This film teams some people not typically associated with Westerns - Jimmy Cagney, Viveca Lindfors, Nicholas Ray. It's a film Ray made between Johnny Guitar and Rebel without a Cause and doesn't have any sort of cult but isn't bad.
The plot has Cagney meet young outlaw John Derek and kind of fall in love with him/see him as a surrogate son. He probably should've been his actual son for the drama to really work, or at least had a longer running relationships - I know the script has characters bang on about the surrogate son stuff but it rang hollow because Cagney meets Derek at the beginning - they hardly know each other.
They are falsely accused of a robbery by townsfolk who later, feeling guilty, offer Cagney a gig as sheriff. There's a twist where it turns out Cagney is an ex con - he says it's because of mistaken identity but why not just have him as a genuine ex con (could've been for good reasons). This weakens the drama.
It is good how Derek turns bad and helps some baddies, led by Ernest Borgnine and I liked the Cherokees providing trouble.
There's good ideas here and Cagney is always compelling and I liked Lindford a lot. Derek is weak - Nick Ray couldn't work his magic on Derek. He doesn't wreck the film though because the character is weak - I just kept wishing they'd have someone like say Farley Granger who was a better actor.
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