The Outriders

I'm on the road, visiting friends and family. I was at my dad's last night, so surprise! You get a review of a Western. So, The Outriders. Three Confederates escape a prison chain gang, after simultaneously stabbing their guard repeatedly with a bayonet and drowning him in a swamp. Maybe that was the Russians' mistake with Rasputin; they only tried killing him one way at a time.

They join up with a band of raiders who know of a wagon train coming from Santa Fe with a load of gold, which they will hijack to help the war effort. So these three will join in as outriders for the convoy to make sure they make it safely to the place where they will be ambushed, robbed, and slaughtered. Except that Will (Joel McCrea) gets sweet on Jen (Arlene Dahl), and starts to have second thoughts. Not about the ambush, but he would surely like for Jen not to die. Problem is, one of the other two, Jesse (Barry Sullivan), has no such compunctions, even though he is also sweet on Jen. As they near the destination, the tension between the two increases, with Clint (James Whitmore) mostly keeping his own counsel in between. Then they learn the war has ended, which is good, but the raiders are still going to attack. Because it's about the gold for them, not the Confederacy.

Whitmore's character was actually the one I was most interested in. He's the calm center between Wil's conflicted soul and Jesse's pure avarice. He's quiet, but there are multiple occasions where he staves off disaster without drawing attention to it. When the other riders are getting angry at Wil's leadership, he hands out the liquor. Soon they're drunk and on the verge of fighting, until Clint steps in and gets them dancing. When Wil has doubts, Clint offers quiet understanding. He doesn't second guess, he doesn't even really offer advice. It's more that he backs up what Wil's instincts are telling him to do already, so Wil keeps moving forward, rather than backtracking. And there's never much doubt which guy he's siding with the whole time. I like quiet, helpful supporting characters.

The Outriders isn't a blockbuster Western, just a solidly average one, but it does have some interesting scenes. Before Wil hands out the booze, he tells Jen to stay in the carriage with the curtains drawn all night. But sometime after the dancing has started, she steps out. This seemed certain to end badly - only attractive woman, lots of drunk roughnecks - but the guys are oddly respectful. They get most aggressive with each other, tossing each other out of the way so they can dance with her. But then Wil gets pushy, and she complains her shoes are worn out. So she retrieves another pair, and then Wil puts them on. While everyone else stands around watching. In complete silence. There's no dialogue, no ambient noise, no background music even. It's damned creepy. I don't know what it was all about.