The Age of Commercialism

Expected more

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Shifting desert sand dunes lend their character to the title of the picture, otherwise "The Walking Hills" might not make much sense. The picture draws heavily from the Bogart classic "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre", but instead of three intrepid prospectors hooking up with a fourth, here we have nine members of an expedition joined by a female traveler (Emma Raines) with a score to settle, or at least find closure if that be her fate.Randolph Scott portrays the nominal leader of the rag-tag desert bunch; funny how in retrospect his character's name (Jim Carey) conjures up a rather different image if you choose to dwell on it. Other members of the gold hunting party include William Bishop, Arthur Kennedy, John Ireland and the always reliable Edgar Buchanan. Considering that Scott's character is the one supposed to have the most common sense and leadership ability, I was consistently distracted by the idea that he would bring a favored mare about to foal into a scorching desert where the threat of a sand storm was ever imminent.A rather stunning casting decision for the film involved the presence of blues guitarist and singer Josh White. He's on hand it seems, primarily to lend his voice to a handful of bluesy numbers that emotionally affect his fellow travelers to varying degrees, though his presence has no additional impact on the story line. Among White's career accomplishments was his being the first black singer to give a White House command performance in 1941 for then President Roosevelt.For a rather short film clocking in at around seventy eight minutes, the story manages it's fair share of character development among the principles while a trio of players (Bishop, Jerome Courtland and Arthur Kennedy) each harbor an innate fear of their questionable past being discovered. The ride off into the sunset so to speak, by Ella Raines' Christy and Bishop's Davey Wilson character may leave one somewhat baffled considering what went before, but no more so than the shifting sand dunes that render their verdict for the remaining wanderers.

"The Walking Hills" is a film you feel is a masterpiece when it starts, but along the way it loses itself in the sandstorm. It was made right after "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" and it follows the same type of plot about men's greed and a treasure. It all starts in a poker game when a young cowboy, Johnny, mentions seeing a wagon wheel in the desert, that being the clue for a missing treasure lost in a wagon about 100 years ago. In Brazil this film was titled "Sete Homens Maus" (Seven Bad Men), even though they are eight plus a woman, Chris (Ella Raines). Anyhow it made me think , specially in some scenes where they are all shown together, of "The Magnificent Seven" directed later on (1960) by the same John Sturges. Sturges was a specialist in action scenes and looked down on "spaghetti" westerns which were characterized by non explicit action scenes, and so it is surprising to see Sturges use a sandstorm, where you half see the action, as the main event of the film. I am sure that if Sturges would have made this film later when he was more known, it would be a better job.

Since 1945 when Randolph Scott decided to concentrate almost exclusively on westerns only one of his westerns was set in the modern west and that is this one, The Walking Hills. Shot on location the film holds it own with such gold hunting classics as The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre and Lust For Gold.Sitting around a poker table one night Edgar Buchanan starts recounting a tale in which a wagon train loaded with sacks of gold dust got lost in the desert in the great Southwest. They're quite an assortment of characters in the place, they include at least one private detective in John Ireland and he's after one of the people in the room. But more than one of them has a reason to fear the law.So all that were in that small barroom set out to the desert fueled by another story that Jerome Courtland tells about coming across an old wagon wheel that would have been contemporary with that gold train. Quite an assortment go besides those in the cast I've already mentioned the guys include William Bishop, Arthur Kennedy, Joe White, Russell Collins and Charles Stevens. Bishop adds an additional plot component, not only is he a suspect, but he's wooing Ella Raines who used to go out with Scott. As for Scott he's concerned with a mare in foal and he brings her along as well. Later on Ella Raines declares herself in on the gold hunt.Although with a lot more cast members out in the desert some people's true nature starts to surface. Quite a few of the cast meets their doom. As for the gold, just about the same ironical ending as in The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre.In a book on the Films of Randolph Scott there's a story told about Ella Raines's husband Ransom Olds who was an air ace from the recent war and would be one again in Korea and Vietnam. It seems as though for a joke he buzzed the company on location. He thought it was funny, but the roaring jet passing over frightened all the horses and the wranglers spent the rest of the day rounding them up. Ella was not amused either, nor I'm sure was Harry Cohn.Not as good as Lust For Gold or The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre, The Walking Hills still holds its own with the others and holds up well for today's audience. Greed is a timeless and universal theme.

"Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" director John Sturges made his first foray into the western movie genre with this modern day western hybrid about a back room poker game that evolves into a feverish search for lost treasure in the desert. Lean, mean Randolph Scott toplines a sturdy, first-class cast in this atmospheric outdoor yarn that features John Ireland, William Bishop, Edgar Buchanan, Ella Raines, Arthur Kennedy, Russell Collins, and Jerome Courtland. Comparisons between "The Walking Hills" and John Huston's eternal classic "The Treasure of Sierra Madre" are inevitable, but the two movies differ drastically. Drawing comparisons between "The Walking Hills" and S. Sylvan Simon's "Lust for Gold" (1949) with Glenn Ford and Ida Lupino is more appropriate. The two films were released in 1949, but "The Walking Hills" came out in March, while "Lust for Gold" premiered in June. Interestingly, Edgar Buchanan appeared in both releases. Western novelist Alan Le May, who wrote both "The Searchers" and "The Unforgiven," penned the screenplay with one-time only scenarist Virginia Roddick providing additional dialogue."The Walking Hills" opens with a foreword: "A border town—like so many in the Southwest it's split in two by the international line and has two names. Calexico in America and Mexicali on the Mexican side." In the first ten minutes of this concise little epic, Sturges and Le May introduce us to the chief characters and the premise. A handsomely attired Dave Wilson (William Bishop of "Coroner Creek") appears on the streets of Mexicali in a coat, trousers, and a Stetson. He is minding his own business as he steps in front of a hamburger joint where he spots Chris Jackson (Ella Raines of "Cry 'Havoc'") flipping burgers. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Dave and Chris, two men scrutinize them from across the street. The first one is a detective, Frazee (John Ireland of "Red River"), and the second one is King (Houseley Stevenson of "Four Faces West"). Later, we learn that Dave is on the run as the result of a card game in a hotel room where a man died in a brawl with Dave. Dave thought the man was drawing a pistol from his jacket. He struck the man. The man toppled out of his chair and fell on a beer bottle, and the bottle punctured his heart. Gee, they must have had some pretty stout beer bottles back in 1949. Anyway, Dave has been on the lam and Frazee and King have been shadowing him since he fled Denver. King fears Dave will slip across the border before Frazee can buttonhole him, but Frazee isn't so sure that Dave is their prey. King argues that the look on Chris' face when she saw him convinced him that Dave was the guilty party.Anyway, Dave wanders over to the Tequila Bar & Grill and spots a horse in a trailer and learns from the truck driver, Cleve (Charles Stevens of "Last Train from Gun Hill"), that the animal belongs to Jim Carey. Cleve explains that Jim is ". . . waiting for his mare to be cleared through quarantine." The barkeep tells Dave about a penny ante poker game in the back room. Dave enters the game as Willy (Edgar Buchanan of "Texas"), an unshaven prospector, observes that Jim Carey (Randolph Scott of "Comanche Station") dreams of breeding a winning race horse. Willy resumes telling a story about lost treasure when Dave sits down. "Like I was saying there was five wagons in that train and they headed right into them walking hills." We learn that the walking hills are sand dunes that provided a short cut through the desert. According to Willy, this happened about a 100 years ago and the wagon train disappeared forever and nobody with it was ever seen or heard from again. Willy elaborates that the wagon train made up a gold shipment coming out of Mexico loaded with upwards of $5-million dollars. Jim remarks that everybody knows about the lost wagon train.A young, footloose cowboy, Johnny (Jerome Courtland of "Cripple Creek"), agrees with Willy that the walking hills pose a menace to anybody that dares to travel through them. Recently, he rode through them, and his horse stumbled on a wagon wheel and threw him. Johnny observes the wheel was a skinny, narrow wheel, not like the big-wheeled borax wagons or the wide-tired kind ideal for desert wayfaring. Silence hangs over the room, and everybody exchanges glances. Frazee has joined them, and he asks Johnny if he could find his way back to where he fell. Initially, Johnny is puzzled, "Hey, what's the matter with you guys? Did I pull something?" Jim refuses to let anybody leave the room, and Frazee makes the attendant Bibb (Russell Collins of "Bad Day at Black Rock") shut the door. They decide to embark as a group to scour the desert where Johnny fell off his horse. They are paranoid that somebody will leak their discovery so they leave later that evening so as not to attract attention and ride into the desert. Temporarily, Frazee loses interest in his quarry, Dave, because a million dollars appeals more to his sense of greed.The rest of "The Walking Hills" takes place in the desert amid the shifting sand dunes as the group struggles to locate the gold while weathering a vicious sandstorm and their own greed. Le May characterizes each individual so they stand apart from each other. Scott plays his usual, tight-lipped hero. In the end, three of them die, and Dave and Chris ride off. Although they don't find the $5 million in gold, our heroes locate a saddle bag with $10-thousand to split amongst themselves. There are a couple of surprises and Sturges maintains a modicum of tension throughout this suspenseful, 78-minute, black & white saga.