Flesh and the Spur

This is a basic good Western film. It doesn't pretend to be anything classic, so it just delivers the basic action, scenery, and gorgeous damsels in distress that make for great male movie watching.

It begins with a man, whose face is never shown, breaking out of prison and possibly killing a guard, then definitely killing a farmer and stealing his revolver. The farmer's brother seeks revenge, and the only clue he has is the revolver, part of a matched pair.

He meets up with a Native American damsel in distress, whom he saves, and an ex member of a notorious gang, and then an old Wild West Show marksman, and together they whittle down the notorious gang which is led by the man with the stolen revolver.

There isn't a lot of mystery, as it is pretty clear who everyone is from the start, but the action and scenery is good, and the characters are worth following.

John Agar searches for the man who gunned down his brother, with a discarded gun his only clue. Along the way he hooks up with macho Mike Conners, an exiled Indian woman, and a snake oil salesman.

The characters spend way too much time talking and not enough time doing the things that make a western good! It picks up near the end but it's too late by then to salvage the picture.

The best thing about Flesh And The Spur, besides the title, is the saloon brawl between a cowpoke and Conners, in which they use spurs as weapons.

John Agar was a talented actor. This just comes to show how far his career had descended since being declared persona non-grata by Hollywood for his drinking and hell-raising.

Co-writer Charles B. Griffith was responsible for some of the best of Roger Corman's micro-budget films (The Little Shop Of Horrors, A Bucket Of Blood, Attack Of The Crab Monsters) and one of his most successful, Deathrace 2000. It's too bad he couldn't breath much life in this script.

The featured song, "My Brother And I" is by Ross Bagdasarian, who a year or so later bought a multiple speed recording device, adopted the stage name David Seville, and invented The Chipmunks!

The titles to this movie says it was filmed in "Pathe Color." The version I saw was black and white.

That pretty much tells you all you need to know about this movie.

One of the infamous Checker gang escapes from prison and on the run shoots John Agar down and takes his weapon with him. As Agar's dad had two long barreled weapons made he gave one each to his twin sons. And it's John Agar out looking for the guy who killed his brother John Agar.

During his search for the Checker gang Agar collects a curious crew around him. Michael Connors a wanted outlaw with an edge to him, talkative trick shot artist Raymond Hatton, and exiled Indian princess Marla English.

Flesh And The Spur was strictly for the drive-in trade. Those matched long barreled pistols that are harped on have a homoerotic twist to them that you couldn't miss. Sometimes you think Agar is more interested in that matched set than in getting his father's killer.

All these folks have done better work, especially Hatton whose credits go back to the earliest of silent films.

Although highly talky and doesn't really have a lot of action, I sort of liked this movie mainly because it immediately puts you into some kind of low-budget independent cinema right from the start.. I mean, look at how the titles are set up! Although John Agar isn't my favorite actor (and hey! Neither is Touch Connors!) I sort of liked their on and off relationship with each other (admiring their guns wink wink) and there's some female candy to look at. But other than that, the plot is pretty straightforward and nothing you've seen before (eg brother tries to get revenge for his other brother's killing) and there's a lot of stretches of winded talking and talking, and it REALLY gets monotonous during the middle. So I would proceed at your own risk.