‘The Ranown Westerns: Five Films Directed by Budd Boetticher’
The Criterion Collection

The Criterion Collection is bestowing a mitzvah upon movie mavens who pine for the days when men were men, when wide open spaces weren’t tourist destinations, and when Karen Steele proved her mettle to James Coburn by wielding a Winchester with acuity and purpose. The latter happens in “Ride Lonesome” (1959), one of five films collected on the new Blu-Ray 4K package “The Ranown Westerns: Five Films Directed by Budd Boetticher.”

To the extent that Coburn retains a hold on the popular imagination, it’s as the gangly wise-ass with a toothy grin who peppered any number of Westerns. Steele’s career was more modest. If the former model is remembered at all, it’s for her appearance in “Star Trek” as one of the mysterious trio of sirens in “Mudd’s Women.” 

Fame is fickle, and no one could have testified to that more than the star of “Ride Lonesome” and, for that matter, all of the films in “The Ranown Westerns,” Randolph Scott.

Scott was a trim 61 years old when he starred in “Ride Lonesome,” and though he was past his prime as a matinee idol he proved profitable as a grizzled veteran during the 1950s. Having worked steadily since the tail end of the silent era, Scott never became a star on the order of pals like Cary Grant and Fred Astaire. He was too stolid as an actor — “lumbering” is the go-to adjective. Dialogue, even at its most epigrammatic, seemed beyond him. John Wayne, in comparison, was a master thespian; Gary Cooper, a veritable chatterbox.

Scott was savvy enough to employ his limited range to good effect, cruising on stoic fortitude, a lanky frame, and the authority that can come with age. He was the “Ran” of Ranown Pictures, the production company he set up with the “own,” producer Harry Joe Brown. The two got down to business and knew it well enough to hire Burt Kennedy, a fledgling screenwriter with a knack for crafting tight narratives with some moral back-and-forth to them. The satisfactions derived from “The Tall T” (1957), “Ride Lonesome,” and “Comanche Station” (1960) can be traced, in significant part, to Kennedy’s gift for the tough-nugget, homespun bon mot.

Then Scott and Brown hired Bud Boetticher. Scott first worked with the director on “Seven Men From Now” (1957), a venture in the mold of the so-called “psychological” Westerns James Stewart made with Anthony Mann. The property, again by Kennedy, was originally intended for John Wayne, but the Duke gave it up when John Ford came calling with a little something called “The Searchers.” Ford’s magnum opus can’t help but come to mind when watching the Ranown pictures, not least because Boetticher milked the majesty of the desert Southwest with a similar cinematic aplomb.

Best to think of the Ranown movies as “The Searchers” done as haiku. These were B-pictures intended to bolster a night out at the movies and, as such, they don’t extend much beyond 75 minutes. There were no cast-of-thousands in these Oaters — just a nucleus of rough-hewn men with a history of bad choices and enough sense to double guess their avarice. And, of course, a pretty girl who is summarily lusted after even as she proves herself a woman of no mean independence. Valerie French’s turn as a sharp-shooting prostitute who won’t take no for an answer in “Decision at Sundown” is particularly gratifying.

It’s a toss-up between “The Tall T” and “Comanche Station” as best of the bunch. The former has acquired a distinct following, but the latter has a final scene that is no less moving for being unapologetically bathetic. What both movies share is bad guys portrayed by actors who really knew how to chew on a role: Richard Boone and Claude Akins. Their relative nuance and clear relish only highlight Scott’s limitations as an actor even as they confirm his iconicity. “The Ranown Westerns: Five Films Directed by Budd Boetticher” is, in its own tight-lipped way, a prickly pleasure.