This B+ western deserves a better grade just for exceeding its production values. The town's set is little better than that for TV westerns like Lawman, and the script works mostly by saying as little as possible, forcing the cinematography and direction to show rather than tell. The familiar stock character actors (including some familiar faces like Emile Meyer who rise to their extended screen-time) all support Mitchum, whose pained charisma and cobra-quick violence are essential to the film's success.
Other reviewers are right that the basic plot is formulaic, but a few variations maintained interest. Meyer's daughter's gradual infatuation with Mitchum is never directly acknowledged by either character (only by townspeople), but the audience sees her putting herself in his company or staring after him or him sometimes looking back. The villain's spy who watches Mitchum from the hotel porch is obviously up to something, but the viewer is cleverly sealed off from the scenes that expose his plot.
Two parts of the script instill suspense and dread that are honest to the story's ambiguous outcome. Twice the town doctor warns that a cure like that Mitchum is offering the town may be worse than the town's disease. Mitchum's character warns of no formulaic redemption when he repeatedly asserts that he's nothing but a gunman and only guns can tame a town—contrasting ominously with formula western heroes who proclaim they don't want to fight, that they're really peace-loving men. One other oddity at the end was Mitchum's taking a bullet so the younger man engaged to Meyer's daughter can prove his manhood. Mitchum's wound seems close to the heart; his and the doctor's initial conversation sounds fatal; and Mitchum reclines in profile like a fallen classical hero. Maybe the studio insisted on a proper romantic ending, though, for then Mitchum and his long-lost wife talk as though he'll hang up his guns and they'll start over, climaxing in a kiss at "The End." B movies like this count as precious jewels and fascinating records of mid-20c culture.
Other reviewers are right that the basic plot is formulaic, but a few variations maintained interest. Meyer's daughter's gradual infatuation with Mitchum is never directly acknowledged by either character (only by townspeople), but the audience sees her putting herself in his company or staring after him or him sometimes looking back. The villain's spy who watches Mitchum from the hotel porch is obviously up to something, but the viewer is cleverly sealed off from the scenes that expose his plot.
Two parts of the script instill suspense and dread that are honest to the story's ambiguous outcome. Twice the town doctor warns that a cure like that Mitchum is offering the town may be worse than the town's disease. Mitchum's character warns of no formulaic redemption when he repeatedly asserts that he's nothing but a gunman and only guns can tame a town—contrasting ominously with formula western heroes who proclaim they don't want to fight, that they're really peace-loving men. One other oddity at the end was Mitchum's taking a bullet so the younger man engaged to Meyer's daughter can prove his manhood. Mitchum's wound seems close to the heart; his and the doctor's initial conversation sounds fatal; and Mitchum reclines in profile like a fallen classical hero. Maybe the studio insisted on a proper romantic ending, though, for then Mitchum and his long-lost wife talk as though he'll hang up his guns and they'll start over, climaxing in a kiss at "The End." B movies like this count as precious jewels and fascinating records of mid-20c culture.