50s Westerns DVD News #110: Warner Archive’s 5 for $45 Thank-You Sale.

Did your aunt Suzy put a twenty in your Christmas card? Well, here’s a good place to use it.

Warner Archive is having a Thank You sale through the 14th, with more than 1,000 titles at five DVD-Rs for just $45. And free shipping. The link is here.

There are some really fine films in the Warner Archive Collection, including some terrific 50s Westerns like Westward The Women (1951), Carson City (1952), The Command (1954), Wichita (1955), The Fastest Gun Alive (1956) and The Hanging Tree (1959). Columbia’s Choice Collection and sets like the Tim Holt RKOs are not part of this promotion.

So have at it. And remember, it’s only good through the 14th!

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50s Westerns Wish List For 2013.

We did a 50s Westerns Want List a couple years ago and it was a blast — and a surprising number of our wishes have since come true! So it seems about time to do another one. Last time around, I polled a few people offline, but I’ve since learned that a lot of the fun comes from watching y’all feed off each other as you load up the comments box.

So send in your lists. I’ll compile and sort the responses — then see if I can get them to someone who can actually do something about it.

I’ll start. Reprisal! (1956) and The Hard Man (1957), both from George Sherman and starring Guy Madison, and Fred MacMurray and James Coburn in Face Of A Fugitive (1959) — all from Columbia. Then there’s a Blu-ray John Sturges/Kirk Douglas/VistaVision twin-bill of Gunfight At The O.K. Corral (1957) and Last Train From Gun Hill (1959). I could go on and on.

UPDATE: I’m compiling and sorting all your requests and will post them Christmas day.

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50s Westerns DVD News #104: Warner Archive Goes Blu-ray.

Warner Archive has announced that it will soon be offering Blu-rays. These will not be MOD discs, and will be pressed in limited quantities.

In other words, if something you like comes out, get it — who knows how long inventory will last. (This was the key to collecting laserdiscs back in the day.)

No idea how they’ll decide which titles get the HD treatment — the ones listed are not previous Warner Archive releases. The Command (1954), the first CinemaScope Western, is a nice-looking Warner Archive title — and it’d be a swell Blu-ray.

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Wonder What Guy Madison Was Up To 58 Years Ago.

From The Chicago Sun-Times, January 23, 1954:

“Dickie Barrett, 5, is going to get Guy Madison’s contribution to the forthcoming Heart Fund Campagn even if it means holding up “Wild Bill Hickok,” Madison’s TV role.”

While the photo caption references Madison’s Hickcok show, The Command (1954) — with Madison starring in the first CinemaScope Western — had just opened. By the way, The Command is a good, if minor, Western — worth seeing for James Whitmore alone. It’s available from Warner Archive.

Any experts out there recognize Dickie’s two-gun rig?

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