sometimes as much as 15 to 18, but for the film, we would shoot maybe four or five. That’s still working pretty fast compared to some productions, but it seemed like a vacation to us.”

Of course, he did so much more over the course of his career, like those great Republic serials, but how can you top being The Lone Ranger?

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Happy Birthday, Fred MacMurray.

Fred MacMurray
(August 30, 1908 – November 5, 1991)

We’ve had a lot of birthdays lately, so I almost gave this one a miss. But Fred MacMurray’s Westerns are a big deal here at 50 Westerns From The 50s.

MacMurray had quite a career, going from big movie star to huge TV star — with some ranching and shrewd investing thrown in for good measure. You hear a lot about him being cheap, but the end justified the means — he died a very, very rich man.

In the late 50s, he hit a real sweet spot, appearing in a string of excellent medium-budget Westerns. Quantez (1957) and Face Of A Fugitive (1959, which had the working title Justice Ends With A Gun) are highlights, but the others are certainly worthwhile. I encourage you to sit down with a few of these things some weekend. A Good Day For A Hanging (1958) is pretty easy to find. Quantez and Gun For A Coward (1957) are available as part of the Universal Vault Series.

Wish I could toast him with his own MacMurray Ranch wine. Should’ve planned ahead. I’d like to “dedicate” this post to not just MacMurray, but to my wife Jennifer, who happened upon Face Of A Fugitive one afternoon and told me how good it was, and Blake Lucas, whose enthusiasm for Fred’s cowboy pictures convinced me to really study them as a whole.

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Screening: The Badlanders (1958) and Johnny Guitar (1954).

The Egyptian and Aero Theatres have organized Ernie: A Tribute To The Great Ernest Borgnine — August 16-19 — and the first night features The Badlanders (1958) and Johnny Guitar (1954).

The lineup is really strong — it includes The Wild Bunch (1969) and Emperor Of The North Pole (1973) — but it would take many, many night to really cover this man’s incredible body of work.

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R. G. Armstrong, 1917 – 2012.

The great character actor R. G. Armstrong passed away on Friday. He was 95.

Mr. Armstrong appeared in a couple 50s Westerns, From Hell To Texas (1958, below) and No Name On The Bullet (1959), but really made his mark in the 60s and 70s. Sam Peckinpah used him a number of times, beginning with an episode of The Westerner, with terrific results. Philip Kaufman’s The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid (1972) is an overlooked gem with a great part for Armstrong. As a kid, he scared me in Race With The Devil (1974).

Originally from Alabama, he got a Masters in English from the University Of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, just down the street. I doubt anybody on campus today knows who he is.

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Lorne Greene, Somewhere Other Than The Ponderosa.

Here’s Lorne Greene, Linda Cristal and Jock Mahoney in Last Of The Fast Guns (1958), a CinemaScope Universal Western from George Sherman. This film really needs to make its way to DVD.

Be sure to head over to INSP TV to enter their Saddle Up and Getaway Sweepstakes. Greene and Bonanza are part of their extended lineup.

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