Estación comanche

The last of the seven Scott/Boetticher collaborations and although it's not one of my favorites {THE TALL T (1957) and RIDE LONESOME (1959) come out ahead}, it's still worth owning on DVD if Columbia/Tristar ever sees fit to release it.

Randolph Scott plays a rancher named Jefferson Cody who's wife was kidnapped by the Comanches a few years before. When he hears that the Comanches are holding a white woman, he goes to them for a trade and winds up with another man's wife named Mrs. Lowe (Nancy Gates).

As they head back, they stop at Comanche Station in order to water their horses and get fresh supplies. When they arrive there, they see three men being chased by a bunch of Comanches on the warpath. Cody recognizes one of them as Ben Lane (Claude Akins), a soldier he had drummed out of the army for an atrocity against the Indians, many years before. He also suspects Lane is trafficking in scalps and that's why the Indians are after them.

They manage to fight them off and when the coast is clear, Lane informs Mrs. Lowe that she has a $5,000 reward put up for her by her husband. Mrs. Lowe then suspects Cody of his intentions but it's apparent from the beginning that Cody isn't interested in any reward money. He just wants to find out what happened to his wife.

Also Lane has a habit of saying "Ha-lo.." every time he's being addressed. A nice script touch put in there by Burt Kennedy who wrote the script. It gives Lane something to distinguish him by.

It now becomes a battle of wills between Cody and Lane with Mrs. Lowe and Lane's two dimwitted sidemen (played by Skip Homeier and Richard Rust) looking on. When Frank (Homeier) is sent up the creek to see if the Comanches have cut off their trail, he comes floating back down, dead with an arrow in his back. And later when Dobie (Rust) has a change of heart and wants to throw in with Cody, he gets shot in the back by Lane for his efforts.

That shot warns Cody that Lane is nearby and the inevitable showdown takes place in the Lone Pine rocks. We all know who wins that one, right? Cody finally brings Mrs. Lowe back to her husband only to learn that he is blind and really doesn't care what's happened to her. He just wants her back.

Beautiful widescreen print that was remastered in the late 1990s, this one would be a welcome addition to any western library. It needs a DVD release.

7 out of 10

Nice film regarded in certain Western lover circles as a cult classic. She was not the white woman he'd bought , but she was the white woman he was going go keep. She was worth 5000 dollars alive or dead but she was easier to bring in dead . Here Randolph Scott is the loner Jefferson Cole, an obsessive, stubborn man hunting the last ten years for his wife abducted by the Comanches, who rescues instead another kidnapped woman, she is a pretty heroíne, Nancy Gates: an attractive and no mean actress, only yo find himself up against three reward-hungry outlaws : the leader : Claude Akins , and his hoodlum sidekicks : Skip Homeier , Richard Rust, all of them insist on accompanying them back to the spouse homestead, saying they need additional protection. However, Cody soon realizes that this nasty trio are after the reward money and are scheming an ambush .Then Cole ferries the kidnapped woman back to civilisation throughout dangerous ways chased by the violent Comanches .

Tipically tough Randolph Scott western from his later years in films made by Budd Boetticher with whom he played a lot of Western in the Fifties and early Sixties. Magnificently and splendidly written by Burt Kennedy with roles doomed from the start . It results to be a bleakly pesimist movie that gains warmth from moving pursuits , Indian attacks , a discreetly elegiac tone and gently ironical humour .It deals with a simple, and plain plot , a hero achieves rescue a woman and they fall in with three villains , in the capable hands of a trío of awesome uglies , excellently played by Claude Akins , Skip Homeier and Richard Rust.

A Ranown production by Harry Joe Brown and Randolph Scott, delivered by Columbia Pictures , Budd Boetticher made it in medium budget and being finely starred by a solid cast as well as competent filmmaking . It contains a colorful and brilliant cinematography in Technicolor by Charles Lawton Jr, showing barren, stark outdoors and rocky landscapes. As well as atmospheric and thrilling musical score by Mischa Bakaleinikoff. The motion picture was compellingly directed by Budd Boetticher . His first Western was the low budgeted The Wolf Hunters 1949 produced by Monogram. With Universal International Pictures Budd made The Cimarron Kid , Bronco Buster, Horizons West , Seminole , The Man from Alamo. In 1956 he directed Seven Men From Now , a Batjac production , it began a long collaboration with Scott . Following Tall T in 1957 , produced by Harry Joe Brown and Boetticher , Decision at sundown 1957 , Buchanan Rides Alone 1958 , Ride lonesome 1959 , Westbound 1959. Most of them written by Burt Kennedy and Charles Lang Jr and cameramen William Clothier and Charles Lawton Jr . Finally, Boetticher wrote Two mules for the sister Sara by Don Siegel and his ending Western : Dying proud produced by Audie Murphy. Rating 7/10. Better than Average. Well Worth Watching .

Saw this film again tonite via the DVD, mainly because it's Scott's penultimate film. Immediately thought of similarity to Scott's The Tall T, later to Ride Lonesome and Seven Men from Now. Difference is I'd give that Elmore Leonard story a few notches on this. Claude Akins is better than just Movin On but doesn't have the menace of Richard Boone or Lee Marvin. Scenery is favored over dialogue. Lots of cutting from scene to scene to indicate time has passed. Skip Hoemeier reprises his role as number 2 gun hand to the villain (Billy Jack to Boone ). Scott is great trading with the Comanche or getting the drop on the bad guys. Lots of good but familiar dialogue- "Seemed like a good idea". He is the archetype noble cowboy true to his values and keeping his dignity, yet always practical. I like this film very much and will watch it again; I'm sure.

This is the final film that was directed by Budd Boetticher and starring Randolph Scott. Like their previous collaborations, they both work together to produce Westerns that manage to rise above the mediocre norm. In this film, a fairly typical plot idea is executed very well--with a grace and style that make the film well worth seeing.

Randolph Scott, as usual, plays a nice but tough guy. He's brave enough to come into a Comanche stronghold in order to negotiate for the release of a White woman kidnapped by the tribe. However, trouble is in store when three drifters come upon Scott and the woman. It seems that the leader of this group (Claude Akins) is a real rogue and plans with his men to kill Scott and the woman. It seems that the woman's husband has offered a reward for her--and it can be collected dead or alive! So what did I like about the film? First, as usual, Randolph Scott is amazing. He plays the perfect cowboy hero--tough, slow to speak and anger but also a decent man through and through. Plus, he's much more believable than the bigger than life characters John Wayne usually played. I loved Wayne's films, but he was always too tough and too in command. Scott is much more like a very capable 'everyman' character. Second, as usual, Boetticher deliberately underplays the action--producing a muted but also quite believable film. Third, the film had a really nice ending--quite the twist.

You can't do a lot better than a Scott/Boetticher western. While this isn't their best, it certainly is quite good.

Comanche Station is the last of several films Randolph Scott made for Budd Boetticher with Columbia pictures. This would have been his last film, but for being lured to do just one more, the immortal Ride the High Country.

The film combines elements of The Naked Spur and Two Rode Together and blends them successfully. Scott is a man with one obsession, to get his wife back from the Comanches who kidnapped here ten years earlier. Whenever he hears of a white woman being put up for trade by the Indians he heads out with trade goods and buys her in the hopes of finding his beloved.

On this trip he ransoms Nancy Gates away from the Comanches. Later on he runs into an old enemy Claude Akins traveling with two young guns, Richard Rust and Skip Homeier. It seems as though Nancy's husband has put up a ten thousand dollar reward for her.

Akins is a truly malevolent figure, a scalphunter who kills Indians and sells their scalps for bounty. Unfortunately the two have need of each other in hostile Indian territory.

Randolph Scott's western heroes usually have an edge to them, they are not pure heroes as Joel McCrea's are. But in this film he's poaching on McCrea's territory in gallantry. His behavior towards Nancy Gates is at all times chivalrous. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a medieval origin to the plot of Comanche Territory.

Had Scott not come back to do Ride the High Country, Comanche Station would have been a good film to go out on.