By Richard Harland Smith
The Young Guns
Brief Synopsis
A disaffected youth falls in with the wrong crowd back in 1897.
Cast & Crew
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Albert Band
Director
Russ Tamblyn
Tully [Rice]
Gloria Talbott
Nora [Bowdre]
Perry Lopez
San Antone
Scott Marlowe
Knox Cutler
Wright King
Jonesy
Film Details
Genre
Western
Release Date
Aug
12,
1956
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Distribution Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Country
United States
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 24m
Sound
Mono (Westrex Recording System)
Color
Black and White
Theatrical Aspect Ratio
1.37 : 1
Film Length
8 reels
Synopsis
In 1897, in the town of Chalmers, Wyoming, Tully Rice, whose father was infamous killer Mark Rice, is ostracized by the local citizenry. Only Sheriff Jim Peyton is sympathetic to the young man's plight. Stating that Tully "doesn't belong in a decent town," Peyton's deputy Nix is antagonistic to him. One day, when Nora Bowdre, the daughter of outlaw Matt Bowdre, comes to buy supplies at the general store where Tully works, Nix harasses her, and when Tully protests, a fight ensues between the two men. After Peyton stops the fight, Nix insists that Tully be arrested, and although Peyton refuses, he realizes that Tully is no longer welcome in town and decides to send him to live with the sheriff's sister in Cheyenne. Embittered, Tully vows to throw in his lot with the Bowdre gang who live in an enclave known as Black Crater in the hills outside town. Bowdre and the rest of the gang are roaming the countryside when Tully arrives, leaving only their sons and elders behind in the Crater. Tully is welcomed by an elderly outlaw named Grandpa Ringo Jones, but the outlaw's grandson, Jonesy, is hostile to the newcomer and incites him to fight. After Tully bests Jonesy, Jonesy takes him to meet the rest of the young toughs, who are led by San Antone. Later, when Nora warns Tully to leave the enclave, he tells her that his father's notoriety resulted in his being exiled from town to town until the sympathetic Peyton brought him to Chalmers. Nora then asserts that Tully will never be free if he stays in Black Crater and confides her plans to leave with her three younger brothers as soon as her father returns and she can make a "clean break" with him. Soon after, the young outlaws invite Tully to join them in robbing a gambler. San Antone explains that gang member Georgie Briggs, unknown to his father, blind card dealer Felix Briggs, is in league with them to rob gamblers of their winnings. Georgie, who serves as his father's "eyes," assures that the gamblers are dealt winning hands, thus providing a lucrative target for the gang. After a gambler named Red Trapnell wins a game of cards, he rides out of town and is ambushed by the gang. When Red resists turning over his winnings, San Antone is about to pistol-whip him until Tully stops him. Sickened by the violence, Tully asks Nora to leave with him, but she insists on waiting for her father to return. When San Antone, angered by Tully's defiance, summons him to the gang's bunkhouse, Nora gives Tully a gun to defend himself. At the bunkhouse, San Antone challenges Tully to draw. Knox Cutler, one of the members of the gang, intervenes, however, and insists that they disarm before confronting each other. Although Tully wins the ensuing fistfight, thus making him the preemptive leader, he is ambivalent about accepting the position. Later, when Peyton rides to Black Crater looking for Tully, Knox orders the sheriff to leave. Tully countermands Knox, thus asserting command of the group. Peyton then tells Tully about finding a beaten gambler on the road who recounted that one man stopped a gang from killing him. When Tully feigns ignorance, Peyton comments that he hoped Tully "would wake up in time to draw the line," then informs him that the man died. Soon after, Knox proposes a plan to rob the Chalmers bank using Tully's inside knowledge of the town. In need of money, Tully tells Nora he is considering the robbery, and Nora replies that if he rides with the gang, she will not welcome him back. When Peyton is notified that Bowdre and his gang have been killed, Nix suggests wiping out the rest of the group at Black Crater, but Peyton hopes that he can convince them to lead peaceful lives. After breaking out of prison, Knox's older brother, Kid Cutler, rides into Black Crater and informs the others that Bowdre and his men have been killed. Bowdre's death frees Nora to leave, and she makes plans with Tully to ride out the next morning. Meanwhile, Kid urges Knox to proceed with the robbery, prompting the impatient Knox to take Nora's brothers and the gang and ride to Chalmers. When Tully learns that the gang has taken Nora's brothers, he hurries to town. As the gang holds up the teller, Peyton and his deputies spot them inside the bank and, in the ensuing gunfight, San Antone is killed. Just then, Tully rides into town and tells Peyton that three defenseless little boys are inside the bank and that Kid is hiding at Black Crater. Tully asks Peyton to let him reason with the outlaws, and as Tully approaches the bank, Knox trains his gun on him. Rebelling, Jonesy points his gun at Knox and orders him to lower his weapon. Upon entering the bank, Tully admonishes the gang to surrender. Jonesy has died from injuries sustained from the gunfight, and the others are wavering when the defiant Knox slings a saddlebag stuffed with cash over his shoulder and uses the boys as a shield until he reaches his horse. With Tully and the law in pursuit, Knox rides to Black Crater and presents the money to his brother. When Kid refuses to let Knox ride with him, the brothers argue. Just as the posse arrives, two gunshots ring out from the bunkhouse, and when Tully runs in, Knox boasts that he has outdrawn his brother, then falls to the ground, dead. After Nora and Tully embrace, Peyton promises to offer the boys care and shelter. Tully then takes Nora to see her brothers.
Director
Albert Band
Director
Cast
Russ Tamblyn
Tully [Rice]
Gloria Talbott
Nora [Bowdre]
Perry Lopez
San Antone
Scott Marlowe
Knox Cutler
Wright King
Jonesy
Walter Coy
[Sheriff Jim] Peyton
Chubby Johnson
Grandpa [Ringo Jones]
Myron Healey
Deputy Nix
James Goodwin
Georgie [Briggs]
Rayford Barnes
Kid Cutler
Stanford Jolley
Felix Briggs
Ralph Votrian
Milky
Jeff Silver
Burro
Earle Hodgins
Georgie
Kim Charney
Rancho
Ken Miller
Jogger
Harris Howell
Rush
Kip King
Miguel
David Rollins
String
Ricky Sorenson
Jake
Ray Teal
Hagberd
Dabbs Greer
Ephraim
Irving Mitchell
Teller
Emory Parnell
Padgett
Scott Lee
Red Trapnell
Richard Warren
Old Hitch
Watson Downs
Old man
Tom London
Snow Eye
Crew
J. Henry Adams
Sound Editing
Lenny Adelson
Composer
Emmett Bergholz
Camera Operator
Ralph Butler
Sound Recording
Jill Campbell
Music Editor
Imogen Carpenter
Composer
Richard M. Chaffee
Set Construction
Ned Dobson
Assistant Director
Bill Fraker
Assistant Camera op
Ellsworth Fredricks
Director of Photography
Louis Garfinkle
Writer
Richard Heermance
Producer
Bert Henrikson
Wardrobe
Austen Jewell
Assistant Director
Joseph Kish
Set Decoration
Emile Lavigne
Makeup
Maurice Lessay
Assistant Director
Ken Lobben
Still Photographer
Dave Milton
Art Director
Alice Monte
Hair Styles
Ted Mossman
Props
Marlin Skiles
Music Composition and Conducting
James West
Const Supervisor
George White
Film Editor
Allen K. Wood
Production Manager
Bob Wyckoff
Assistant Camera op
Film Details
Genre
Western
Release Date
Aug
12,
1956
Premiere Information
not available
Production Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Distribution Company
Allied Artists Pictures Corp.
Country
United States
Technical Specs
Duration
1h 24m
Sound
Mono (Westrex Recording System)
Color
Black and White
Theatrical Aspect Ratio
1.37 : 1
Film Length
8 reels
Articles
The Young Guns
As he would in the later Son of a Gunfighter (1965), Russ Tamblyn plays a frontiersman with father issues in the Allied Artists western The Young Guns (1956). A former juvenile (as Rusty Tamblyn, he was Spencer Tracy's son in Father of the Bride [1950] and Father's Little Dividend [1951]), the then 21-year-old actor was pointed toward more adult roles with his performance as Tully Rice, son of a notorious Wyoming badman, whose legacy of lawlessness makes him unwelcome in society. Taken into the fold of the "wild bunch" Bawdre Gang, Tully finds surrogate brothers in pistoleros Perry Lopez and Scott Marlowe, as well as a love interest in Gloria Talbott, daughter of absentee outlaw kingpin Matt Bawdre. A blending of tropes from westerns and juvenile delinquent films (Tamblyn would go on to JD glory in West Side Story [1961] while Scott Marlowe played the lead in Edward L. Cahn's Riot in Juvenile Prison [1959]), The Young Guns was the first film directed by Albert Band, who had assisted John Huston on The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and collaborated on the script for The Red Badge of Courage (1951). The Young Guns screenplay was the work of Louis Garfinkle, later a co-author of the unproduced stage play that served as the basis for Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter (1978). Picking up an early paycheck as an assistant cameraman was William Fraker, later the celebrated cinematographer of another Hollywood classic concerned with unfortunate paternity - Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968).
By Richard Harland Smith
By Richard Harland Smith
The Young Guns
As he would in the later Son of a Gunfighter (1965), Russ Tamblyn plays a frontiersman with father issues in the Allied Artists western The Young Guns (1956). A former juvenile (as Rusty Tamblyn, he was Spencer Tracy's son in Father of the Bride [1950] and Father's Little Dividend [1951]), the then 21-year-old actor was pointed toward more adult roles with his performance as Tully Rice, son of a notorious Wyoming badman, whose legacy of lawlessness makes him unwelcome in society. Taken into the fold of the "wild bunch" Bawdre Gang, Tully finds surrogate brothers in pistoleros Perry Lopez and Scott Marlowe, as well as a love interest in Gloria Talbott, daughter of absentee outlaw kingpin Matt Bawdre. A blending of tropes from westerns and juvenile delinquent films (Tamblyn would go on to JD glory in West Side Story [1961] while Scott Marlowe played the lead in Edward L. Cahn's Riot in Juvenile Prison [1959]), The Young Guns was the first film directed by Albert Band, who had assisted John Huston on The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and collaborated on the script for The Red Badge of Courage (1951). The Young Guns screenplay was the work of Louis Garfinkle, later a co-author of the unproduced stage play that served as the basis for Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter (1978). Picking up an early paycheck as an assistant cameraman was William Fraker, later the celebrated cinematographer of another Hollywood classic concerned with unfortunate paternity - Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968).
By Richard Harland Smith
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The film opens with the following written prologue: "In 1897, just as today, many public spirited citizens were aroused by the problems of delinquency among the youth of various communities...This story of one such community is based on fact." The onscreen opening and closing cast credits differ slightly in order.
Although a March 1955 Hollywood Reporter news item noted that Albert Band and Lou Garfinkle were to write the script from their own original screen story, only Garfinkle is credited onscreen. The same news item stated that Hayes Goetz, who purchased the story, was to produce the film, but an October 1955 Los Angeles Times news item noted that Garfinkle and Band were to co-produce following a setback for the project. [Richard Heermance was ultimately credited onscreen as producer.] The article added that Garfinkle was to expand the screenplay into a novel that would be published about the same time the film was released. That novel was never published.
A September 1955 Los Angeles Examiner news item noted that Band considered casting the sons and daughters of famous actors in the cast. That news item also stated that John Barrymore, Jr. and Edward G. Robinson, Jr. had already been signed, but they were not in the released film. Several reviews note that the film was "a story of juvenile delinquency on the range."
