User reviews

We follow Barry Sullivan (Tom Horn) in the Arizona desert towns as he joins up with a group of outlaws headed by Broderick Crawford (Morgan). They spend their time carrying out robberies so that they can fulfil their dreams. Sullivan plans to make it to San Francisco with Marjorie Reynolds (Julie) to embark upon married life. First of all, he has to make it out of Tombstone, though, a town that shows no mercy.

This is a snappy western with the acting honours going to Broderick Crawford. We get nice outside locations, shoot-outs, chasing posses, a square dance, bar-room entertainment courtesy of Julie Gibson (Dolly Lane), hold-ups, betrayal, a love interest and a final twist at the end. An enjoyable western.

Bad Men of Tombstone is directed by Kurt Neumann and adapted to screenplay by Philip Yordan and Arthur Strawn from the novel The Last of the Bad Men written by Jay Monaghan. It stars Barry Sullivan, Broderick Crawford, Marjorie Reynolds, Fortunio Bonanova and Guinn Williams. Music is by Roy Webb and cinematography by Russell Harlan.

Mightily as solid as it is macho, Bad Men of Tombstone is worthy of viewing investment by those with a bent for noirish Westerns. Story is standard fare, where a group of desperadoes live the criminal life but start to squabble and bicker as personalities clash and mistrust pulses away. There is a dearth of good people here, pretty much everyone is bad, tainted by bitterness or out for revenge. A romantic interest is inevitably perched on the plotting, and gunfights, brooding and a bleak finale are on the way. Script is a good one, allowing the characters room to breathe, Neumann keeps things brisk and Harlan's moody black and white photography is classy. 7/10

This had mediocre B movie Western branded all over it . Co-written by Philip Yordan whose main output at the time was indeed B movie Westerns one didn't hold out much hope for this . Even the title conjures up images of men having to do what men have to do . When the melodramatic music blazed across the screen you just knew you're going to be watch Western melodrama

Yordan did write THE BIG COMBO a few years later , a film that is now regarded as a Film Noir classic and BAD MEN OF TOMBSTONE does have a relatively nourish feel to it . Tom Horn finds himself cheated at a game of cards which leads to him being imprisoned in the town jail where he meets William Morgan who has a plan to break out . Teaming up with Morgan's gang Horn finds himself as a fugitive as he plans his revenge

You're not watching a Western where the lines between black and white are clearly drawn and there is a streak of amorality running throughout the movie . Horn quite happily joins on robberies carried out by the Morgan gang though it is noticeable that Horn doesn't kill anyone who doesn't deserve a bullet . The final third is let down by an unlikely love affair and then as you might expect the resolution is fairly predictable but for a film that I expected to be mediocre it did exceed my expectations to an extent

I think one of the best performances of Barry Sullivan, perhaps the best. A nostalgic film, considered a western B, but with a high level of photography, an intelligent script and excellent performances by Sullivan and Broderick Crawnford. An old and unpretentious western that deserves to be revised when. When I saw Bad Men of Tombstone for the first time I was only 10 years old and after that I have reviewed several times whenever possible. For a long time I looked for a copy on VHS and then DVD, but could not. Finally got a DVD and then I could better analyze the film Kurt Newmann, whose script, I realized later is the competent Philip Yordan. The western highlights the harsh frontier life where it was not possible to trust people and stealing was an activity considered almost normal. Keep me a copy of this valuable western made ​​in a distant era - 1949 - so 63 years ago. A worthy representative of the western filmography

Surprisingly well done b/w oater, with great, often noir-ish cinematography by the masterful Russell Harlan. Director Kurt Neumann tightly stuffs the 75 minutes with flawless action. Not a single frame wasted. There are rich clichés and standard situations, for sure, but only the ones we love with classic westerns. And there's a bit of a surprise ending, clearly not what you would call a "Happy End". Character actors Sullivan and Crawford are very intriguing and add some deeper psychological aspects to the outlaw story of friendship, jealousy and betrayal. Both are stone gunslingers without compassion, characters based on the McLoury-Clanton gang of Tombstone. The real brutality and senseless killings of the Old West is installed during the first 5 minutes of the movie by Sullivan: a gun-happy murderer who shoots a gambler to death because he cheated him out of a horse months earlier. Definitely underrated and worth a closer look.