Gunfight in Abilene (1967)

Bobby Darin looks so goofy in this movie that seeing Leslie Nielsen as a grim and malevolent land baron makes this movie even funnier. Bobby Darin has a nice personality, but he looks 100% ethnic New Yorker, and I doubt he could ride a horse. This is not a bad movie, except that it does not make any sense. It is just the kind of movie that was put together and nobody bothered to check if the plot made any sense, or if the dialogue made any sense. Just a passable B movie. The horrible song, Amy, makes it even worse. The movie was all about Bobby Darin and his guilt over killing Nielsen's brother. The song is about Amy, who plays second fiddle to the broken friendship between Darin and Nielsen. Just another part of the story that is awkward.

Are you kidding me - Bobby Darin - in a Western? I would have lost that bet big time. But you know what, he wasn't that bad. There were a few times I thought he was over-acting the role but in general a credible job. One problem though, was his casting as a baby face in the starring hero role. Like Audie Murphy, the matinée good looks don't always work when going up against the town bully or a gnarly gunslinger like Joe Slade (Donnelly Rhodes). Not only that, but when sized up against some of the other players, he was pretty much on the small side.But all in all, the story was pretty good. Now Leslie Nielsen - I guess I've seen him too many times in Airplane and Police Squad pictures to take him seriously in a dramatic role. So with that club hand of his, injured by Cal Wayne (Darin) when they were youngsters, it looked like a caricature and any minute I was expecting the kind of treatment we got from Kenneth Mars as the inspector in "Young Frankenstein". It came pretty close at one point too, when he started banging the hand on the back of a chair, but that was it. You have to admit though, Nielsen's character Grant Evers looked pretty fast on the draw for a cripple. It would have been something if the final showdown was between him and Cal.You know who got the short end of the stick here though, don't you? After all her fussing over Cal, Leann (Barbara Werle) got broomed so quickly she didn't even show up at the end of the picture. She could at least have gotten eighteen yellow roses for her trouble.

A lot of 1960s B westerns turned out to be remakes of 1950s B films - especially those starring Audie Murphy - and this is no exception. Its a remake of Showdown in Abilene starring Jock Mahoney. This is so close to the original that the original writer of Showdown, Berne Giler, gets a 'screenplay' credit although I suspect that means Giler's original script was handed to the other credited writer, John Black, who made a few nominal changes to update it for the budget and to try and disguise that this was a remake by changing the character names.Looking suspiciously as if it was intended originally as a Murphy vehicle, this humdrum affair features singer Bobby Darin as a gunfighter who can't put on a gun again after accidentally killing his best friend but naturally is forced to do so at the end. Darin struggles in the acting stakes - someone must have told him to wear black gloves as a symbol of being psychologically disturbed (maybe he saw Kirk Douglas in The Last Sunset - of which more later) although no-one comments on this even when he wears them indoors - and bites his lips a lot. He's also too slight to be a feared gunman and looks faintly ridiculous in nicely pressed tight beige trousers.The background plot is a range war between cattlemen and sodbusters. However, being that this is a cheap film, all of the shots of cattle herds and civil war fighting are taken from other films shot on different film stock and it shows. This being a Universal release the production has been allowed to raid the Universal library and che civil war shots are from Shenandoah and many, if not all of the shots of cattle herds are from aforementioned The Last Sunset including shots of a cattle herd crossing a river into a town and being put into a cattle corral. So, instead of seeing any cattle everything is largely confined to the standing Universal western town set and a few indoor sets.The film is lamentable short on much action until the end. Further Darin's character came across to me as a complete cad. Darin's chopped off Leslie Neilson's arm, killed his brother and then tomcatted his fiancée(whom Darin also humiliates by being blatantly unfaithful too by screwing another woman virtually infront of her and then dumping this other gal when the ex-financee changes her mind). Neilsen should have shot Darin dead.I thought Don Galloway came off best as the laid back deputy quite happy to serve any sheriff, no matter how corrupt.

Besides one other Western, ‘Journey to Shiloh' (1968) and the obscure early effort ‘Lonnie' (1963), William Hale has worked principally in TV since the start of his career. This is a shame as from the evidence of ‘Gunfight in Abeline' at least, he is able to work comfortably in a major genre with none of the small screen inhibitions which seems to affect directors who cross over.The present film was received indifferently by critics upon its first appearance and it is hard to see why. While no masterpiece, it is a solid, engaging piece of work, offering Darin one of his finest and most dramatic roles. When one remembers the dull screen impression made by his nearest equivalent in Westerns, that of Audie Murphy (another actor who died relatively young), Darin's considerably more interesting screen persona seems to have been badly wasted. Add to his acting abilities as a vocalist and songwriter - as evidenced by the memorable ballad ‘Amy' over which the credits of this film play out – Darin's versatility is very interesting. In fact he was briefly marketed by the ever hopeful studio as the "new Sinatra".In ‘Abeline' Darin plays Cal Wayne, a man haunted by two accidents: that of the injury of Grant Evers' arm when they where children, and of the death of Evers' brother during a skirmish during the Civil War. Evers' arm is a constant reminder of Wayne's incipient guilt, as well as suggesting the cattle magnate's unfeeling morality. But Evers is no simple black hearted villain. He has behaved with perfect honour towards his intended bride Amy and, although a ruthless businessman, initially at least strives to avoid confrontation and violence with the farming lobby. Far more reprehensible is his henchman Jack Slade, and the mutual distaste between the two is always evident. (The difference is particularly noteworthy when Slade upbraids Evers for his weakness in paying compensation to the farmers for his early trespassing and crop destruction.) Even Evers' final act of violence towards Wayne is one generated through impulsiveness, as the now-sherriff confesses how he killed his employer's brother.‘Abeline' builds a compact and satisfying Western drama, albeit small-scale, around the Wayne-Amy-Evers-Slade relationships, and Hale's widescreen compositions, his dollying and tracking are very effective without drawing attention to themselves. Most noticeable is the final showdown. Here he employs some off-centred camera angles to frame the boastful Slade, while the montage of facial shots accompanying the ultimate draw anticipates some of the flamboyance of Leone.This is a film which is entirely successful in its own rewarding and modest terms, and only fails being memorable by an absence of more colourful supporting actors. Neilsen too (acting straight here, long before the days of 'Airplane!')lacks a certain charisma and some of the film comes across as being slightly glum. If Hale had been able to add a Brennan or a Devine into the mix, them the results could have been marvellous. Instead we have a Western drama well worth seeking out, as a traditional, effective genre outing.