Brilliant and touching

Absolutely Fantastic

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Burt Lancaster Saddles Up for the First Time and Seems Home on the Range in This Underrated Western. It's Got Everything a Thinker's Western Could Have. A Detailed "Adult" Script When the "Adult" Western was Just Being Born and Would Flourish with Anthony Mann and Budd Boetticher.This One Feels Different. With a Voice Over Narration Uncommon in the Genre, it Lays Out Details About Cattle Ranching and Roundups that are Interesting and Add Flavor to the Proceedings. The Baby Out of Wedlock Story (that is the vengeance of the title) Must have had the Production Code Squirming, is Unique for the Time and Almost Unheard of in Westerns.It's Got a Good Cast, a Prolific Director, an MGM Budget, Color, Wide Open Spaces, Gritty Violence, and a Crackling Mature Mixture of Morality and Money Grubbing. Robert Walker is as Slimy as They Come as the Spoiled and Evil Son, and John Ireland and Hugh O'Brian as Dim-Witted Thugs Using Family Ties to Justify Their Lust for Violence. As In Most Westerns the Females are Peripheral to the Story Even Though They are Central to the Motivations of the Hard Living Men. Overall, this is an Offbeat Film that Seems to have Elevated Itself Spontaneously as the Unusual Elements Rose to the Forefront and Made This a Unique Entry in the Usually Stodgy Western Formula.

Brashly handsome Burt Lancaster (as Owen Daybright) and little brother Robert Walker (as Lee Strobie) return from a cattle round-up as their western town celebrates the arrival of a newborn baby. The kid is illegitimate, and sexy Sally Forrest (as Lily Fasken) isn't identifying the papa. You can bet it's either Mr. Lancaster or Mr. Walker, though (it's not much of a secret). Walker, by the way, is married to neglected Joanne Dru (as Jen); and, both women seem to be in competition for both men.It's also important to know that Lancaster is supposed to be the older "foster brother" of Walker, and helped their disabled father Ray Collins (as Arch Strobie) "raise" the little guy. Moving the plot along is the arrival of new mother Forrest's angry brothers John Ireland (as Hub) and Hugh O'Brian (as Dick); naturally, they want to kill the father of their new nephew. Though done well, this all comes across as dull. Lancaster and Walker are fine actors, but do not fit the story; Ms. Dru is underused.Also ill-served by the story is young ranch-hand Carleton Carpenter (as Hewie). He serves as the film's "narrator" and guide. Coincidently, Mr. Carpenter had a surprise multi-million-selling hit during this film's original release, as his "Aba Daba Honeymoon" recording with Debbie Reynolds outdistanced its introduction in "Three Little Words (1950). "Vengeance Valley" doesn't serve its personnel well, but Lancaster rode on to successfully mix western genre films in with his impressive repertoire.***** Vengeance Valley (2/6/51) Richard Thorpe ~ Burt Lancaster, Robert Walker, Carleton Carpenter, Sally Forrest

From the film's title you would think the story in the film has something to do with revenge, yet it's really more to do with opportunism. The idea that the son of a self made wealthy rancher would grow up spoiled has been explored in other westerns, while the adopted son would truly appreciate the values of hard work and sacrifice and thus earn more of the respect of the father than his own true son ever could. This of course drives the true son to want to get rid of the adopted one, even if they grew up the together and the adopted one always tried to cover for the numerous deficiencies of the true son. In this case wayward Sally Forrest has a child which is fathered by true son Robert Walker, while adopted son Burt Lancaster voluntarily takes the so-called blame. Walker is married to attractive Joanne Dru, who seems to instinctively know who the real father is, and after witnessing Walker take a whip to a horse, decides to dump him. Forrest's two brothers (Hugh O'Brien and John Ireland) are mistakenly after Lancaster's character instead of Walker's. Maybe it's their revenge that is at the heart of the film's title, though why they should want to kill the father of their sister's illegitimate child is not clear, other than being a typical Hollywood plot utilized in order to move things along. In any event, Walker does decide to take advantage of the two brothers' misplaced hatred for Lancaster and the plot actually isn't half bad once it gets going, when everyone is out on the range rounding up the cattle. Dru looks especially good, Lancaster is solid in his part, but Walker's character is the most interesting, with whatever vengeance he may feel towards Lancaster well concealed beneath a cool exterior.

Feckless cowboy, married but also semi-secretly the father of an infant born to an unwed neighbor girl, allows his foster-brother to take the rap when the vengeful brother of the tight-lipped lass comes to town packing heat. Oater opens with a laughably clichéd narration by a Jimmy Stewart sound-alike informing us this is a yarn about "cow country and cow punchers, cattle, and men. Worn leather, saddles, blisters and branding irons!" Unfortunately, it turns out to be a rather wan, dim horse-opera, with Robert Walker's rotter one-dimensionally written and portrayed (he whips a horse that won't let him ride, a signal to us that his wife--who only has one Sunday dress--is miserable at home). Burt Lancaster, occasionally unshaven and cat-like in his movements, broods sexily and is the only reason to watch the picture. *1/2 from ****