Western

Arrow in the Dust (1954) Lesley Selander, Sterling Hayden, Coleen Gray, Keith Larsen, Western

Arrow in the Dust (1954)
Army deserter Bart Laish decides that the best way for him to get away is to join a wagon train headed for Oregon. They’re about a week ahead of him and on the trail Bart comes across an old friend, Major Andy Pepperis who is dying from wounds received in an Indian attack. He warns Bart that the Indians will next attack the wagon train and afterward finds the army station, Camp Taylor, destroyed. He assumes Pepperis’ identity and catches up to the wagon train taking command of the soldiers escorting it. He proves to be a capable leader and quickly gains everyone’s respect. As they get closer to their destination, Bart is closer to being caught and has to decide if and when he will leave them.
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The Apple Dumpling Gang (1975) Norman Tokar, Bill Bixby, Susan Clark, Don Knotts, Family, Comedy, Western

The Apple Dumpling Gang (1975)
Three orphaned siblings are forced upon confirmed bachelor Donovan (Bixby) in a 19th century boom town of Quake City, CA. After an earthquake shakes the area, the children find a large gold nugget worth tens of thousands of dollars. But their newfound wealth is causing more problems than it’s solving, so they agree to “give” the gold to two bumbling outlaws (Knotts & Conway). But they only way they can get the gold is to steal it from the bank vault where it’s being held for safe keeping.
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Man from Del Rio (1956) Harry Horner, Anthony Quinn, Katy Jurado, Peter Whitney, Romance, Western

Man from Del Rio (1956)
Mexican gunfighter Dave Robles outdraws the town’s outlaw-turned-sheriff and is invited to fill the dead man’s shoes. But a tin star doesn’t bring automatic respectability and Robles is shunned by the town’s leading citizens. His popularity with its less-savory element, particularly saloonkeeper Bannister, wanes dramatically, too, as he starts to take his job seriously. It is his love for a decent, caring woman that keeps Dave in town, but can she convince him to lay down his gun and start a new life?
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The Cariboo Trail (1950) Edwin L. Marin, Randolph Scott, George ‘Gabby’ Hayes, Bill Williams, Western

The Cariboo Trail (1950)
Jim Redfern dreams of owning his own cattle ranch and along with his partners Mike Evans and Ling heads off on the Cariboo Trail into the interior of British Columbia. There’s a gold rush on and along the way they’re joined by old-timer Grizzly Winters, a prospector who hasn’t had much luck of late. They soon come up against Frank Walsh whose men stampede their cattle. Evans is severely injured forcing Redfern to amputate his left arm. Evans hates him for that and will have nothing to do with him or his dream of the cattle ranch. Walsh owns the local town making it difficult for Redfern to get re-established. Things begin to go his way when he finds gold.
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The Wild North (1952) Andrew Marton, Stewart Granger, Wendell Corey, Cyd Charisse, Adventure, Romance, Western

The Wild North (1952)
Jules Vincent, a happy-go-lucky, outgoing French Canadian trapper in the wild Northwest, befriends a beautiful Native American girl, and although he makes an enemy of bully Mike Brody, he agrees to travel with him. When Brody tries to kill them, Vincent kills him in self-defense. He is pursued by a by-the-book, idealistic Constable Pedley, who believes in the mounties’ credo “we always get our man.” The country is rugged and fraught with dangers like white water rapids, avalanches, wolf packs and desperadoes. After capturing Vincent, the inexperienced Mountie finds he is in no shape to get back to civilization without Vincent’s help. Pedley is torn between fulfilling his duty and freeing the man who has saved his life.
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The Quiet Gun (1957) William F. Claxton, Forrest Tucker, Mara Corday, Jim Davis, Western

The Quiet Gun (1957)
Hired gun Doug Sadler rides into a small Western town and immediately provokes the local sheriff, Carl Brandon, by tormenting a simpleminded local named Sampson. Brandon is further provoked by a visit from city attorney Hardy, who announces that the town council is charging local rancher Ralph Carpenter with violations of morality for living with an Indian girl. Brandon, who is in love with Carpenter’s estranged wife Teresa, realizes that there is something sinister behind both these events, but he is unsuccessful in preventing calamity from erupting. Eventually he must stand against his entire town in order to protect it and the law he represents.
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Joe Dakota (1957) Richard Bartlett, Jock Mahoney, Luana Patten, Charles McGraw, Romance, Western

Joe Dakota (1957)
In the sparsely populated town of Arborville, California, rides a lone stranger.His name is Joe Dakota and he’s looking for an old friend whom he calls The Old Indian.The townsfolk claim the Old Indian had packed up and left town but Joe doubts it.Heading for the old man’s farm Joe notices a group of men working on a new oil rig dug right on The Old Indian’s property. When Joe starts asking questions about his old friend,the men either clam up or state that the old Indian has sold his land and left town.However,Joe Dakota knew his friend well and is sure that his friend wouldn’t have sold his land.Joe decides to stick around and investigate further, despite protests from the townsfolk who want to see the back of Joe.Amid threats,intimidation and lies Joe makes one new friend, Miss Jody Weaver, who is willing to shed some light on The Old Indian’s fate. Nevertheless, town baddie Cal Moore, who claims to have purchased The Old Indian’s land, is stirring the townsfolk against Joe Dakota.
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Django (1966) Sergio Corbucci, Franco Nero, José Canalejas, José Bódalo, Western, Action

Django (1966)
Sergio Corbucci crafted one of the most popular and widely imitated of the Italian “spaghetti westerns” of the 1960s with this violent but stylish action saga. A mysterious man named Django (Franco Nero) arrives in a Mexican border town dragging a small coffin behind him. When he attempts to save a woman who is being attacked by a group of bandits, he finds himself in the middle of a conflict between Mexican gangsters and racist Yankee thugs, with the innocent townspeople and a fortune in Mexican gold stuck somewhere in between. Django becomes a force to be reckoned with when it’s discovered his coffin actually contains a Gatling gun. Django proved so popular in Europe that over 30 sequels and follow-ups were produced, though Franco Nero would not return to the role until 1987’s Django 2: Il Grande Ritorno (the only sequel endorsed by Corbucci), which proved to be the last film in the series.
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The Naked Dawn (1955) Edgar G. Ulmer, Arthur Kennedy, Betta St. John, Eugene Iglesias, Crime, Drama, Western, Action, Romance

The Naked Dawn (1955)
Given a bigger budget than usual, cult director Edgar G. Ulmer rises to the occasion in The Naked Dawn. Filmed in Mexico, the story focuses on a poor but proud farmer named Manuel (Eugene Iglesias) and his wife Maria (Betta St. John). When glib-tongued drifter Santiago (Arthur Kennedy) tries to get Manuel mixed up in a train robbery, the farmer is at first resistant, but is goaded into joining Santiago by the covetous Maria. Corrupted by the prospect of untold wealth, Manuel begins plotting the murder of Santiago; meanwhile, Maria makes plans to bump off Manuel and run off with the handsome stranger. There’s a moral in all this, and Ulmer makes certain that we don’t miss it.
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The Singer Not the Song (1961) Roy Ward Baker, Dirk Bogarde, John Mills, Mylène Demongeot, Drama, Western

The Singer Not the Song (1961)
During the 1950s, in a small isolated Mexican village, the local Roman Catholic priest, Father Gomez, is an older man with a broken spirit. During his tenure in the village of Quantano, he fought hard to keep his flock of parishioners, in spite of threats and intimidation from the part of local bandit Anacleto Comachi and his men. The atheistic bandit has imposed his tyrannical rule over the region for many years. The local Police cannot find any witnesses to come forward and testify to any wrongdoing from the part of Anacleto. Therefore, they cannot charge him or arrest him. The Catholic Church replaces Father Gomez with a younger, more energetic priest, Father Keogh from Ireland. Before departing the village, Father Gomez warns Father Keogh of the dangers of defying Anacleto Comachi’s authority. But Father Keogh openly defies the bandit and administers his daily priestly duties at the village church. He even manages to persuade some of the villagers to start attending church again.
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High Plains Drifter (1973) Clint Eastwood, Verna Bloom, Marianna Hill, Western

High Plains Drifter (1973)
“Who are you?” the dwarf Mordecai (Billy Curtis) asks Clint Eastwood’s Stranger at the end of Eastwood’s 1973 western High Plains Drifter. “You know,” he replies, before vanishing into the desert heat waves near California’s Mono Lake. Adapting the amorally enigmatic and violent Man With No Name persona from his films with Sergio Leone, Eastwood’s second film as director begins as his drifter emerges from that heat haze and rides into the odd lakefront settlement of Lago. Lago’s residents are not particularly friendly, but once the Stranger shows his skills as a gunfighter, they beg him to defend them against a group of outlaws (led by Eastwood regular Geoffrey Lewis) who have a score to settle with the town. He agrees to train them in self-defense, but Mordecai and innkeeper’s wife Sarah Belding (Verna Bloom) soon suspect that the Stranger has another, more personal agenda. By the time the Stranger makes the corrupt community paint their town red and re-name it “Hell,” it is clear that he is not just another gunslinger. With its fragmented flashbacks and bizarre, austere locations, High Plains Drifter’s stylistic eccentricity lends an air of unsettling eeriness to its revenge story, adding an uncanny slant to Eastwood’s antiheroic westerner. Seminal western hero John Wayne was so offended by Eastwood’s harshly revisionist view of a frontier town that he wrote to Eastwood, objecting that this was not what the spirit of the West was all about. Eastwood’s audience, however, was not so put off, and an exhibitors’ poll named Eastwood a top box-office draw for 1973.
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