After Stagecoach John Wayne and Claire Trevor made a few films together, of which this is one. It's made for Republic, and directed by Raoul Walsh - who made surprisingly few films with Wayne.
Republic took out the cheque book for this one - they borrowed Walter Pidgeon from MGM, have Gabby Hayes and Roy Rogers no less in the support cast (Rogers is quite good), the source material comes from a novel by W R Burnett, there are plenty of extras.
It's a good story, helped by an action packed background - bleeding Kansas before and during the war. John Wayne comes to town and becomes a sheriff; he's Union leading, he falls for Claire Trevor whose brother Rogers likes Wayne but is Confederate leaning. Pidgeon loves Trevor and goes around robbing people secretly, which upsets his mum Marjorie Main.
It's all good melodramatic stuff and I actually wasn't sure how it would end. There's an attack on Lawrence based on the Lawrence Massacre but it's so fictionalised (Wayne gets there in time to warn people, the people fight back, no kids are mown down) that it doesn't matter. Needless to say, there's not one black face in the film.
Wayne is warm and engaging and spars well with Trevor. Its fun to see Pidgeon in a villainous role, there's plenty of action, Walsh keeps things moving fast.
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