Ride Beyond Vengeance

Pouring cold water in Coldiron.

I see why some folk like it, the downbeat and harsher edges appealing, if only it wasn't so badly constructed and played! It is to my mind a classic example of the funk American Westerns had got themselves into at this juncture of genre film making.

Michael Rennie and Bill Bixby are badly miscast, Claude Akins overacts to within an inch of his life (a rare poor show from him), while Bernard McEveety's direction shows why he was more at home in TV work. It all looks desperately fake, the interiors of key buildings looking like Wild West themed restaurants, the rest of the exteriors looking like what they are - stages! (most likely built from Chuck Connors' woodenness) Script is weak, which leads to a sto...

Downbeat town-bound Western with Chuck Connors made by a TV team

In a West Texas town in the Old West, a newly married couple lives well in her aunts mansion, but the husband (Connors) feels he must make his own money and so travels to Dodge City to become a buffalo skinner. After 11 years he returns home $17,000 richer, but is waylaid by three shady characters (Claude Akins, Bill Bixby and Michael Rennie). Naturally he seeks vengeance. Gary Merrill plays his stepdad while Frank Gorshin shows up in a small role. Towering Buddy Baer is on hand as a formidable bouncer.

"Ride Beyond Vengeance" (1966) began as a Doc Savage movie which folded due to legal rights to the story The Thousand Headed Man. With the cast already under contra...