This is I assert a very important and influential movie, notwithstanding its inexpensive sets and generally impoverished feel. Its producers, writer and co-author Richard Bartlett, co-star and associate producer Earle Lyon and co-star/associate producer Ian MacDonald gave it a generally competent and intelligent feel. It is rather well-acted by Peggie Castle as Karen Marshall aka Kate Masters, William Talman as the marshal, Earle Lyon and Ian MacDonald as the Ivers, Robert Lowery as Big Mike, Marie Windsor as the unscrupulous Bess, Joe Besser as "Doc", Barbara Turner as Jennie Ivers, Norman Jolley and the rest of the cast. The importance of the film lies, I claim, in the fact that it is the first time in film history that a female central character was shown as being capable of committing physical violence as a volitional course of ethical action. in the same year that this film was produced, in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" author Jack Finney had to explain to his hero that his fiancée was capable of and willing to help him during a fight; the usual Hollywood myth had the female standing and biting her knuckles while the male in an action film tried to fight three or four roughnecks. This is the film that changed that stereotype. The story-line is an unusually good one, I suggest. Castle was a child when she watched the Ivers take over the valley, goading her farmer father into a losing gun duel and murdering her mother before her eyes. She gets herself trained as a sharpshooter in the Annie Oakley model, her ultimate goal being to prepare herself to draw against the murderer, Jud Ivers. Ben Ivers, the father, has meanwhile been shot and paralyzed; and the marshal who is after the gang tries to talk her out of risking her life, committing homicide and ignoring the fact that his way is better; during the contest, he falls in love with her and she with him. It takes him walking up to her as she holds a gun on him to prove the rightness of his argument that, "learning to use a gun isn't learning to kill'. She won't kill him to have her way, but when the time comes, she has to have a showdown with her enemies, which leads to a surprising and very satisfying conclusion. Cinematographer for the film was Guy Roe; music was provided by Leon Klatzkin, who also conducted ably. Thomas Connolly did the set designs while Harry Reif was the set dresser; Henry Helfman made the costumes seem more expensive than they were. Richard Bartlett managed to keep the dialogue believable and the action moving at most points; minor errors do not matter to a film--this is by any standards an unusually well- acted "B" picture. Castle is very good, Talman quite good as both marshal and admirer. Lowery is powerful as a nice-guy barkeep and Windsor effective as saloon woman. Earle Lyon underplayed Ben Ivers with high-voltage; Ian MacDonald made an effective killer, and Joe Besser made his alcoholic partner memorable. By the time "Maverick" is produced, "Support Your Local Sheriff", "Cat Ballou" and "The Hallelujah Trail" are created, the insulting and unAmerican puritanic stereotype of the passive female--that kept so many fine actresses in Hollywood bondage to reactionary producer ""tsars' for decade--has been effectively shattered. This is one of the films that helped to do that; it is inexpensive and occasionally flawed, but it has a coherent story line and, to the objective appreciator, is always sincere and above-average
