Colt .45 was the first movie up on the three pack of Randolph Scott Westerns that I picked up a week or two ago. Colt .45 has a script by Thomas W Blackburn and the director is Edwin L Marin. Randolph Scott is a gun salesman for the new repeating Colt .45 pistols. They need to be loaded with powder, but having 6 bullets to everyone else's one is a bit of a nice advantage.
Zachary Scott is a gunslinger who's in jail when Randolph is visiting with the sheriff. While transferring Zachary from the jail to the stage Zachary grabs Randolph's guns, shoots the sheriff, and runs off with them. The deputy thinks Randolph is in with Zachary and locks him up. Four months later a judge lets him go and Randolph starts on Zachary's trail. It's not hard to follow, there aren't many repeating pistols out that way, and Zachery has left a trail of dead bodies. Along the way Randolph helps Chief Thundercloud, who had been shot by Zachary, and the Chief proves to be a good alley. Ruth Roman and Lloyd Bridges are a couple caught up in Zachary's path. Lloyd is weak and he let's Zachary push him around. You know he'll come to a bad end.
I usually like Randolph and here is no exception. The movie has plenty of the things you want in a Western, punchin', ridin', gunshootin', a lady and a good villain. Zachary Scott plays a mean son of a bitch who's only a man when he's got a gun in his hand. Another person's life means nothing to him. No one's sad when he gets his. It was a good film, glad to have picked it up.
Tall Man Riding is a 1950 Western with a script by Joseph Hoffman and direction by Lesley Selander. Randolph Scott plays a guy who returns to his home town to get his revenge on a rancher who publicly whipped him out of town ten years earlier. Randolph was spending too much time with the rancher's daughter, played by Dorothy Malone.
When he returns Randolph finds the rancher a broken man, blind and in the middle of loosing his ranch for not having filed his land claims with the federal government. The villain finds this out and the land goes up for grabs. There's too be a land rush and the local head villain, played by John Denher, is going to cheat to get the rancher's nice house. Randolph helps the rancher get his house back and he gets Dorothy too. Another decent story with good actors. Nice to have seen it.
Fort Worth is a 1951 Western with Randolph as a man who's hung up his guns. He's gone into the newspaper business because the pen is mightier than the 6 shooter. Randolph returns to Fort Worth and opens a paper. The two large ranchers in the area have a rivalry over a rail line coming to the town. It leads to fighting and dead people.
Randolph has to take up his guns after the villains kill his editor. There's plenty of the usual Western stuff going on. There's even a bit of a romance. It was entertaining. The script was by John Twist and it was directed by Edwin L Marin.
All in all a nice trio of films. Glad to have it and might get around to seeing it again.
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