Quantez

After a bank robbery, Heller and his small gang are on the run from the posse. The gang intends to cross the border into Mexico but their horses are tired. The outlaws decide to make a stopover in the town of Quantez to rest and feed the horses.

Heller is a brutal and cynical man who treats his woman, Chaney, with disdain and contempt. When Heller treats Chaney bad, Teach defends her, causing violent clashes between himself and Heller. Gentry has to step in and separate the two before they kill each other over Chaney.

When the gang reaches the town of Quantez it is shocked to see a deserted ghost town. Nevertheless, they decide to rest there for the night. Gato, the gang's scout, scouts around at night and finds an Apache spear with a message that anyone still found in town after sunrise will be killed. Gato realizes there are Apaches around but decides to keep this information to himself. With Apaches lurking around and Heller trying to kill Teach over pretty Chaney it doesn't look like the gang will ever reach Mexico.

Bank robbers holed up in a deserted ghost town? Apaches nearby - sounds exciting, but Quantez fails in the shoot 'em up department ( well accept the lively action-packed finale). However, it has an interesting dialogue, good characters and ok tension. What plays against it is too much gabbing and not anything exciting happening, but I still thought it was ok. Diverting enough if you have nothing to watch. I guess I liked its brooding atmosphere and the psychological discord in the characters - Fred MacMurray is excellent as always. Dorothy Malone sizzles. Shame the plot wasn't sharper and had more action.

Robbers flee for the Mexican border. They make for the small town of Quantez to water their horses and get some food, but find it deserted. They spend the night there, wondering what is going on and squabbling among them over leadership of the group and Dorothy Malone.

It's a very talky and philosophical western, bookended by action sequences to keep fans of the genre happy. By itself, it's interesting as a statement of the bandit life, a shaky A western that tries to make itself as something out of the mold of more standard fare. It succeeds because of its cast, including Fred MacMurray, John Gavin, and Michael Ansara, who was taking a brief break from playing Cochise on TV.

A western that has way too much talk, but the talk does draw some deeply etched characters is Quantez. Had they pumped it up with a bit more action this could have been a classic. That is despite Fred MacMurray who really never felt right in westerns. He does all right by this one however.

The hot tempered John Larch leads a gang of outlaws fresh from a bank robbery takes his three men fleeing a posse. His henchmen are Fred MacMurray an experienced outlaw who doesn't talk much about himself, a young fast draw in John Gavin who is from the east and Sydney Chaplin a man raised among the Apaches in whose country they have to pass through. And he also brings his main squeeze Dorothy Malone for those cold desert nights.

The outlaws arrive in the freshly deserted town of Quantez, deserted because the Apaches under Michael Ansara have made it most uncomfortable to live. What to do, but take stock of the situation and formulate a plan to get across the desert.

So while they're stuck there, the true character of all comes forth. All of them are chafing under the leadership of Larch who once again is playing a rather arrogant, loudmouth individual who is a fast gun, but has little else to recommend them. And of course there's the presence of Malone who just by being there is giving them all an itch that Larch won't them scratch.

Only one other speaking part is in this film that of James Barton who plays a wandering painter and who has an extra horse they might need to make it across the desert. It would be smart if they all stuck together until the Indian crisis is passed or they're all dead, but Larch won't let that happen.

It's plain that MacMurray should be the gang leader, but he has reasons why he's not and for that you see Quantez for.

Quantez is a bit verbose, but the characters are interesting to say the least.

The truly novel, surprising touch about this pedestrian and verbose Western is that the cast includes Charlie Chaplin's son, Sydney, playing Gato, a white man who grew up with, and is loyal to, the Apache and their legendary leader, Vitorio.

I found it tough to suss out what a strikingly beautiful and nicely coiffed Dorothy Malone was doing among a motley crew whose every individual member has designs on her... and she hoping that one of them will save her from Heller's (Larch's) horny clutches. Fred MacMurray shines as the thief on his way to redemption.

Director Harry Keller remains best known for cranking out B Westerns and, to his credit, QUANTEZ has a cast good enough to outstrip B status, its cinematography is competent if nothing to write home about - most of the (verbal) action occurs in a desolate wood building town, but somehow the indoor lighting looks electrical, which looks inappropriate to put it mildly.

The screenplay by Wright Campbell could and should have been more concise. 6/10.

Quantez is directed by Harry Keller and written by R. Wright Campbell and Anne Edwards. It stars Fred MacMurray, Dorothy Malone, James Barton, Sydney Chaplin, John Gavin and John Larch. A CinemaScope production in Eastman Color, with music scored by Herman Stein (supervision Joseph Gershenson) and cinematography by Carl E. Guthrie.

A gang of robbers hole up for the night in the ghost town of Quantez. But what is the greater threat to their well being? The Indians out in the hills? Or each other?

Maybe you get to be a killer? But you will be sick to the stomach because of it.

A smartly written and acted psychological Western, Quantez deserves to be better known and appraised. This is all about characterisations and the hot bed situation they dwell within, the emphasis on dialogue and interactions as suspicion, passions, racism and treachery show their hands. Standard characters do apply, the girl with a past she's not proud of, the loose cannon, the greenhorn kid, the duplicitous one and the guy with a secret tucked away. There's even a late addition of a wandering minstrel (Barton), splendidly calling himself Puritan. These characters are well blended for narrative strength by Keller, the director keeping things on the slow burn, an impending sense of implosion permeating proceedings. Technical aspects are smart, the exterior filming, when the film comes out of the claustrophobic confines of the ghost town, is most pleasing, while the Eastman Color is gorgeous and never garish. Cast score well, notably a stubble and grungy MacMurray, a pretty and emotionally fragile Malone and Larch, who is unstable and enjoying his chance for villainy.

Except for a fist fight, an opening pursuit and the odd moment of macho posturing, the action is saved for the excellent last quarter, so first time viewers after a high energy Oater are advised that this is not the film for them. But for those who like some psychological discord in their Westerns, where plot dynamics are simmering until the denouement, then seek this out if you can. 8/10