Showdown (1963)

★ 5.9 1h 19m IMDb

Western

A cowboy has to get 12,000 dollars in stolen bonds from the ex-girlfriend of his partner, or the gang holding him hostage will kill him.

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Cast

Audie Murphy as Chris Foster Died 1971 · Kingston, Texas, USA Audie Leon Murphy (June 20, 1925 – May 28, 1971) was a fifth grade dropout from an extremely poor family who became the most decorated American soldier of World War II. After the war he became a celeb...

Kathleen Crowley as Estelle Died 2017 Betty Jane Kathleen Crowley (born December 26, 1931) was an American actress and was Miss New Jersey in 1949 and a contestant for Miss America in the same year (she came in sixth). After the pageants,...

Charles Drake as Bert Pickett Died 1994 · New York City, New York, USA Charles Drake (October 2, 1917 – September 10, 1994) was an American actor.Drake was born as Charles Ruppert in New York City. He graduated from Nichols College and became a salesman. In 1939, he turn...

Harold J. Stone as Lavalle Died 2005 · New York City, New York, USA From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Harold J. Stone (March 3, 1913 – November 18, 2005) was an American film and television character actor. Born Harold Hochstein to a Jewish acting family, he be...

Skip Homeier as Caslon Died 2017 · Chicago, Illinois, USA Skip Homeier (October 5, 1930 – June 25, 2017, born George Vincent Homeier) was an American actor who started his career at the age of eleven and became a child star. Homeier worked frequently throug...

Director R.G. Springsteen

Cast Audie Murphy, Kathleen Crowley, Charles Drake, Harold J. Stone, Skip Homeier, L.Q. Jones, Strother Martin, Charles Horvath, John McKee, Henry Wills

John Chard 7/10 Sep 14, 2019

I would have let you die!

Showdown is directed by R.G. Springsteen and written by Bronson Howitzer. It stars Audie Murphy, Kathleen Crowley, Charles Drake, Harold J. Stone, Skip Homeier, L. Q. Jones and Strother Martin. Music is by Hans J. Salter and cinematography by Ellis W. Carter.

Plot has Murphy as Chris Foster who has to get 12,000 dollars in stolen bonds from the ex-girlfriend of his partner, Bert Pickett (Drake), or the gang holding him hostage will kill him.

Filmed in black and white, something which didn't sit well with Murphy, this turns out to be a well photographed (the sumptuous back drop of the Alabama Hills, Lone Pine) low budget Oater of interesting ideas. The outdoor prison used here - criminals chained by neck collars to a pole in the center of town - is refreshingly original and a superb plot device that thrusts good guys (Chris and Bert) and bad guys together as a unit, for a while at least that is...

Trouble is, is that this is only a small section of the story which occurs at the pic's beginning. We get some exciting action and character laying foundations for the inevitable break out, and then it moves away from the jail scenario. The premise is so good one kind of hankers for much longer of this story angle, maybe even for the story to have been different and made this the bulk of the movie as a character piece - with the break out and subsequent held to ransom aspect in the last third. But I digress whilst forgetting this is a 1960s low budget job.

Narrative contains themes of addiction, tortured love and blind loyalty, which is credit to the writing of the wonderfully named Bronson Howitzer (really Ric Hardman!). However, the romantic thread bogs things down since it comes off as nonsense, with Crowley - as lovely as she looks - utterly unbelievable in the Western setting. Worse still is the head villain played by Stone, who not only makes preposterous decisions, he's also just not very villainous into the bargain. Still, Murphy is on good enough form and he's backed up by some notable genre performers.

A mixture of the usual good and bad for a Murphy 1960s Oater, but enough here to make it a comfortable recommendation to fans of star and genre. 6.5/10