Silver Lode (1954)

A lot of fun.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

The reason that led me to watch this movie is because it's listed in the book ''The 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die'', and in the end it was worth-watching!This Western follows the footsteps of ''High Noon''; here John Payne plays Dan Ballard, a man arrested by four marshals for a murder he didn't commit, and while he struggles to find the real culprit the townspeople start leaving him to his destiny. The only ones on his side are his soon-to-be-wife Rose (Lizabeth Scott) and saloon lady Dolly (Dolores Moran). The things I liked about the movie are the music and the supporting cast: Dan Duryea shines as the evil sheriff McCarthy (that was a subtle reference to Joseph McCarthy) and in the end is killed by Payne in the church of Silver Lode; Stuart Whitman, Alan Hale jr. and Harry Carey jr. are great as the sheriff's henchmen, and they were specialized in Western movies.Still a well-made Western and I liked it very much.

As something original and different this is a pretty interesting movie to watch. It's a western but not one with a story that involves a typical gunslinger story or revenge plot.It's a movie in which a man who is about to get married has to defend himself in front of its town and town-folks, when he man, who claims to be an U.S. Marshall, rides into town with a warrant for his arrest and accuses him of having committed a murder. This whole story provides the movie with a different approach like you would normally expect from a western. If I have to compare it to anything else, the movie "The Ox-Bow Incident" is the one that comes the most close to it.Even though its an interesting and original approach it doesn't also mean that the movie is great throughout to watch. The movie does certainly feel a bit dated and its being a bit awkward to watch at times because its action and just the movie overall feels a bit clumsy and is cheap looking at times.The story itself also of course doesn't provide the movie with much spectacular fireworks. Not that the movie is dull or anything but at times I wished there would be some less talking and also less characters involved with the story.This movie would had most likely not cost a lot of money to make. It has an unknown director at the helm and also an unknown cast in it. Directing and acting-wise this is also not really a movie that impresses much but due to the fact that its original and different this movie still remains a perfectly good one and also interesting one to watch.7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

What could easily have been just another low-budget Western oater or, worse still, the poor man's HIGH NOON (1952), is turned by excellent scripting (atypically the work of a woman!) and direction into a true gem of the genre during its golden age. In fact, the film wears its anti-Red Scare intentions proudly on its sleeve by actually naming its chief villain (Dan Duryea in formidable form) McCarthy and making him an outlaw posing as a fake U.S. Marshal! Reformed gunfighter hero John Payne (in his first of four movies for veteran director Dwan) has his 4th of July wedding (to local belle Lizabeth Scott) disrupted by the arrival in town of Duryea and his men (including Stuart Whitman and Harry Carey Jr.) claiming to have a warrant for his arrest for killing Duryea's brother and absconding with the sum of $20,000. So far so conventional plot-wise but what is remarkable here is the way that the film-makers chose to employ the townspeople who are constantly following the protagonists around the streets of Silver Lode, at first forcibly siding with Payne (to the point of holding Duryea et al at gunpoint) but, with time, being swayed by the latter's lies and an unfortunate series of events that lead them to believe Payne guilty of murdering their sheriff (Emile Meyer) and one of the marshals, as well as wounding Scott's hot-headed brother. Aiding Payne, apart from the unwavering Scott (of course), is his ex-flame, sultry saloon gal (Dolores Moran, the wife of producer Benedict Bogeaus and whose last film this proved to be) who spits one-liner put-downs to hero, villain and everyone in between; I really liked her character and, apparently, so did Dwan because he opted to close the film on the image of her running frantically clenching the all-important telegraphic confirmation (Duryea's men had intuitively cut the lines beforehand) of Payne's claims of innocence. However, in view of the film being a thinly-veiled allegory on the ongoing witch-hunts, it is a telling comment on the relative nature of truth that the girls had already won the day by forcing the gullible telegraph official to write down a false reply. The expected climactic confrontation between Payne and Duryea, then, takes place inside a bell tower – with the latter's bullet ultimately ricocheting on himself in God-like retribution – making for a doubly ironic ending to a film (beautifully shot in color by the great John Alton) that had held its audience entranced for all of 77 breathless minutes.

I must admit here and now that I have not seen this film. However, in my research of such B-Westerns, I found that this film was originally shot in 3-D. That has not been mentioned anywhere.Perhaps the IMDb crew can investigate and make the appropriate notation wherever it is that such notations are made.I certainly would like to see this film, as it appears to have an interesting cast... John Payne, Dan Duryea, and Lizabeth Scott usually do good work, and the other reviews have generally been positive.From the reviews, this could perhaps be one of the best 3-D movies made during the 3-D movie craze in the early 1950's... Hondo being another one that could be better.