The main attraction here is bidding adieu to the Golden Boy early in this movie and watching the emergence of Bill Holden. It's his posture straightening up, his wide smile becoming more like gritting teeth, and how he delivers his lines from lower in his diaphragm.
Oh, the blond dye job remains but the solid, serious man who owned the 50s is on show here, pre Sunset Boulevard.
And as usual in the 40s, he's stuck in a crappy movie.
We know Glenn Ford's character is nuts because he combs his hair with a six-shooter. This movie doesn't explore his PTSD (or whatever it was called post Civil War) any more than it explores the intracies of property law. It's just a loosely held together excuse for a love triangle and tangled loyalties over frontier justice.
Edgar Buchanen was under-rated as a sidekick. He dispenses sage advice and acts as an excuse for exposition without getting on a viewer's nerves like Walter Brennan or Gabby Hayes or a few others.
But this movie, jeepers, did the writers want us to believe Ford's character burned out the townsfolk so he could smoke out Holden's character.
Just goofy.
