Stranger on the Run

When you see the cast, the director and the writer, the single thought is that this has got to be a great Western. Fonda rarely made a bad film. The director was at times masterful. But Hollywood is an industry. It makes films like Ford makes cars and every now and the you get the motion picture version of the Edsel. The best thing in it is Fonda's wig. Henry never had a lot of hair but what he carries on his head looks like a busby gone wrong, like the picture itself. Dull. Unimaginative. Utterly unbelievable. I am only spending time writing this to suggest that you might want to spend your time watching the same cast in other movies.

This first-class western was made for television and directed by none other than Don Siegel who assembled a first-rate cast, (Henry Fonda, Anne Baxter, Michael Parks, Dan Duryea, Sal Mineo, Bernie Hamilton and Madlyn Rhue), yet not many people have seen it or even heard it. Indeed, this is the kind of film that had it been given a proper cinema release might have become something of a cult movie. Fonda is the drunk who rolls into town in search of a girl called Alma only to meet with a wall of silence. It seems that Alma (Rhue) is the town tramp who has attracted the wrong kind of attention. It's also not the kind of town that welcomes strangers. That's just the beginning of a highly unusual plot that doesn't quite go in the direction you might expect. All the performances are excellent, (especially those of Baxter and Duryea), and while it may not be the best thing Siegel ever did, as part of the Siegel canon it has a lot to recommend it.