For Richard Slotkin (Gunfighter Nation, p. 440, p. 734), The Last of the Fast Guns (1958) belongs to a series of Westerns imitating and extending the gunfighter-in-Mexico scenario developed in Vera Cruz (1954), culminating in The Magnificent Seven (1960): e.g. Sherman’s The Treasure of Pancho Villa (1955), Richard Fleischer’s Bandido! (1956), James B. Clark’s Villa! (1958), Robert Parrish’s The Wonderful Country (1959) or, to a lesser extent, Sherman’s Border River (1954), Edgar G. Ulmer’s The Naked Dawn (1955) and Robert Rossen’s They Came to Cordura (1959). “Labelling this trend the ‘counterinsurgency scenario’, Slotkin draws explicit parallels between Cold War-era Westerns and US governmental policy” (Austin Fisher, Radical Frontiers, p. 127). So many Westerns to watch … and the European Football Championship. Last one I saw was:
Only the Valiant (1951), directed by Gordon Douglas
US Cavalry Captain Richard Lance is in trouble. His men and his sweetheart think he’s a coward because he shunned a potentially lethal mission. In truth, he simply obeyed his commanding officer’s orders. To redeem himself, he volunteers for a suicide mission: to defend the abandoned and misnamed Fort Invincible against a superior number of Apache braves. For this task, he deliberately selects the worst soldiers of his regiment. Will Dick (Peck) succeed and regain his men’s and lover’s respect and esteem?
Upright, straight, elegant, dutiful. The part fits Peck well. Despite its fine cast (Ward Bond, Gig Young, Lon Chaney Jr. amongst others), Only the Valiant leaves the impression of an under-budgeted, over-scripted attempt at a cavalry Western, referring back to the Battle of Thermopylae and forward to The Dirty Dozen, but sadly lacking in fire- and horsepower.
COLD MOUNTAIN - Switched it off before the first half hour. Too much romance and an irritating Nicole Kidman turned my stomach very early on. Nope, not for me at all.
THE LAST HUNT - Bleak with a rare for the genre ecological conscience. Robert Taylor is a mean SOB that finds pleasure in killing anything that moves. Loved the last scene in the snow, so fitting.
MAN IN THE SADDLE - Always enjoying those little b westerns DeToth made and this is no exception. No match for DAY OF THE OUTLAW of course, but still very watchable.
I agree with your assessment of Cold Mountain (I sat through it till the end ). Liked The Last Hunt a lot and, surprisingly, prefer it to Brooks’s The Professionals and, unsurprisingly, to his lame Bite the Bullet. The shots of Taylor’s character’s grim end somehow anticipate the death of Nicholson’s Jack Torrance in The Shining, don’t they? And I think some of the (real) buffalo killing footage was reused in a Winnetou film but I can’t remember which one. Haven’t seen Man in the Saddle, which I initially – after having read your short review – confused with Tall in the Saddle.
I can safely say that THE LAST HUNT is my favorite out of Brooks’ westerns, but not my favorite Brooks film. That title goes to LOOKING FOR MR. GOODBAR. I kinda dig both THE PROFESSIONALS and BITE THE BULLET, they are in no way top stuf for me though. As far as the ending goes, I have seen THE SHINING only once in my life and that was more than 15 years ago. I would be lying if I said that I remember its ending. Another movie with a very similar ending scene though is the TV movie DELIVER US FROM EVIL with George Kennedy, which I do like a lot by the way.
I had a bad feeling about COLD MOUNTAIN long before I even started to think about watching it. Sad thing is that I was confirmed way too early in the film. Although not my favorite period for western films, there are only three post 2000 westerns in total which I couldn’t finish, MEEKS CUT OFF, THE VIRGINIAN and COLD MOUNTAIN.
I enjoyed Zachariah, and i kind of enjoyed acting of young Don Johnson as well. But, could be better. I was disappointed a little, because noone was wearing a mirrorshades in a significant way as the poster promised. Anyway, not sure about those hints of homo love - it was just a bromance movie for me, nothing more.
Terror in a Texas Town (1958), directed by Joseph H. Lewis
Well-written (Dalton Trumbo), dark, cynical Shane variation. With its comic-bookish exaggerations and stylized mannerisms a Spaghetti Western avant la lettre.
Features an obese would-be oligarch with a predilection for lobsters (Sebastian Cabot); a black-clad, sadistic gunslinger with a hand of iron, literally (Ned[rick] Young); a disillusioned, world-weary upstairs girl with a heart of gold (Carol Kelly); and as hero a Swedish whaler, who “youst returned from sea” (Sterling Hayden). – Very enjoyable.
Well, I don’t think I have. I watched lots of forties & fifties US westerns when I was young, selected a couple of favorite directors and movies and forgot about the rest. Often, when I watch a western I thought i had never seen before, I realize that I had seen it already, long ago. But if you haven’t seen a movie in over two decades, it’s more or less new to you
Yes, I know what you mean, happens to me too. I saw many German-dubbed American Westerns on Austrian television in the 1980s when I was a teenager (I’m forty-seven now). Settings, characters and plots tend to blend into an infinite Wild West of cinematic imagination; watching old US Westerns on DVD these days might bring about a feeling of déjà vu. As Neil Young put it, “It’s all one song.” The titles don’t serve as a point of orientation either, since they were translated arbitrarily; e.g., Sturm über Texas (“Storm over Texas”), German title of Terror in a Texas Town, which in any case is worth a (re-)watch. Approved, yet not rated by sQCA (stanton’s Quality Control Authority).
I watched many of those American westerns on German television, most of the time Saturday night, ARD or ZDF. They showed a lot of westerns in those days, but always dubbed in German, and with German titles, so I have the same ‘title disorientation’. The only positive thing - apart from the movies - is that I got used to watching westerns (and other movies) in German. I feel uncomfortable when watching westerns in French (I have several French television networks here in Belgium), doesn’t feel right, but I’m perfectly okay with German cowboys.
Don’t worry, I have the same problem with German titles. They sound all the same, and I often don’t know which film is which, and which one is meant if I read a German title.
I think mostly in original titles anyway, also for languages I don’t understand.
Good early 50s western with Rod Cameron in top form as a two-fisted ranch foreman involved in a range war amongst other things. The plot may seem a complex one, but what makes this a gem is the great cast and the action (especially the fistfight between Cameron and Forrest Tucker in a cabin). From Rod Cameron’s westerns that i have seen so far. this one is the best.
). Liked The Last Hunt a lot and, surprisingly, prefer it to Brooks’s The Professionals and, unsurprisingly, to his lame Bite the Bullet. The shots of Taylor’s character’s grim end somehow anticipate the death of Nicholson’s Jack Torrance in The Shining, don’t they? And I think some of the (real) buffalo killing footage was reused in a Winnetou film but I can’t remember which one. Haven’t seen Man in the Saddle, which I initially – after having read your short review – confused with Tall in the Saddle.
