Bill reprend la lutte (1939) Online

Lively little matinée programmer, thanks to some spirited dialog and the two leads. Elliott shows a larger range of moods than usual, while Meredith makes a convincing tomboy. Their chemistry together remains engaging for this type movie. Also, Taylor's comedy relief is subdued and doesn't intrude on the story. Note too that veteran baddie Charles King plays a good guy (a rancher), for a change.

This may be the only oater I've seen where one girl (Meredith) hard rides and shoots in order to save another girl trapped in a run-away wagon. At the same time, the predictable crash is spectacular. Too bad, however, the action never leaves the scrubby LA area, even though the rocky locations are well used by director Deming. All in all, it's a better than average matinée western with that gritty cowboy lead, Wild Bill Elliott, in charge.

Wild Bill Saunders (Bill Elliott) jackrabbits his way to the town of Prairie Port and immediately finds himself in the middle of a gang shoot 'em up in the middle of Main Street. What's odd about the opening is that he just kind of stands there and watches the proceedings as a somewhat disinterested bystander as if a stray bullet would never even think of hitting him. I wish I had that kind of confidence.

Well Wild Bill doesn't get to tame the entire West, but he does a pretty good job here of settling things down in Prairie Port. After taking down gunslinger Turkey (Lane Chandler), Saunders accepts the town marshal position and proceeds to round up the rest of villain Blaisdale's (Kenneth MacDonald) crew, including his main henchman Rawhide (Dick Curtis). He gets a little push from the gun totin'owner of the Oasis Restaurant and after that it's curtains for the bad guys.

One of the things I always found odd about Elliott is the way he wore his guns - backwards as it were in his holster. The tenths of a second longer that it took to draw and shoot never seemed to bother him, but I have to wonder how practical it might have been against an opponent just as quick but with pistols already positioned to fire. There's another anomaly here when Saunders uses a lasso to bring down not one, but two outlaws on horseback! It looks great in the movies, but a move like that would have to be one in a million.

Getting back to that opening scene. Remember when Pepper (Iris Meredith) shoots Wild Bill's hat off? He was standing right in front of a huge plate glass window; how'd the bullet miss that? I guess this kind of stuff never bothered the matinée crowd back in the day, but it's the kind of stuff I enjoy picking out of these B oaters whenever they occur. That along with the price of things, like ten cents for a bowl of chicken noodle soup (minus the chicken) at the Oasis.

It might sound clichéd today, but there must have been a time when dialog like Saunders uses sounded fresh to audiences. One such is when he first sets out for villain Turkey and states "I'll bring him back Judge, alive if I can". But I think my favorite was when he had his quarry cornered and taunted him with "What's the matter, run out o' lead?" At that point, you know Turkey was a gone goose.

Wild Bill Elliott made his first of three films as knight of the plains Wild Bill Saunders in The Taming Of The West. Let no one think the entire west was tamed in this film, just a small portion of it where outlaws are running rampant.

Elliott arrives as the pleasant and peaceable stranger, in fact in many films are Red Ryder, Bill Hickok, etc., Elliott always said he was a peaceable man. It became one of the great western catchphrases back in the day.

Almost on a dare from Iris Meredith he takes a job as the new marshal and starts rounding up Dick Curtis and his band of cutthroats. But these guys are getting some heavy duty protection because they've got juice in some high places. The trick is to find the real brains behind these outlaws.

The Taming Of The West was the first of three films where Elliott played Wild Bill Saunders. He also played Wild Bill Hickok several times and was forever billed as Wild Bill in his films. Elliott films could be violent, a bit more so than the Saturday matinée crowd was normally given.

This one is not bad for a B western and Elliott is easy to take as a cowboy hero.