The Broken Land

While I don't watch a steady diet of westerns I watch them from time to time for the cast members and since THE BROKEN LAND has also a score of 5,0 I expected it to be bad but instead it was worth the view.

When the story begins Dave Dunson rides in a small town ruled with an iron fist by a corrupt Sheriff (Kent Taylor) that uses law for controlling everyone, including locking up Will Brocious (Jack Nicholson) only because his father was a crook, insisting that a feeble-minded guy was trying to shoot him and locking up Dunson because he wanted to stop his reign of terror. How it will unfold it's best if you see it for yourselves.

While the plot looked like that of so many other westerns it was still very entertaining and the acting by all no names except Nicholson was decent. Still, if you are a huge fan of westerns or you don't have nothing else to do and you already saw a lot of stuff this is for you.

And what a delight to watch it in LBX please folks !!!! What a pleasure because it is so rare from an API production. The story itself is not that terrific, but for a B western, that's what I like, instead of the bland and standard yarns with the same character, as the likes of Bill Elliot or Roy Rogers.... Don't mind about Jack Nicholson, focus instead on this cosy tale, despite the fact that it won't bring anything exceptional, except the villain as lead character, but it is only a rare little gem, so unique and hard to find in LBX. And the acting is pretty good too for this kind of production, even the directing, from this unknown director. But I have always craved for evil lead characters, especially a rogue sheriff, played here by Kent Taylor.

Very early Jack Nicholson vehicle that is nothing more than a quick B-western with some exotic Arizona Apache Zone locales. Evil small town sheriff Kent Taylor rules the community with an iron fist and several within the small landscape join forces to change things. Nicholson is way down the list on the credits as a young hothead who has an itchy trigger-finger and likes to solve things with a rifle rather than by talking things out. An extremely wishy-washy film that is shorter than most documentaries these days (the film is only about an hour in length) and sports no real recommendations anywhere across the board. Only memorable to see how Nicholson was before his "Easy Rider" days. Turkey (0 stars out of 5).

I enjoy westerns but have noticed that about 95% of them have 3-4 different plots. Originality is NOT a trademark of the genre! Because of this, while "The Broken Land" is far from a great film, it IS original and kept my interest.

The film is set in some old western town. Soon you realize that the Marshal is insane or a total sadist. I'd vot for him being BOTH!! For him, the law is a meant to control everyone and soon he locks up one guy for having a father who was a crook! Then, he insists that a poor feeble-minded guy is a thief and is about to shoot him!! A stranger in town attacks the Marshal to stop this murder...and ends up getting locked up as well! And, it only gets worse!

While the film has a very nice plot, it was far from perfect...hence the score of 6. The actors were all no-names at the time (of course, Jack Nicholson has gone on to better things....or so I've been told). Most were reasonably good but not outstanding. The script also had a few loose ends such as the 'big revelation' from the lady at the end...which turned out to be not much of a revolation. Still, it IS original and kept my interest. Plus, if you aren't sure about investing your time, it's only a hour in length!

This short 1-hour Western movie centers on a drifter who comes to a small town and has run-in with its sadistic sheriff. A string of circumstances leads to running from a posse, robbery, and murder. Considering the limited length of this movie, it's a good story, the characters are likable, the dialog is literate, the performances are good (particularly Jack Nicholson), and it's well directed. If you collect Western movies, this one is worth having.