Five Guns West

Near the end of the Civil War in Texas, five hardened convicts are pardoned to participate in a dangerous mission to apprehend a traitor and a gold shipment. Mike "Mannix" Connors plays one of the ne'er-do-wells while Dorothy Malone is on hand as one of two people living at the stage stop. John Lund co-stars.

"Five Guns West" (1955) is a B Western, known for being the directorial debut of trailblazing Indie filmmaker Roger Corman. It's not bad and thankfully shot in color. But the geography is disingenuous and the early reference to 1867 is laughable in light of the fact that the Civil War ended in 1865.

There are similarities to the earlier "Hangman's Knot" (1952), but it's different enough to stand on its own, although it lacks the budget and isn't as good. The movie focuses on the bickering social dynamics of the five former convicts and which one will get the woman.

The film runs 1 hour, 17 minutes, and was shot at Jack Ingram Ranch (in Woodland Hills) & Iverson Ranch (in Chatsworth), both in northwest Los Angeles.

GRADE: C+

Done on a dental floss budget Five Guns West tells the story of the Confederate Army recruiting five outlaws and pardoning them from sentences of death to help recover several thousand dollars of gold bullion. It's kind of a different slant on the plot of the much bigger budgeted Virginia City. We learn that the Confederacy is much interested more in getting their traitorous agent back to stand trial as he has a lot of contacts to give the Union and pretty much blow up their spy system.

The five recruited are Michael Connors, John Lund, Paul Birch, R. Wright Campbell, and Jonathan Haze and they're about what you would expect from outlaws. The mission is to intercept a stagecoach at a particular station that will be carrying the agent and the gold.

That station is operated by Jack Ingram and his niece Dorothy Malone. Remember these guys are outlaws and haven't been with a woman in a while. As that line from Casablanca would read transfered here, Dorothy constitutes a second front all her own.

There are a couple interesting twists in this film involving the characters and the film was Roger Corman's directorial debut. If Corman didn't have a penchant for other genres he might have made some more interesting westerns like Five Guns West.

This was a fairly typical "formula" western. Since I grew up on this sort of western, I rather enjoyed it. One must concede that it could never have been considered a contender for any sort of award, but it was entertaining enough to keep me watching until it was over (of course, most any movie can do that LOL).

Actually, I really enjoy the old western movies -- I don't even mind the corny ones. I believe that one must remember that these movies were made for entertainment (and mostly entertainment for kids at the Saturday afternoon matinée showings, I suspect). Given those sorts of parameters, Five Guns West doesn't seem so bad. It is entirely possible that I first saw it on a Saturday afternoon back in Franklin, NE during the mid-1950s.

Five criminals, some smarter than others, are pardoned by the Confederacy in order to rob a stagecoach of Union cash and capture a Confederate traitor. The five make their way to the rendezvous, where some of them menace a young woman and her elderly uncle, leading to in-fighting and the eventual battle with the US Army.

It's surprising to discover that the directorial debut of Roger Corman is not only a western, but is in color as well, with good photography by Floyd Crosby and some decent outdoor locations. On a technical level, this looks better than some of Corman's later, shoe-string black and white productions.

On hand is frequent collaborators like actor Jonathan Haze, Crosby, and writer R. Wright Campbell, as well as it's distributor, the soon-to-be renamed American International Pictures.

As far as the actual movie goes, it gets a bit talky at times, but it's a solid enough B-picture. Also, it's easy to see why villain Mike Conners went on to bigger and better things.

'Five Guns West' is legendary Roger Corman's debut as director, although he had produced couple of movies before. The film was shot in nine days on $60.000 budget. It shows that the film was made by first time director with being little uneven at places, but it is still entertaining piece.

Turing the Civil war, South desperately is in the need of men, so Confederate States gives pardon to five hard criminals and sending them behind enemy lines to capture the traitor and bring back the stolen gold. Sending criminals to do official government business is always interesting premise and the film doesn't disappoint at that department. The characters are interesting, and quite well developed (this is probably due to the low budget - not enough action, but plenty of interesting interactions between characters), so even with the low amount of shooting, the film is entertaining enough to keep the viewer interested - with five hardened criminals and stolen gold in the game, it can't be any other way.

Quite well written screenplay, good acting, and filmed in Pathe color, 'Five Guns West' doesn't feel much like rushed low budget independent production. Nothing spectacular, but should interest hardcore Corman (and Western) fans enough.