Home from the Civil War, young Neal Hammond : Rock Hudson and his older brother : Robert Ryan are glad to return to Austin Texas ranching. However , brother Dan wants more and he takes over properties . As 2 brothers go their separate ways after Civil War , one leads a peaceful life as a rancher , but the other corrupted by the war engages in a violent campaign to build his own empire ,and carrying out terrorisation . His attempt to enter business is thwarted by carpetbagger Cord Hardin : Raymond Burr . But among the growing opposition to his band is the new sheriff , to become his his nemesis , his brother Neal, along with an old friend : James Arness .
It begins as a sluggish , slow-moving Western but follows to surprise us with complex characters , thrills , breathtaking patches and decent plot about two differen brothers ; as both of them end up on opposite sides of the law . The simple tale is almost rudimentary though full of clichés, as the monotonous script lines too often settle for crude routine . Suspense and tension builds over the time in which the outlaws and the starring await to take the farmer's lands . The action is decently made , as when the nasties shoot without remission and rustling cattle . The highlights of the film are the facing off between Robert Ryan and his enemies and the climatic showdown on the ending . Robert Ryan gives a nice performance as the ex-officer who forms a rustling gang and parlays his ill-gotten gains into a land empire . Rock Hudson provides a slighly laborious acting as new Marshal of Austin , but his interpretation is really eclipsed by the great Robert Ryan . His acting as the mobster-tycoon reverberates all the movie in a manner that sometimes anticapates ¨The rise and fall of Leg Diamond¨ considered to be Boetticher's the best .
Support cast is pretty good , such as : Burr as as the nasty owner who beats and humiliates Ryan in a poker game , John McIntire as the honest father though he was only 2 years older than Ryan , James Arness , Dennis Weaver , Mae Clarke , Tom Powers , Douglas Fowley , among others.
It displays an atmospheric score by Herman Stein and Henry Mancini , both of whom uncredited . Colorful cinematography in Universal style by Charles Boyle . The motion picture was professionally directed by Budd Boetticher in ordinary and traditional wake.Still apprentice work , so don't expect anything quite so stylishly spare as the Randolph Scott/Boetticher cycle , but Burt Kennedy's intelligent scripting was probably the decisive factor in those later films . Boetticher formed a production company called ¨Ranown¨ along with Harry Joe Brown and Randolph Scott and as usual writer Burt Kennedy. The first Harrry Brown-Boetticher-Scott movie was 1956's " Seven men from now" , following ¨Decision at sundown(57)¨, ¨Buchanan rides alone(58)¨,¨Westbound(59)¨ ,¨Ride lonesome(59) ,in the decades since, they have produced and directed one Western ¨Comanche Station(60)¨ . Boetticher was a great expert on Western genre and also on the bullfighting world as ¨Bullfighter and the lady¨, ¨The magnificent matador¨ and ¨Arruza¨ . Rating : 6/10 . Well worth watching .
