COMANCHE STATION

US, 1959, 75 minutes, Colour.
Randolph Scott, Nancy Gates, Claude Akins, Skip Homeier.
Directed by Bud Boetticher.

Comanche Station was written by Burt Kennedy who wrote a number of westerns and went on to direct several of them during the 1960s, including Welcome to Hard Times and Dirty Dingus Magee. This film was directed by Budd Boetticher, who had directed many of action films but worked with Randolph Scott in a number of films during the second half of the 1950s.
The reference to the town of Lordsberg, a reference to the title of the first film made by John Ford.
The film is really a short story, a man trading with the Indians for the return of a woman and his taking her back to her husband, with attacks by a group of outlaw whites.
Since the mid 1940s Randolph Scott had appeared only in westerns which is the way people remember him, although he appeared in dramas and even musicals and the 1930s with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. His last film, Ride the High Country, was to appear three years after this film.

1. An entertaining Randolph Scott western? His screen persona in the 1950s? Westerns only? This film coming towards the end of his career?
2. The contribution of the writer, Burt Kennedy, and his later career in writing and directing westerns? The career of the director, Bud Boetticher, and his several films with Scott?
3. The screenplay as a short story, a simple and brief tale of the west?
4. The locations, the mountains, the open spaces, a sense of the west, the widescreen process? The musical score?
5. The focus on Cody, his being surrounded by the Comanche, the gun, the bundle of goods, throwing the spear? The bargain? The woman, in captivity, the trade?
6. Cody as a loner, his age, experience, his decision to trade for the woman, not knowing of the reward, beating the other groups who wanted to trade? The character of the woman, leading her to safety?
7. Her story, married, her husband not coming to get her, his putting up the money? Her reaction in talking about her husband? Thinking that Cody blamed him? Her antagonism, her later apologising? The revelation at the end that he was lame and blind? Her having a little boy? The happiness of the final reunion?
8. The trek, the Indians pursuing the group of shooters, taking refuge with Cody, his pushing the woman into the water trough to save her? The killing of the Indians? Removing their bodies?
9. The character of Ben, the leader, giving orders to the two young men, his past history with Cody, cashiered from the army, Cody saying he should have been hanged? The talk, the collaboration? The plan with the two men, to kill Cody, to kill the woman because the reward was whether she was dead or alive, the plan for the money?
10. The two young men, Frank, a follower, obeying orders, the talk at night, Dobie as an earnest young man, quoting his father, seeing Cody as an ideal, making something of life, his sense of morality, despite intending to kill the woman?
11. Stopping, the woman washing her clothes and bathing, the possibility to kill her at that stage, Frank, his being killed? His saddle left for his name and memory?
12. Getting near the town, Ben and his making his move, shooting Dobie, the reaction of the woman? Ben and Cody, talking, drawing, Ben dead?
13. Returning the woman to her family? Cody not thinking of a reward?
14. An interesting, brief film about whites and Indians, dealings with the Indians, the outlaws, the gunfighters and the scalphunters?