Sam Whiskey

After being enlisted by a hot widow (Angie Dickinson), a former war spy (Burt Reynolds), a blacksmith (Ossie Davis) and an inventor (Clint Walker) team-up to salvage a treasure in gold bars from a sunken ship in the Platte River, a treasure the woman's husband stole. They then have to return the gold bars to the Denver Mint before the phony bars are discovered and the woman's family name is tarnished. But how will they get all those gold bars into the Mint without anyone noticing?

People tend to dub this a Western Comedy, but it's not in the silly sense of "Blazing Saddles" (1974) "Texas Across the River" (1966) or "The Duchess and the Dirtwater Fox" (1976). It's more of a Western Caper with amusing flashes, mainly due to Reynold's fun-loving title character.

The same plot was later used in John Wayne's "The Train Robbers" (1973) with Ann-Margret in the Angie Dickinson role, minus the caper in the third act. They're both worth checking out, but I favor "The Train Robbers" because, to me, the caper in the last act gets kind of tedious, not to mention unbelievable. Nevertheless, "Sam Whiskey" features a great cast with fun-lovin' chemistry and quality Western locations.

It is presumed that the story takes place circa 1870-75 since it is detailed that Sam was a spy during the Civil War and he appears to be around 30-35 tops. Actually, the earliest the story COULD have taken place would be 1906, which is when the Denver Mint began minting coins, but this would make Whiskey about 65 years old, which he obviously isn't. Adding to the problem, the Carson City Mint shut down in 1893. So the timeline is all fudged up.

The movie runs 1 hour, 36 minutes and was shot at Universal City, Burbank and Lake Camanche, Ione, California (with underwater scenes done in Silver Springs, Florida).

GRADE: B/B- (6.5/10)

So I was sick all weekend, bedridden with the flu and flipping through cable when I stumbled upon the Encore Western Channel, which I watched for hour after hour. For some reason, they were playing a triple-shot of Burt Reynolds westerns: Navajo Joe, The Man who Loved Cat Dancing and Sam Whiskey.

Now I grew up in the Eighties so I missed most of Reynolds movies; last year I hunted down and watched many for which he is best known: Smokey and the Bandit (rip-roaring hilarity), Stroker Ace (yuck), Cannonball Run (meh) and Hooper (my all-time favorite, ridiculously entertaining). I thought I had seen all there was to see from ol' Burt, but Sam Whiskey pleasantly surprised me.

This isn't really a western, it's more like a heist movie set on the frontier. I think the reason some of the other reviewers were disappointed by this one was that they were looking for stagecoach robberies, breakneck horseback riding and wide frontier vistas. While there is some of that, for the most part this film revolves around a "reverse-heist;" In this case, Burt and his team played by Ossie Davis(very funny and amiable as a blacksmith) and Clint Walker (imposing hulk of a man who's gentle on the inside) are trying to return some gold to the US mint. They work out a suitably ingenious and ludicrous scheme (the cornerstone for every caper flick) and work it out.

While the proceedings are executed largely for laughs there are surprising amounts of edge-of-your-seat suspense as various curveballs are thrown our heroes' way. I have to admit I laughed out loud probably five times, which was incredible considering how miserable I felt and how much my sore throat hurt WHEN I LAUGHED. But I forgive the movie for this! I like the overall good-natured and almost lackadaisic nature of the pacing. The film keeps moving and is engaging, but by no means is it in any hurry.

So I would recommend this one to all Burt Reynolds fans, all caper movie fans and generally anyone who is willing to give a 40-year-old easygoing movie a chance.

And as an interesting side-note: As if I didn't already realize that I'd watched westerns all weekend -- I thought that actor Clint Walker looked vaguely familiar but couldn't quite place him. They I looked him up on IMDb...he played the icy bad guy in a Charles Bronson western I'd watched earlier in the weekend, "The White Buffalo." I hadn't placed him because it was such a polar opposite role for him. So in his career he's pulled a heist on the Denver Mint with Burt Reynolds and got into a gunfight with Charles Bronson on the frontier. Not too shabby.

Sam Whiskey is directed by Arnold Laven and written by William W. Norton. It stars Burt Reynolds, Ossie Davis, Clint Walker and Angie Dickinson. Music is by Herschel Burke Gilbert and cinematography by Robert C. Moreno.

Widow Laura Breckenridge (Dickinson) offers Sam Whiskey (Reynolds) a $20,000 reward for the return of some gold that her late husband had stolen from the Denver mint. However, she doesn't want the gold for herself, she wants Sam to put it back into the mint before it's found to be stolen and soils her family name!

Maybe it's because I consider myself a Reynolds fan that I found this to be a whole bunch of fun? That I appear to be at odds with critical consensus about Sam Whiskey's worth as entertainment?

Stolen money burns a hole in your pocket.

Sam Whiskey knows exactly what it's doing, it mixes the caper movie with a Western setting and lets the principal players have fun with it. The quadruple lead players bounce off of each other with considerable charming results, the set-up is suitably daft, a reverse robbery if you like, and there's no shortage of suspense and action. In fact the various twists that arise as Reynolds, Davis and Walker go about their mission of goodwill for the sultry Dickinson, are well implemented into the plot. The De Luxe colour photography is most pleasing, though the absence of scenic panoramas is sorely felt, and the music score is complementary to the tone of the story.

True, the direction is hardly inspiring, the quirky nature of the whole thing narrows down the number of film fans it might appeal to and the idea is indeed thin. Yet for Reynolds fans it should be sought out, to see him at the end of the 60s before "his" time would come in the 70s. Watch him perform with a comedic glint in his eye, see Dickinson smoulder and raise temperatures, Walker play at odds with his macho persona, and Davis having fun being the tough boy of the group. Enjoy the cheekiness (Re: ludicrousness) of the caper, the early diving technique on show or sample the verbal amusement that comes from the stars. I just know I had a big enough grin on my face come the end to make this a strong 7/10 rating. Non Reynolds fans should probably knock a point off that rating, though.

Reynolds' undeniable charm and appeal are stretched to their limit in this simple, eternally average western yarn. He plays the title character, a drifter who is talked into a nearly impossible heist job by the sexually persuasive Dickinson. The film opens with an enjoyable confrontation between Reynolds and Davis (who would later work together on "Evening Shade".) The pair later hooks up with gorgeous lunkhead inventor Walker and attempts the job at hand...putting $125,000 worth of gold BACK INTO the Denver mint. They are pursued by a mysterious man, with the thickest eyeglasses on the planet, who wants the gold for himself. The film has a light tone and has the elements to be amusing and entertaining, but somehow misses the mark. For one thing, if one removed the scenes of the covered wagon travelling cross country, the film would probably run about 40 minutes! Also, the plot, as written, is just a little thin to sustain a feature film. Reynolds is near the peak of his attractiveness and shows off his chest in a bathtime scene. Unfortunately, Walker (who possessed the chest to end them all!) is denied that chance. The closest he gets is a bondage scene in which his shirt is cut open slightly. (Was Reynolds afraid of a little beefcake competition?) Davis does well in his role and Walker has a few nice bits as well. The whole thing just has a sheen of mediocrity over it. Dickinson is her usual stiff, breathy-voiced self, but is attractive and manages to supply a touch of amusement. Oft-used character actor Schallert is given a nice role. One mystery that even J.B. Fletcher couldn't solve: How could anyone, after hearing Reynolds sing in this film, hire him for "At Long last Love"?? Fans of Reynolds and of quirky westerns should enjoy it more than others.

Sam Whiskey (Burt Reynolds , one of his first ever main cast ) is an rogue adventurer , then he's hired by a gorgeous widow (Angie Dickinson ). He must retrieve a treasure recently stolen by her deceased husband from a sunken ship . Sam teams up an African-American blacksmith (Ossie Davis) and a tall inventor (Clint Walker) who designs a diving helmet . But they are followed by a fat man and hoodlums (Anthony James) . Later on , they manage to get hundred pounds of gold bars and put it into a mint house ruled by a stiff-upper-lip superintendent (William Schallert) with anyone aware .

This entertaining movie displays western action , fist-play , bemusing caper , shootouts and lively humor . Friendly performance by Burt Reynolds at his first serious attempt to be fun and enticing Angie Dickinson who does a brief nudist exhibition and heavily cut by censorship . This film is one of a number of screen westerns that Burt Reynolds played during the mid-late 1960s and early 1970s . These movie westerns include Fade-in (1965) by Jud Taylor ; Navajo Joe (1966) by Sergio Corbucci ; 100 rifles (1969) by Tom Gries ; The man who loved Cat Dancing (1973) by Richard T Heffron and the overlong TV series Gunsmoke . Good secondary cast , as the veteran William Schallert as mint superintendent , Ossie Davis , Clint Walker and last film of Chubby Johnson , habitual support cast in numerous Westerns ; furthermore , Anthony James , usual baddie of the 70s . Atmospheric musical score and colorful cinematography ; however , the film is made in television style . Director Arnold Laven created his proper production company along with Arthur Gardner and Jules V. Levy in the 50s , at the decade since , they had produced dozens of additional TV Western including ¨Rifleman¨ , ¨Big Valley¨ , ¨Law of the Plainsmen¨ , ¨Zane Grey theater¨ , ¨Gunsmoke¨ and Laven directed several Western movies such as ¨Geronimo¨ , ¨Rought night in Jericho¨ , ¨The glory guys¨ and ¨Sam Whiskey¨ , among others. Rating : Average but amusing.