Traição Cruel

A pretty routine Audie Murphy vehicle made infinitely watchable by Dan Duryea's colorful and totally against type performance as the notorious black clad outlaw Whitey Kincaid. A gem for Duryea fans.

Director Jesse Hibbs does a sterling job with B material. He extracts one of Duryea's best performances as the backshooting killer who actually has some decency and gets to like Murphy for being so honest.

Murphy, a more limited actor than Duryea, also performs credibly throughout, and supporting actors like Paul Birch (Sheriff Kenyon) and William Pullen (Lawyer Meredith) only add to the film's overall quality, as the top heavies.

Even pretty Susan Cabot, a substandard actress at the best of times, does well.

Photography is typical B quality, and the script not bad at all, with Cabot asking Murphy if the tunnel is long enough. I can only wonder if Hitchcock saw this film and decided to use a similar, but subtler, line at the end of NORTH BY NORTHWEST.

You could do a lot worse than watch this likeable and unassuming Western.

Ride clear of Diablo is my favourite Audie Murphy western.Its exciting,suspenseful and the rapport between audie and Dan Duryea is great.This film is highly enjoyable with humour and a good twist in the end.This is a feel good western.

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 a classic style western with Audie Murphy as the good guy seeking out the killers of his father and brother. Fortunately, he's got experience in the field of "troubleshooter", and can handle things better than the killers, the town's most respected men, think. They send him on suicide missions against the likes of wild cards Dan Duryea, the professor Russell Johnson, and Jack Elam, only to be stunned by Audie's survival against these odds.

In making this, you could see that all involved allowed Duryea's overwhelming persona to take control. And that was the key. A great work relies not only on the great persona, but also the others to be willing to work off of him. "Great actors are great reactors" is known well to the acting community. A pity that many of the plebes who post on IMDb will laud the wrong actor.

Anyone can play a sadist. The real actors are the ones who can react to the sadist, and let him come across with power. Anyone can shout "That ain't no country I ever heard of", but the real actor is the one who is willing to stutter "What?" over and over.

However, here, Duryea deserves his praise. He's not your cliché bad guy. He's Duryea, full of fun and laughter, and each film he manages to make the character a little different. Just saying that the others deserve respect, too, for their cooperation.

Full of thrills, the film seems to last only a few minutes. And that's the sign of a good director. You get your bang for the bullet here.

Plus the classic combo of Murphy and Duryea. The only thing more magical than that would be to add in Stewart with an accordion.