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Sorry, this movie sucks

An Exercise In Nonsense

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

While it's true that this is not a "typical western" in the sense that the good guy wins, kisses the girl and rides off into the sunset, I don't believe it's a remarkable movie.Firstly, the typecasting of actresses such as Joan Blondell and Gloria Graham is obvious - they appear to be rehashing the roles they played in Other Men's Women and Human Desire, respectively. Claude Akins is a psychotic alcoholic. He's lucid enough to know there is money involved in the scheme against Chuck Connors, but impaired enough to be controlled by the others in the gang for most of the movie.Bill Bixby's character is merely odd - a foppish, sadistic gigolo who develops some sort of conscience in the end. There is no rationale for his breakdown or his self-mutilation. Paul Fix does well as a double-crossing scoundrel who receives justice at the hands of Claude Akins. His actions are out of character, as he has not shown much in the way of initiative up to this point. He, as well as the others, have taken their marching orders from Michael Renne.The book and original story may have had more depth, but the movie version seems shallow and frankly, quite lazy, in its attempt to create a character-driven drama. It leans more toward Soap Opera (or Rope Opera, if you prefer) with heavy doses of gratuitous violence.

Ride Beyond Vengeance casts Chuck Connors as a returning buffalo hunter returning to his wife after an eleven year absence. Sounds a whole lot like the plot premise for the Iliad and Connors does go through some trials just like Ulysses did.Eleven years earlier Connors married Kathryn Hays who faked a pregnancy to get her aunt Ruth Warrick to consent to the wedding. Hays is a few steps up the social scale from Connors. Anyway he hauls out and says he'll make a fortune and return.But like Ulysses he stays away and on his return is set upon and actually branded with a running iron. The three who do it are a pair of bottom feeding sadists Bill Bixby and Claude Akins and also Michael Rennie who's a rich man courting Hays because he and everyone else think her husband is dead.Connors ain't dead and when he wakes up he's going to take care of business the way Ulysses took care of all of Penelope's prospective suitors.This no frills B western has a fine supporting cast to Connors and Hays. In very telling bits are Joan Blondell as a bordello madam and Gloria Grahame as an unfaithful wife having an affair with younger Bill Bixby. It's a flashback to the Forties and Fifties when Grahame was the big screen's number one trollop.As for Bixby and Akins the two of them are incredible studies in villainy. Akins who in his big screen career played some of the biggest low life villains ever really hits rock bottom here. He overacts outrageously, but all to good effect.Bixby is the first one who Connors catches up with and his devolution as a human being may contain his finest big screen performance. Later on Frank Gorshin in a small bit himself gives a description of Bixby's final moments that will unnerve you for days.Ride Beyond Vengeance is one brutal and savage western which no way would have made it in the days of those cowboy heroes for Republic. This is one western recommended highly for adults and forbidden for little kids.

"Ride Beyond Vengeance" is more than a typical western. Although produced on a low budget by television producers Mark Goodson And Bill Toddman ("The Price is Right") and featuring several names mostly familiar to TV audiences, it has a dynamic, if pessimistic script more concerned with character development than standard action--not that the film lacks action or violence. Cowboy Jonas Trapp (Chuck Connors of "Rifleman" fame) falls in love with the beautiful Jessie (Kathryn Hays), very appealing in her first film, a wealthy girl out of his humble class. Against the wishes of her snobbish aunt (Ruth Warrick), she marries him, later faking a pregnancy to win her aunt's consent. But Jonas tires of living off of his wife's family, and eventually deserts her to become a buffalo hunter. 11 years later, with his self-made fortune, he sets out to return home, only to be set upon by three sadistic marauders, Michael Rennie, Bill Bixby and Claude Akins, who steal his money and leave him for dead. Rescued by a farmer (Paul Fix, Connors' "Rifleman" co-star) who nurses him back to health, Jonas becomes consumed by the desire for revenge. As fate would have it, all three men live close to Jonas' former home. Matters quickly get worse when Jonas reunites with his wife, only to discover that she is now engaged to Rennie. Made on a three week schedule on an obvious sound-stage, "Ride Beyond Vengeance" succeeds in transcending it's shortcomings by the powerful acting of a first-rate cast. Connors gives his best performance, and he is well (if briefly) supported by Joan Blondell (as a gossipy townswoman), Gloria Grahame (a cheating wife having an affair with Bixby), Gary Merrill as Jonas' foster father, Frank Gorshin as an arrogant ranch hand, and Buddy Baer as a Bouncer. Buried way down the cast list is young starlet Marrisa Mathes, who is sympathetic and real as the grieving girlfriend of Bixby who reaches out to Jonas. But, next to Connors, the film belongs to Bixby, as a sadomasochistic dandy. James MaCarthur and Arthur O'Connell appear in a present day prologue to set the scene and narrate the story. The screenplay is based on Al Dewlen's novel, "The Night of the Tiger" and spends considerable time fleshing out the characters. Of course, violence rears it's ugly head here and there, but not so much as to put off the viewer. (It did, however, put off critics when it was released back in 1966) but it went on to garner a massive audience when it had its television premiere. Today, it seems better than it was initially given credit for, and remains well worth seeing. A widescreen DVD release is due out in December. It's about time!

This quirky little western is no more than mediocre but it sports a number of odd touches that you won't see elsewhere. The high point (or low point) comes when Chuck Connors is branded on his 45-inch chest with a red-hot iron shaped like a "T." Also worth noting is an eclectic, one-of-a-kind supporting cast which manages to find room for Bill Bixby, Jamie Farr, James MacArthur, Arthur O'Connell, Michael Rennie, Frank Gorshin, Gary Merrill, Paul Fix, and Claude Akins, as well as three veteran actresses: Joan Blondell, Ruth Warrick, and Oscar-winner Glorida Grahame. What a marquee! This is also one of the few westerns told in flashback and one of the few to feature, among its characters, a census-taker.