Four Fast Guns

**_A paraplegic mogul hires gunmen to take out the town tamer_** What I like about this obscure B&W Western is that it’s adult-oriented and throws in some unique bits. It’s different and artistic enough to stand out. James Craig stars as the antihero, which shows that Spaghetti Westerns didn’t invent that kind of protagonist (far from it). The difference is that Craig’s Sabin is an interesting character and not a self-serving one-dimensional caricature. Beautiful Martha Vickers plays the faithful blonde wife of the wheelchair bound villain (Paul Richards). She was 34 during shooting and this would be her final movie. Elsewhere in the cast, Edgar Buchanan is used as side entertainment as Sabin’s sidekick Dipper. I’ve met people much like him in real life and even had one such guy as a subordinate at work years ago. Brett Halsey appears late in the game with an interesting revelation about his character (stay away from spoilers). His nonchalance is notable, similar to, say, Clint Eastwood, whose star wouldn’t rise for another four years. Lastly, John Swift appears as a teenage runt with a perpetual scowl, practically begging to be shot by one of the gunmen. There’s an interesting theme about respecting the borders of matrimony regardless of whether or not one’s love is for somebody else. I should add that a renowned critic denounced the film as predictable. It’s not. It’s short-n-sweet at 1h 13m and was shot in 1959 at Apacheland studios in Gold Canyon, Arizona, which is east of Phoenix, with some scenes done in the Sonoran desert southwest of there. Some studio work was done at Universal Studios. GRADE: B-/B