miscwesterns

Misc Westerns

1. Abilene Town (1946) – Randolph Scott:

Randolph Scott plays the Marshall Dan Mitchell who tries to keep things peaceful in town. Edgar Buchanan plays the sheriff Bravo Trimble who rather gambles than shoots. Lloyd Bridges can be seen as Henry Dreiser.

2. Broadway to Cheyenne (1932) – Rex Bell:

Broadway To Cheyenne starts off with a bunch of big city gangsters fighting and killing each other with Detective Breezy Kildare (Rex Bell) caught in the middle. When Breezy goes out west to the ranch where he grew up he runs into the same bunch of crooks. The gangsters are offering "protection" to the local ranchers. For the rest of the movie it's cowboys and gangsters. One striking scene has the protective association gangsters mow down a bunch of innocent cattle with a machine gun! This was the first of the Bells that set up the novel precedent for his films that would start in the East and wind up out West.

3. Santa Fe Trail (1940) – Errol Flynn and Ronald Reagan

It's 1854. Robert E. Lee is Superintendent of West Point, where J.E.B. Stuart (Errol Flynn) and George A. Custer (Ronald Reagan) are classmates. In the dormitory, one of the cadets (Van Heflin) reads aloud the secession-promoting pamphlets of abolitionist John Brown.

At graduation, the address is given by Secretary of War Jefferson Davis. J.E.B. Stuart and Custer are assigned to the 2nd Cavalry in the Kansas territory, where they have to deal with John Brown.

4. Jack London’s Queen of the Yukon (1940) - Charles Bickford:

Sadie (Irene Rich) owns a riverboat that gold-miners are using to travel to their claims, while gambling and drinking on the way. The Yukon Mining Company sends Thorne (Melvin Lang) to take over Sadie's boat and then cheat the miners out of their claims.

Sadie turns to her trusted friend Ace (Charles Bickford) to sort out all the complications.

5. Only the Valiant (1951) – Gregory Peck:

Capt. Richard Lance (Gregory Peck) is unjustly held responsible, by his men and his girlfriend (Barbara Payton), for an Indian massacre death of beloved Lt. Holloway. Holloway (Gig Young) is killed while escorting a dangerous Indian chief to another fort's prison.

The chief escapes. Knowing their fort is in danger of Indian attack, Lance takes a small group of army misfits to an abandoned nearby army fort to defend a mountain pass against the oncoming Indian assault.

Their mission is to stall for time until reinforcements from another fort arrive.

6. The Plainsman (1936) - Gary Cooper:

Epic C.B. DeMille production of the opening of the West stars Gary Cooper as Wild Bill Hickok and Jean Arthur as Calamity Jane. The pair fall in love while trying to put down an Indian uprising and ruthless gunrunners. With James Ellison, Charles Bickford, Gabby Hayes; look for Anthony Quinn as an Indian.

7. Kit Carson (1940) - Jon Hall - Trapper Kit Carson (Jon Hall) and his band of men join John C. Fremont (Dana Andrews) on his way to California. Enroute they are subjected to Indian attacks that are propagated by the Mexican Government, that does not want the contingency to reach California. Once in California, Fremont and Carson initiate a campaign to free the state from Mexican control.

8. Joel McCrea in Ramrod (1947) - A cattle-vs.-sheepman feud loses Connie Dickason (Veronica Lake) her fiance, but gains her his ranch, which she determines to run alone in opposition to Frank Ivey (Preston Foster) , "boss" of the valley, whom her father Ben wanted her to marry. She hires recovering alcoholic Dave Nash (Joel McCrea) as foreman and a crew of Ivey's enemies. Ivey fights back with violence and destruction, but Dave is determined to counter him legally... a feeling not shared by his associates. Connie's boast that, as a woman, she doesn't need guns proves justified, but plenty of gunplay results. Story is by Luke Short. Movie ends at 1hr 34min.

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9. Joel McCrea in Four Faces West (1948) - Joel McCrea, Frances Dee, Charles Bickford - Cowboy Ross McEwen (Joel McCrea) arrives in town. He asks the banker for a loan of $2000. When the banker asks about securing a loan that large, McEwen shows him his six-gun collateral. The banker hands over the money in exchange for an I.O.U., signed "Jefferson Davis". McEwen rides out of town and catches a train, but not before being bitten by a rattler. On the train, a nurse, Miss Hollister, tends to his wound. A posse searches the train, but McEwen manages to escape notice. However a mysterious Mexican has taken note of the cowboy, and that loudmouthed brat is still nosing around. Who will be the first to claim the reward for the robber's capture? [ADDED]

10. Joel McCrea in South of St Louis (1949) [COLOR] - The original title was "Distant Drums", this was a description of Civil War army deserters.

In Missouri during the Civil War, the Three Bell Ranch belonging to Kip Davis (Joel McCrea), Charlie Burns (Zachary Scott) and Lee Price (Douglas Kennedy) is destroyed by Luke Cottrell (Victor Jory) and his guerrilla raiders. Cottrell plunders the region for personal gain rather than in the name of the Union, as he claims. Driven from their land, many settlers move to Texas, still a neutral territory. Kip, Charlie and Lee go to Brownsville, Texas, looking for Cottrell. After a fistfight between Kip and Cottrell, Cottrell is told to leave Texas. While Lee decides to join the Confederate army, Kip and Charlie try to raise money to rebuild their ranch. Eventually, they get involved in smuggling arms for the Confederacy, bypassing the blockade imposed by the Union. This lucrative enterprise brings them into conflict with Cottrell who, after leaving the Union cause, is also smuggling guns out of Mexico. After a series of conflicts, crosses and double-crosses between Cottrell and the three friends, the Confederates capture Brownsville.

[ADDED]

11. Northern Patrol (1953) Story by James Oliver Curwood – Stars Kirby Grant - Corporal Rod Webb (Kirby Grant) and his dog Chinook finds a man who seems to have hung himself after writing a suicide note. Webb notes this happened while the suicide was in the midst of cooking himself a meal, and concludes that all is not right in this part of Canada. Kirby Grant later played Sky King on TV. [ADDED]

12. Joel McCrea in The San Francisco Story (1952) - In the 1850s San Francisco newspaper editor Jim Martin seeks the help of wealthy miner Rick Nelson (Joel McCrea) in ousting crooked politician Andrew Cain. Cain's girlfriend Adelaide falls in love with Rick. Rick and the bad guy shoot it out with shotguns on horseback. [ADDED]

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