5 Card Stud (1968)

I've seen a handful of Hopalong Cassidy Westerns in which Robert Mitchum appeared as a heavy (he went by Bob back then), so it was cool to see him in a villainous role at the top of the bill here with Dean Martin. He doesn't come on the scene until a good while into the story but he makes his presence felt forcefully as the newly arrived preacher in Rincon. If you think about it, it didn't take much to establish his character as the killer of the poker game participants that hung a player for cheating. How that all came about is what makes the story interesting.I had to question Mama Malone's (Ruth Springford) response to the new saloon competitor in town when she described her marketing plan as 'good liquor, a few card games and no girls'. Two out of three ain't bad, but Van Morgan (Dean Martin) would have had a problem with that last one even if he was a long time friend of Mama. Maybe if Lily Langford (Inger Stevens) offered the first two she could have owned the whole town. Speaking of which, her prices for a shave ($1.00), a haircut ($2.50) and a shampoo ($3.00) seemed kind of steep for the 1880's compared to other era Westerns I've seen. The $20.00 Miscellaneous fee sounded about right.I guess I'd have to question the casting of Roddy McDowall in the picture as the guy pulling strings with Preacher Rudd (Mitchum). Setting aside his British background, he just didn't seem to be the right choice to portray a Western bad guy. Be that as it may, I thought it was rather generous of Van Morgan to cover for Nick Evers' (McDowall) complicity in the murders by chalking up his death to getting 'on to the Preacher'. Heading on to Denver, he'd be the only one to know better.

It's a film noir/Western/suspense of bizarre beauty and extraordinary performances ; being based on a novel by Ray Gaulden and interesting screenplay by Marguerite Roberts . A card shark is caught cheating, he is taken out and lynched , later on , this engenders several murders . The players in an ongoing poker game are being mysteriously killed off, one by one . A professional gambler (Dean Martin) who attempted to prevent the lynching tries to ensnare the assassin with the aid of a preacher (Robert Mitchum) with a weapon .Suspenseful film dealing with a card player who is lynched by the drunkards he was playing against. Tension from the opening game going on until ending and never lets up , being for Agata Christie aficionados . This is a tremendously exciting story of an obstinate card player and a strange preacher with a gun . It begins as a slow-moving Western but follows to surprise us with dark characters , strong supporting work , solid plot and in whodunit style . The tale is almost grim , a priest comes to a town just in time to make sure its citizenry but later the events get worse . Main cast is frankly magnificent . Sympathetic Dean Martin as as a reluctant card gambler and nice Robert Mitchum as a gun-toting preacher . First-rate Robert Mitchum in similar role and performance to ¨Night of the hunter¨ that was the acting of his life . In addition , Roddy McDowall steals the show as the cynic Nick . Supporting cast is extremely good such as Inger Stevens as Lily Langford , Katherine Justice as Nora Evers , John Anderson as Marshal Dana , Yaphet Kotto as Little George , Denver Pyle as Sig and Whit Bissell as Dr. Cooper , among others . Good Technicolor cinematography by Daniel F. Fapp . Enjoyable musical score ties up a top-notch Western package ; it is composed by the maestro Maurice Jarre . Furthermore , agreeable song by Dean Martin , including lyrics by Ned Washington . Watchable results for this offbeat Western .This well-paced in cracking style flick is compellingly directed by Henry Hathaway and usually works very well , taking a firm grip on the action and suspense . Here he directs efficiently Dean Martin and with strong screen presence by Robert Mitchum , both of whom collaborated in some Western . Hathaway himself was only even nominated for an Oscar , but his movies themselves are testimony to his skills to heighten narrative tension and shoot action so exhilarating it made adrenalin run . He does the human touch and full of insight that accompanied him during most of his films and the story develops pleasantly in a large frame with an interesting plot and fully adjusted to the requirements of the action . Henry was a craftsman who had a long career from the 30s with successful films , and especially Westerns , as ¨Brigham Young¨ and ¨Raw Hide¨ . In his 60s Hathaway still got the vigour to make some fiery movies as ¨From Hell to Texas¨, ¨How the West was won¨, ¨Nevada Smith¨, and ¨Shoot out¨ . He was an expert on Western genre as he proved in ¨True grit¨ , ¨Five card stud¨ , ¨Nevada Smith¨ ,¨How the West was won¨ , ¨Rawhide¨ , ¨Brigham Young¨ , ¨Buffalo Stampede¨, ¨Garden of evil¨ and ¨The sons of Katie Elder¨. Rating : nice Western that will appeal to Robert Mitchum and Dean Martin fans .

I'm more of a Mystery than a Western fan myself; "Five Card Stud" is a rather unique genre crossover - a bit like "Ten Little Indians" with gunfights thrown in. Leisurely paced but never boring, occasionally humorous without losing its seriousness, it is particularly recommended to those looking for the offbeat. It may be a little disappointing that the most obvious suspect turns out to be the person responsible for the killings, but the ironies and the morally grey areas of the story remain strong. The film also benefits from a great cast: Robert Mitchum is both amusing and larger-than-life as a preacher who's also an ace shooter ("By day he sweats for a pinch of yellow dust, and at night he squanders it on LUST!"), but extra-sweet Katherine Justice and extra-slimy Roddy McDowall stand out as well; and in 1968 it was still fairly uncommon even for an excellent black actor like Yaphet Kotto to be allowed, like he is in "Five Card Stud", to hold his own against an otherwise entirely white cast. Score and photography are top-notch. *** out of 4.

"Garden of Evil" director Henry Hathaway's western whodunit "5-Card Stud" pits 'hellfire gambler' Dean Martin against 'gunfire preacher' Robert Mitchum in a frontier tale about lynching, murder, and revenge. Mind you, deducing the whodunit will pose only a minor challenge for astute audiences. You will spot the actor committing the crimes long before the film identifies him in its second-to-last scene. If you study the stable strangling scene, the killer's headgear reveals his identity. The characters in "True Grit" scenarist Marquerite Roberts' screenplay, based on Ray Gaulden's novel, are flat since they change neither their mentality nor their morality. Nevertheless, Roberts boots around a provocative question about "who people were before they became who they are" which segues with the mystery. Otherwise, this Hathaway horse opera is sturdy enough, contains a believable cast and knows how to blend comedy with drama nimbly enough so it rarely becomes either heavy-handed or repetitious. Compared with Hathaway's other oaters, "5-Card Stud" doesn't top "True Grit," "The Sons of Katie Elder," "Garden of Evil," "From Hell to Texas," or "Rawhide." "5-Card Stud," however, does surpass "Shoot Out" and "Nevada Smith." Although some critics didn't cotton to Maurice Jarre's orchestral score and even denigrated it as "Dr. Zhivago" on the range,' I contend it is superb music and differs from anything that Jerry Goldsmith, Elmer Bernstein, or Ennio Morricone would have provided. Jarre's score enlivens the action and enhances the atmosphere. The Dean Martin "5-Card Stud" title song marks this sagebrusher as a traditional western. As far back as the 1950s, most major sagebrushers contained a ballad about the story or the hero with lyrics like ". . . play your poke and he'd leave you broke." The song here paints a portrait of the protagonist and his poker playing skill.Interestingly, "5-Card Stud" makes some racial references that chipped away at the usual barriers. In one scene, Mitchum's gunslinging preacher doesn't think it inappropriate that a black man be buried among whites, something that marked this western as a departure from Jim Crow mentality. John Sturges' "The Magnificent Seven" had broken ground earlier with a gunfight so an Indian could be buried in a white graveyard.Professional gambler Van Morgan (Dean Martin of "Sons of Katie Elder") takes a break from a Saturday night poker game while Sig Ever's son Nick (Roddy McDowell of "Planet of the Apes"), stableman Joe Hurley (Bill Fletcher of "Hour of the Gun"), Mace Jones (Roy Jenson of "Big Jake"), storekeeper Fred Carson (Boyd 'Red' Morgan of "Violent Saturday"),and Ever's ranch hand Stoney Burough (George Robotham of "The Split") continue to gamble with newcomer Frankie Rudd (Jerry Gatlin of "The Train Robbers") until Nick catches Rudd cheating 'red-handed' and assembles a lynch party. They haul Rudd against his will out to a stream and string him up from the bridge. Barkeeper George (Yaphet Koto of "Live and Let Die") warns Morgan, and Morgan lights out after Nick and company to thwart the necktie party. "You don't hang a cheat," Morgan growls, "you kick him out of town." When Morgan arrives, Frankie is swinging with a noose around his neck, and Nick buffalos Morgan on the back of the head with his six-gun.Mama Malone (Ruth Springford of "Vengeance Is Mine") discovers Morgan strewn on the boardwalk the following morning and summons George to help the battered gambler to his room. Morgan decides to pull out of Rincon and try his luck in Denver. Before he leaves, he rides out to Sig Ever's spread to bid goodbye to Sig's comely daughter Nora (Katherine Justice of "The Way West") and deck Nick as repayment for clobbering him at the hanging. Naturally, the town marshal (John Anderson of "Young Billy Young") can neither identify the lynch mob nor can he identify the hanged man. Later, participants in the card game begin to die. One is wrapped up in barbed wire. Another is hanged in the church. Still another is suffocated in a barrel of flour. Indeed, Hathaway and Roberts make each death look different. Eventually, George visits Morgan in Denver and Morgan decides to return to Rincon. Two things have changed since Morgan rode out. First, the town has acquired a gun-toting pastor who renovates the church and holds services. Second, Lilly Langford (Inger Stephens of "Hang'em High") has opened a barbershop that features a $20 item that intrigues Morgan when he visits her establishment. Lilly and Nora contend for Morgan, while our hero closes in on the new preacher Jonathan Rudd. "5-Card Stud" boasts several good scenes. Hathaway does a good job of staging a shoot-out in the streets of Rincon when paranoid miners go berserk because they fear they may be the next victims of the local serial killer. If you slow down your DVD or VHS copy, Dean Martin loses his Stetson when he seizes an axle to let a wagon haul him out of harm's way. You can see his headgear fall off completely. In the next scene, Martin's hat is back on his head. Nevertheless, it is still a neat gunfight with Morgan and Rudd standing back to back against the opposition. The scene at a windmill where Rudd hits each of the windmill blades because he was aiming at the spaces between the blades is fun, too. George plays a role in the story and provides his buddy Morgan with a clue to the killer's identity. The animosity between Nick Evers and Van Morgan is feisty throughout the action with Nora trying to do her best to dampen it. Van Morgan and Lilly have some amusing banter. The expository scenes about Nick's childhood almost make his character marginally sympathetic.Indeed, "5-Card Stud" is no classic, but it is good enough for a rainy day.