Chevauchées avec le diable

Someone guns down Audie Murphy's father and brother and steals their cattle, so Audie pins on a badge and goes hunting Dan Duryea. After he brings in his man, giggling madman Duryea is cleared in court by corrupt lawmen Paul Birch and Russell Johnson. Duryea takes a shine to Murphy's naive honesty.

It's a well written western, and if Duryea dominates the movie, it's all offered pretty much in the wheelhouse of the leads. It's another of Universal's "shaky A" westerns, focusing more on character and story than the declining B westerns of the era. Jesse Hibbs, in his second time wielding the megaphone, does a good job, and seems to have established enough of a rapport with Murphy to direct half a dozen of his movies over the next four years. He was born in 1906. By the time he was 30, he was an assistant director, and was that on more than fifty films. With the decline of lesser productions, he shifted to directing TV westerns and episodes of THE FBI. He died in 1985.

Murf plays a man intent on revenging the murder of his kin. To give the appearance of helping him he is deputized by a renegade sheriff and sent off on a mission sure to cause his death at the hands of psychotic killer Whitey Kincaid. When things don't go as the lawman planned he and his henchmen must try other measures to get the pesky little rascal off their scent or be found out as the very ones Murf is seeking. Average western with Duryea giving quite a performance as the always jolly, backshooting scumbag Kincaid.

One on hand this is a pretty standard Audie Murphy movie and I enhoy watching him so no problems there!

On the other hand this is better than average due solely to the over the top performance of Dan Duryea who steals the show delivering some good laughs.

Good support cast and a simple plot with a short running time make this a very easy matinee watch.

Recommend for sure :)

A strong supporting cast and good writing make this one of Audie's better efforts from this period before westerns devolved into parodies of themselves.

Dan Duryea and Russell Johnson (the professor from Gilligan) have surprisingly interesting roles. Duryea plays the bad guy with the good heart. Johnson plays an apparent weak drunkard who surprises.

Audie plays it straight as a naive young man, Clay Omara, seeking justice for the slayers of his brother and father but every once in a while shows he's tougher and smarter than the average bad guy.

Abbe Lane and Susan Cabot add a dash of spice. Lane is the saloon girl with the heart of gold. Cabot is the sheriff's niece engaged to the town lawyers who it is immediately apparent will fall for Clay.

This is probably one of my top 3-4 favorite Audie Murphy movies, and I've seen about 20 of them--or about 50% of what he made. Dan Duryea as Whitey Kinkaid is a very interesting and amusing character who plays nicely off Audie's very credible performance. Russell Johnson (later the Professor on Gilligan's Island) as Jed Ringer and the lawyer and sheriff have some great lines that offset the B picture sets. All in all, this is a highly watchable movie, along with another Murphy/Duryea team-up, "Six Black Horses." Duryea and Murphy appeared together again in Jimmy Stewart's "Night Passage," but I like Ride Clear of Diablo and Horses better. Would pay $500 to have Audie's full filmography on DVD.