Randolph Scott captures young killer James Best and intends to take him to Santa Cruze to be hanged for murder, and collect the reward. Along the way he runs into two miscreants, Pernell Roberts and his sidekick James Coburn, who would like to take Best in themselves, in return for which they would received amnesty. ("Ain't that a great word?") They also provide protection to a woman, Karen Steele, who wears a pointed 1950s brassiere throughout and is there chiefly to stimulate the glands of Roberts. (Scott, after listening to Roberts praise the various physical and characterological properties of Steele: "She ain't ugly.") The conflict intrinsic to this arrangement is that Scott, on the one hand, and Roberts and Coburn on the other, seem to be at cross purposes. If Scott doesn't hand over the prisoner, then Scott gets the bounty but Roberts and Coburn don't get their amnesty. Roberts reluctantly informs Scott that, sooner or later, Scott will be shot. Meanwhile they must hang together under threats from Apaches and from Best's brother and his gang, who are in hot pursuit.

Of the several movies that Randolph Scott and director Budd Boetticher made together, I think I probably enjoy this one the most -- this and "Seven Men From Now." It's a leisurely travel story set among the stucco-textured rocks of Movie Flats, California. The story is simple, the location shooting impressive, and the dialog by Burt Kennedy sings with a kind of folk lyricism. (If you get amnesty, "You don't have to shiver every time you see a man wearin' tin.") Scott is his stalwart, taciturn self. Coburn's dim-wittedness provides some gentle humor. Pernell Roberts fakes a Southern accent and seems to be enjoying the camera a little too much, which turns him into a self-satisfied Hollywood actor instead of a sympathetic and colorful criminal.

The nicest performance may be that of James Best as the callow, somewhat sensitive, but doomed murderer. He's given the line that warns Karen Steele to stay away from the body of a man slaughtered by Indians: "Ain't nothing' for a woman to see!"

Yet, watching these collaborative efforts in sequence, as I've been doing -- why it sets a man to wonderin' what it is that keeps them entertainin' stead of a mite more than that. Of course the budgets were low, but some directors have been able to overcome such strictures. The musical scores were by Heinz Roemheld and they're pedestrian. The five scripts written by Burt Kennedy are better than the rest. And there's an awful lot of repetition. There's nothing wrong with quoting yourself. John Ford often had men splashing a glass of whiskey into a fireplace and having it flame up. Howard Hawks repeated himself often, including single lines like, "Good luck to you." Hitchcock had his cameos and Huston often dubbed his voice somewhere into the mix. But those were self-conscious tricks, a kind of joke, whereas here the repetitions seem to stem from a conviction that the audience doesn't pay enough attention to notice them.

Not to go on about it. It was an enjoyable series and this example is an exemplary one.

Ride Lonesome is directed by Budd Boetticher, written by Burt Kennedy and stars Randolph Scott, Karen Steele, Pernell Roberts, James Coburn, James Best & Lee Van Cleef. Charles Lawton Jr. is the cinematographer (in CinemaScope for the Alabama Hills, Lone Pine, California location) and Heinz Roemheld provides the musical score. Film is part of the Ranown Western cycle involving Boetticher, Scott, Kennedy and producer Harry Joe Brown.

Bounty hunter Ben Brigade (Scott) captures wanted outlaw Billy John (Best) and tells him he's taking him to Santa Cruz to be hanged. Best boasts that his brother Frank (Cleef) will soon be arriving to ensure that doesn't happen. Brigade isn't the least bit bothered by this statement. The two men stop at a Wells Junction, a remote swing station, where they encounter Boone (Roberts) & Whit (Coburn),two drifters, and Mrs Lane (Steele),the station attendant's wife. With Mr Lane missing and the Mescalero Apache's on the warpath, the group decide to collectively travel to Santa Cruz, but hot on their trail are the Indians and also Frank John's gang. There's also the small matter of motives within the group, for it seems Boone & Whit, too, have a special interest in Billy, while Brigade may have something far more ulterior driving him on...

As the decades have rolled by, the Boetticher/Scott Westerns have come to be rightly regarded as genre high points. Between 1956 to 1960 they produced 7 pieces of work. The weakest of which were the more jovial "Buchanan Rides Alone" (1958),and the Kennedy absent "WB" contract filler that was "Westbound" (1959). The remaining five each follow a familiar theme that sees Scott as a man driven by emotional pain, movies with simmering undertones and pulsing with psychological smarts. If you poll a hundred Western fans for their favourite Boetticher/Scott movie, you will find any of the five being mentioned as a favourite - such is the tightness and intelligence of each respective picture.

So we are out in the desolated Old West, it's harsh and weather beaten. Our five characters are either troubled by death - prior and pending - and, or, searching for a life that may be a touch too far from their grasp. As their journey unfolds, loyalties will be tested and shifted, uneasy bonds formed, all while psychological and sexual needs bubble away under the surface. All this human foible glowering is viewed by the enveloping Alabama Hills - with Mount Whitney the chief patriarch overseeing his charges. "Ride Lonseome" is a stunning genre movie, an elegiac piece, one that's bleak yet not without hope, a collage of tones seamlessly blended together to create one almost magnificent whole. It was the first Boetticher movie to be in CinemaScope, and pic is directed with great economic skill, where the whole width of the screen is creatively used by the director, thus placing the characters in the landscape in the way that the great "Anthony Mann" used to do with "Jimmy Stewart". His action construction is smart, and it should be noted that there is not one interior shot in the whole film. Lawton Jr. sumptuously shoots in Eastman Color, which is actually a perfect choice for the rugged terrain and the wide and lonesome inducing open spaces provided by the Scope format. While Kennedy's script is sparing, perfectly so, the dialogue is clipped but very telling, and crucially there's no manipulation in the narrative.

Then of course there's the cast. Scott leads off with one of his brave and ageing man of few words portrayals, a character with inner sadness gnawing away at him. With just one glance and a couple of words, Scott actually provides more depth than most other actors in the genre were able to do with more meatier parts. With the lead protagonist established, Boetticher surrounds him with fine support. Coburn was making his film debut and with his tall frame and distinctive voice he leaves a good impression, mostly because he works so well off of Roberts' more outwardly tough turn. Their partnership gives the film a believable friendship at its centre, lovable rogues perhaps? And they also provide some of the lighter moments that Boetticher and Kennedy use to tonally keep us guessing. Steele is just sultry, a blonde fire cracker in the middle of a potential hornets nest. While Best does a nice line in snivelling weasel, his character trait being that he shoots his victims in the back. As for Cleef? He's barely in it, but after his character is introduced into the story, his presence hangs over proceedings like a dark heavy cloud. He will be back, though, and rest assured it's worth the wait.

Does Ride Lonesome have flaws? Yes. One thing is, is that at 73 minutes it's too damn short!. But moving away from that particular greedy itch of mine, the film does carry some Western clichés. Most notably with the Indian participation in the story. Be it chases, portentous smoke signals or an adobe corral attack - where our group are of course outnumbered - it's stock Cowboy & Indian fare, not helped by Roemheld's music, which only reinforces the clichés. Thankfully, in Boetticher's hands the clichés are overcome by the scenes managing to raise the pulse, and in one particular sequence, it provides the basis for a terrific tracking shot. Roemheld however does deliver the goods for the finale, though, and what a finale it is too. Featuring a tree shaped like a cross, the ending has sparked many an interpretation. Some way too deep (French critics) & some just bizarre (internet sleuths),when actually the interpretation is simple - hell they even got "Martin Scorsese" to explain it on the DVD... The memorable shot involving the tree, as the music pounds away, can induce pounds of goose-flesh rising up on the skin. As endings go in the Boettticher canon? It gives "Comanche Station's" riderless horse finale a run for the title of being his, and Scott's, best. A near masterpiece from a true auteur. 9/10

Budd Boetticher and Randolph Scott teamed up for quite a few westerns. While most of them have the simplest of plots, they managed to rise above the vast pool of mediocre films of the genre. Now this wasn't necessarily because the plots were that unusual. In fact, the plot for RIDE LONESOME seems rather similar to quite a few westerns I've seen. The difference is the nice meandering style and Scott's simple and seemingly effortless delivery. Some of this was Scott--he was a much better actor than people thought at the time. Some of this was Boetticher's ability to bring out this from Scott and the other actors. So together they have produced with RIDE LONESOME yet another classic film---one that is strikingly beautiful and once again has an object lesson about doing the right thing--a common theme in their films together.

The film begins with Scott catching up to wanted man James Best. However, this occurs after Best tells the rest of the gang to fetch his much-feared brother, played by Lee Van Cleef. Much of the rest of the film consists of Best and Scott waiting for the eventual confrontation--as they are days away from town and are in the middle of the desert. Along the way, they meet up with two criminals who become partners, of sorts, with Scott. That's because apparently Best is SUCH a wanted man that they are offering amnesty to anyone who brings him back to face justice--and these two ruffians are looking to make a new start. There's a lot more to the story than this--including a few twists and turns along the way that keep the whole thing very interesting. The end, in particular, works great--and it's always nice to watch a film than manages to end well.

In addition to good acting, as usual, from Scott, he's joined by James Coburn in his first film and Pernell Roberts in a role just before becoming famous on "Gunsmoke". I lovely story from start to finish that manages to breath life into a glutted genre--after all, they must have made a bazillion cowboy pictures during this era and only a few manage to stand above the pack.