Vengeance Valley (1951)

Very well executed

the audience applauded

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

"Vengeance Valley" is a great title squandered on a not so great movie (and, oddly, one in which there isn't really much 'vengeance'). Burt Lancaster plays the up-right, honourable foster-son of a crippled cattleman at odds with his brother (and blood-son of the rancher), a conniving ne'er-do-well with a quick gun-hand. Complicating matters, the married brother has fathered a child on a local lass and her two ornery brothers have shown up to hunt down the scoundrel who dishonored their sister. Lots of shots of Lancaster's legendary grin and tousled good-looks, generic cow-poking, and mountain scenery but other than some fisticuffs and the inevitable showdown at the end, there's not a lot of action. Most of the characters are typical Hollywood western-types and the script/acting is on par with a good episode of Bonanza (although the unwed mother story line might be a bit to risqué for the Cartwrights). IMO, Lancaster is one of the all-time great "Hollywood leading-men" but even his undeniable charisma can't raise "Vengeance Valley" above the great raft of mediocre westerns to tumble out of the sagebrush in the '50s.

It's springtime here in the Old West and the cattle is bein' brung down from the snowy mountains. Robert Walker and his adopted brother Burt Lancaster is two of the cowboys that's been gone all winter.The first thing they do is head towards the local pub where nothing much has changed while they've been gone -- except for one thing. Sally Forrest, the saloon gal, was pregnant and has done give birth out of wedlock. Nobody knows who dunner but whoever dunner, it's a big disgrace. Why Old Doc wouldn't even go out to the ranch to lend a hand in the birthing.Lancaster rides out to the ranch with a sack full of food and some five hundred dollars for Lilly and her baby. He finds his sister-in-law, Joan Dru, has been helping out, and Sally Forrest's brothers, Hugh O'Brian and John Ireland, has rid in from out of town too -- angry as disturbed wasps and ready to gun down the father, as soon as somebody knows who it is.Actually it doesn't look too promising, the kind of Western in which every well-dressed cowboy must wear an open vest, no matter how ragged his clothes. Yet, it's reasonably well written. There are small conversational exchanges that are unusual in a typical Western. (A man who just lost a fist fight can't "sit a horse until I get this hand fixed." His "hand". Not the kind of line you'd expect.) The musical score is pedestrian but the location shooting shows a Colorado that's colorful and inviting. Some nice footage of quarter horses at work.The two leads do well enough. Lancaster was an ambitious actor but never bravura. In a way his dramatic performances improved with age. I admired his casual walk, a half-crouch, arms wide, fingers apart, as if ready to leap on something.Robert Walker is the better actor but he's miscast. He's not a cowboy. He's Bruno, the half-mad and very urban psychopath. He's excellent at suggesting disdain and disbelief. He lies incandescently. But he's no cowboy. Sorry.The plot's been described elsewhere. Lancaster, the adopted son, is always covering for Walker's peccadilloes, until Walker goes too far. The dynamic was taken to excess in "The Man From Laramie," in which the Walker figure (Alex Nicol) is a snarling, vindictive, lying coward.It occurs to me, amid all the jokes about cooking, that those cowboys must have eaten a lot of beef. I wonder how they fixed it? I've had steaks from range cattle and they fought me back. They had the texture of white walled tires. I wonder if them cowboys has ever heard of beef bourguignon. Stroganoff?

Burt Lancaster started his career in the late forties starring in films noirs like "The Killers" or "Sorry, Wrong Number", and then in the early fifties became an action hero in swashbuckling adventures like "The Flame and the Arrow" and in Westerns like this one. There are similarities between the plot and that of "The Man from Laramie", another Western from the fifties. Both films feature a power-struggle within the family of an elderly, wealthy rancher. In each case the old man has a single son of his own, and has adopted his trusted ranch foreman as a virtual second son. In both films the old man's biological son is a dissolute, worthless character. The main difference lies in the personalities of the adopted sons. In "The Man from Laramie" the adopted son, Vic, initially seems like a decent character, but eventually turns out to be as villainous as his adoptive brother Dave; the real hero of that film is a stranger, the titular Man from Laramie. In "Vengeance Valley" the adopted son initially seems like a cad, but later turns out to be the film's hero. In 19th century Colorado, a young woman named Lily Fasken gives birth to an illegitimate child, and refuses to identify the father. Her brothers Hub and Dick believe that the culprit is Owen Daybright, the adopted son of a wealthy cattleman named Arch Strobie. Hub and Dick know that Owen has given their sister $500 to take care of the baby and come looking for him, hoping to force him to marry Lily. What they don't know is that the real father is Strobie's real son Lee, who is already married. The film then explores the complications arising from this situation and from Lee's attempts to cheat his own father over a cattle deal. The film's main faults are the poor quality of the colour, which appears dull and washed-out, and of the sound, which is sometimes muffled. It lacks the power of the really great fifties Westerns like "Shane", "The Big Country" or, for that matter, "The Man from Laramie" itself, which has a similar plot but a greater depth of characterisation and is an excellent film as opposed to a merely good one. Those points apart, however, "Vengeance Valley" is a very watchable Western with an exciting plot. Lancaster was perhaps not yet the great actor he was to become later in his career, but he makes an attractive and sympathetic hero as Owen, and he makes this a very decent example of a "second division" Western. 7/10

Brashly handsome Burt Lancaster (as Owen Daybright) and little brother Robert Walker (as Lee Strobie) return from a cattle round-up as their western town celebrates the arrival of a newborn baby. The kid is illegitimate, and sexy Sally Forrest (as Lily Fasken) isn't identifying the papa. You can bet it's either Mr. Lancaster or Mr. Walker, though (it's not much of a secret). Walker, by the way, is married to neglected Joanne Dru (as Jen); and, both women seem to be in competition for both men.It's also important to know that Lancaster is supposed to be the older "foster brother" of Walker, and helped their disabled father Ray Collins (as Arch Strobie) "raise" the little guy. Moving the plot along is the arrival of new mother Forrest's angry brothers John Ireland (as Hub) and Hugh O'Brian (as Dick); naturally, they want to kill the father of their new nephew. Though done well, this all comes across as dull. Lancaster and Walker are fine actors, but do not fit the story; Ms. Dru is underused.Also ill-served by the story is young ranch-hand Carleton Carpenter (as Hewie). He serves as the film's "narrator" and guide. Coincidently, Mr. Carpenter had a surprise multi-million-selling hit during this film's original release, as his "Aba Daba Honeymoon" recording with Debbie Reynolds outdistanced its introduction in "Three Little Words (1950). "Vengeance Valley" doesn't serve its personnel well, but Lancaster rode on to successfully mix western genre films in with his impressive repertoire.***** Vengeance Valley (2/6/51) Richard Thorpe ~ Burt Lancaster, Robert Walker, Carleton Carpenter, Sally Forrest