Blu-Ray News #355: Audie Murphy Collection II (1950-1954).

Kino Lorber’s second hi-def batch of Audie Murphy Westerns is coming in June. This set includes Sierra (1950), Kansas Raiders (1950) and Destry (1954).

Sierra (1950)
Directed by Alfred E. Green
Starring Wanda Hendrix, Audie Murphy, Burl Ives, Dean Jagger, Tony Curtis, James Arness, Jack Ingram, Houseley Stevenson, I. Stanford Jolley

Audie and his dad, Dean Jagger, have been hiding in the mountain for years. A chance meeting with Wanda Hendrix brings civilization to their doorstep, where it’s not welcome.

Wanda Hendrix and Audie Murphy were newlyweds when production began on this one. They were separated before its release. Some really nice horse stuff (some of it lifted from 1949’s Red Canyon) and a great cast of character actors.

I’m doing a commentary for this one.

Kansas Raiders (1950)
Directed by Ray Enright
Starring Audie Murphy, Brian Donlevy, Marguerite Chapman, Scott Brady, Tony Curtis, Richard Arlen, Richard Long

U-I mangles history again, but who cares? Murphy is Jesse James, Brian Donlevy is Quantrill. Yet another solid Western from Ray Enright, with typically-gorgeous cinematography from Irving Glassberg.

Destry (1954)
Directed by George Marshall
Starring Audie Murphy, Mari Blanchard, Lyle Bettger, Thomas Mitchell, Edgar Buchanan, Lori Nelson, Wallace Ford

For this 1954 remake, U-I puts Murphy and Mari Blanchard in the roles played by James Stewart and Marlene Dietrich in 1939’s Destry Rides Again. George Marshall directed both versions. (There was a semi-remake in 1950, Frenchie, with Joel McCrea, Shelley Winters and Marie Windsor.) In this one, it’s good to see Murphy play against type a bit, and it’s always great to see Wallace Ford. Of course, Mari Blanchard looks terrific.

All three of these pictures boast the usual U-I 50s Western Technicolor sheen. (Destry should be widescreen.) They’ll look wonderful on Blu-Ray. Highly recommended.

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DVD Review: The Black Dakotas (1954).

Directed by Ray Nazarro
Screenplay by Ray Buffum and DeVallon Scott
Director Of Photography: Ellis W. Carter
Film Editor: Aaron Stell

Cast: Gary Merrill (Brock Marsh), Wanda Hendrix (Ruth Lawrence), John Bromfield (Mike Daugherty), Noah Beery, Jr. (Gimpy Joe), Fay Roope (John Lawrence), Howard Wendell (Judge Baker), Robert Simon (Marshal Whit Collins), James H. Griffith (Warren), Richard Webb (Frank Gibbs), Peter Whitney (Grimes), John War Eagle (Chief War Cloud), Jay Silverheels (Black Buffalo), Clayton Moore (Stone)

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At only 65 minutes long, The Black Dakotas (1954) was clearly meant to fill out a double bill. But for a film that’s not all that noteworthy, there are a number of things about it worth noting.

First, there’s the cast. Gary Merrill, in his first Western, is the bad guy — a Confederate hoping to stir up things with the Sioux to keep Union soldiers tied up. He gets a lot of screen time for a villain, maybe because he’s far more interesting than the good guy (John Bromfield). Wanda Hendrix, Audie Murphy’s ex-wife, was about to retire from the movies (at least for a few years), and she’s fine here. Noah Beery, Jr. does what he can with a rather odd part. The great James H. Griffith doesn’t have a whole lot to do as one of the bad guys.

John Bromfield and Wanda Hendrix

More on the cast. The Black Dakotas was shot during the period when Clayton Moore left The Lone Ranger TV series (over a salary dispute, reportedly) and returned to B Movie character parts. Moore’s not listed in the credits, but he’s there. You’ll also see Jay Silverheels (Tonto to Moore’s Lone Ranger) as one of the Sioux chiefs. From Moore and Silverheels to Beery and Griffith, the characters actors run rings around the leads.

Here, Ray Nazarro does what we’ve seen him do so many times — put together a brisk little movie that delivers in the action department. It seems like no matter how small the budget or tight the schedule, Nazarro delivers the goods, the same way Lesley Selander always does. Of course, having Ellis Carter as director of photography doesn’t hurt. Why isn’t Carter brought up more often? He shot The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957), for God’s sake! He gives The Black Dakotas a much bigger look than you’d expect. An early sequence was shot on a cloudy day — at Iverson, I think — and Carter really makes a positive out of a negative.

Carter’s fine work is well presented (in widescreen) in Mill Creek’s 7 Western Showdown Collection, a two-DVD set that contains seven Westerns. All the pictures look terrific, and the price is hard to beat. Recommended. I hope Mill Creek keeps up the good work, and I’d love to see movies like this make their way to Blu-Ray.

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