Les Rôdeurs de l'aube

This was one of the last movies that Randolph Scott made before he joined with Budd Boetticher as director to make his best films. It is still a good one and Tim Whelan did a good job in his last years.

One of the interesting things in the film about catching the predecessors to the James boys, the Daltons and the Youngers, was the references to voting. The ladies were saying that someday they would get the vote and they would have the scum running the town that harbored the Renos. It was interesting watching this on the anniversary of the 1915 vote by the House to keep denying women the right to vote.

Golden Globe nominee Mala Powers was excellent as the Reno sister that had to choose between what was right and her brothers. Of course, she was easy pickings for the smooth talking Scott.

Lots of shooting and western fun for those that like that, but with Scott you always get some great acting.

It is more than twenty minutes into the movie before its star Randolph Scott makes his appearance and his lean craggy presence gives a decided lift to proceedings .He plays an undercover agent sent to pose as a train robber and infiltrate the Reno brothers gang who -aided by corrupt local officials -are wreaking havoc in Indiana .He then persuades the gang to embark on a train robbery with a view to entrapping them . The script is by the cult pulp crime novelist Horace McCoy and is based on a story by another feted pulpster ,Frank Gruber, and it is slick and efficient with solid performance from a sturdy supporting cast which includes dependable performers like Forrest Tucker ,and J Carroll Naish as two of the Reno brothers Handsome photography and the brisk direction of Tim Whelan are distinct assets and the historically accurate finale ends proceedings on a gritty and powerful note as frontier justice takes over from the rule of law .

A good little movie which Western devotees will like

After burning an undercover agent alive, outlaw brothers Forrest Tucker, J. Carroll Naish, and Myron Healey are infiltrated again, this time by former Confederate super-spy Randolph Scott, sent by the Peterson (Pinkerton?) Detective Agency. He ends up falling in love with the brother's pretty, law-abiding sister.

A slight cut above some of Scott's usual 1950's B-westerns (the ones not directed by Budd Boetticher), this has really good production values, entertaining heavies, as well as a script with some great hard-boiled moments and bits of nasty (for the 50's) violence. Also, you can't go wrong with Edger Buchanan as a crooked judge!

Scott gives one of his typically tough, yet upright performances, while Tucker and Naish work well together and almost steal the show as the meanest of the Reno brothers.

Any movie that has J. Carroll Naish as a cowboy can't be all bad (he's good) and pros like Kenneth Tobey and Edgar Buchanon have a certain "authenticity" that benefits a western. Forrest Tucker could be a good guy or a bad guy as the occasion demanded. Here, he's in his nasty, bad guy mode, pumping lead at people and even burning an informer alive. Tucker heads a gang of notorious robbers, including three of his brothers, that owns the corrupt lawmen of one Indiana county. In order to undo them, Randolph Scott, a resourceful spy, must be infiltrated into the gang. To complicate matters, Tucker and Naish's sister, who disapproves of their illegal ways, falls in love with Scott but is disillusioned when he appears to be an outlaw like them. Almost everything (there is a slight surprise at the end) works out as one would expect. Scott's presence carried many a mediocre western and, with interesting actors supporting him, it happens here but don't expect anything more than variations on a familiar theme.

Pretty standard 50s western fare here...nothing you wouldn't expect.

However, as I grew up in Jackson County, Indiana, it was quite strange to hear the names and the communities from my childhood as the locale of the story.

By the way, whoever wrote the "trivia" for this film has no idea what they're talking about in regards to the "flat plains" of Indiana. The film notes at the beginning this is "Southern Indiana" -- and my home county has some significant hills and very rolling landscape. Central and northern Indiana IS flat. Where this movie takes place is definitely NOT.