That was an excellent one.

Fanciful, disturbing, and wildly original, it announces the arrival of a fresh, bold voice in American cinema.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Seasoned western leading man Rory Calhoun plays a cow hand named Santee who embarks on a different career as a bounty hunter hen he learns he can pick up $3-thousand for catching a Mexican bank robber who sports those eponymous spurs. After he guns down El Pescadore (Robert Carricart of "Fun in Acapulco"), Santee appropriates the black spurs of the title that the Mexican wore. Meantime, Santee's prospective bride, Anna (Terry Moore of "Mighty Joe Young"), who abhors his change of profession, leaves him before he can marry her. Anna lectures him at one point that the $3-thousand is "easy" money. This theme of "easy money" permeates this oater. "Johnny Reno" director R.G. Springsteen's "Black Spurs" was one of several westerns that venerable Paramount producer A.C. Lyles produced during the 1960s with actors and actresses whose careers were fading into obscurity. The interesting but formulaic Steve Fisher screenplay adheres to the old school of westerns where bounty hunters were reviled for their cynicism. Actually, Santee doesn't gun down every man that he stalks like those ruthless bounty hunters in Spaghetti westerns; Santee allows one or two to live. Later, he refuses to pursue the bounty on a man's head until it totals over $500. The black spurs that he took from the Mexican serve as a metaphor for what Santee has become. The first major turning point of the film occurs when Santee the bounty hunter decides to turn into a full-fledged villain. He cuts a shady deal with a notorious, well-heeled, land owner, Gus Kile (Lon Chaney, Jr.), who wants to attract the railroad to the town that he owns. Naturally, Kile's town is named Kile, and the land around it is worth about ten cents an acre. Were the railroad to locate in Kile, Kile's acreage would increase to as much as $10 dollars an acre. Instead of running their line through the town of Kile, the railroad has chosen to lay tracks through the nearby town of Lark. Santee learns that the railroad discriminates against lawless, wide-open towns. Santee and Kile set out to transform Lark into a town so wild that the railroad will relocate to Kile. Santee convinces a local Lark saloon owner, Pete Muchin (Richard Arlen of "Wings"), to go into business with him. Santee imports gambling machines and girls to Lark. Straight-up, honest, lawman, Sheriff Ralph Elkins (James Best of "The Dukes of Hazzard"), tries without success to evict Santee from town, but he doesn't have enough support from local citizens to run him out. Reverend Tanner (Scott Brady of "$"), baits Santee into brawling, but the parson loses to our protagonist. Santee learns that Tanner is not you're your ordinary, everyday gospel minister. At the same time, Tanner doesn't let Santee alone and struggles to appeal to his conscience. Meantime, villainous Bill Henderson (Bruce Cabot of "Big Jake") arrives with Shifty (Joseph Hoover) and his wagon load of slot machines. Sadie (Linda Darnell of "Forever Amber") brings her dance hall girls to town. Pretty soon the town of Lark is wide-open. Santee encounters Sheriff Elkins's wife, and the woman turns out to be none other than Anna. She insists adamantly that Santee clear out of town. Eventually, Sheriff Elkins stirs up too much trouble for Henderson's taste. Henderson and his cronies tar and feather the scrupulous lawman without Santee's approval. Santee learns the terrible truth about Anna and why she couldn't wait for him after he went in pursuit of the "easy money" on El Pescadore It seems that she got pregnant, and the ladies of the town shunned her business because they regarded her as a tramp. Santee learns that the little boy, Chad, is really his own son. Santee's conscience prompts him to back out of his deal with Kile. In a bizarre reversal of roles, Santee appropriates Elkins' badge and cleans up the town.Springsteen stages several okay shoot-outs, and "Black Spurs" doesn't wear out its welcome. The gunfight involving Deforest Kelly as a crooked lawman who wants to kill Santee is rather slick. Kelly gives two prisoners in his jail a choice. They are about to swing on the gallows, but he will let them conveniently escape from jail, if they were cut down Santee in the street when they make their big break. Predictably, everything goes wrong, and Kelly pays for his treachery. Aside from some scenes set on the trail, most of the action in "Black Spurs" transpires in town. The film chronicles the changes that occur in our hero's life, and we see Calhoun go full circle until he is back on the side of law and order. Although it came late in Calhoun's career, "Black Spurs" contains more plot that most of his westerns that he made during his heyday in the 1950s.

It's always cool for me to catch one of my favorite TV Western cowboys show up in a movie like Rory Calhoun did here. His run as 'The Texan' during the 1958/1960 season would have overlapped Scott Brady's tenure as 'Shotgun Slade' airing from 1959 to 1961. 'The Texan' was the better of the two shows and had that rousing theme music at the end of each episode. Stephen King must have thought so too because he wrote Rory Calhoun into his novel 'The Regulators'.Right out of the box though, I had to wonder about the name of Santee's (Calhoun) first bounty target. The Mexican outlaw was called 'El Pescador', which translates as The Fisherman, so I was a little puzzled by that. That doesn't sound very villainous to send shivers up your spine. But his character had those black spurs that gave meaning to the title, which Santee confiscated to bolster his image and reputation.The picture reminded of the 1959 Audie Murphy Western "No Name on the Bullet" in as much as when Murphy's character Gant arrived in town, it aroused a lot of town folk suspicion that they were the one he was after. There sure were a lot of guilty citizens in Kile, Kansas when Santee came on the scene. With 'No Name', Gant was content to let the town people take each other out over their suspicions, so his work there was made that much easier.I guess the turning point for Santee here had to be the revelation that old flame Anna's (Terry Moore) son was his as well. You can see the gears slowly turning in Santee's mind about what's important in life and what's not, like turning the civil society in Lark into a hotbed of sin and debauchery. The tar and feathering of Anna's sheriff husband Ralph Elkins (James Best) also played it's part, but you know, I had to laugh when Ralph wanted to lend a hand during the gunfight against the baddies. He looked like The Mummy in one of Lon Chaney's earlier films in which he portrayed the bandaged one ("The Mummy's Tomb" and "The Mummy's Ghost"). It was really kind of comical.Well besides the principals already mentioned, there was cool support here from the likes of DeForest Kelley, Bruce Cabot and Linda Darnell in a final film appearance, although her second billed status is questionable since she only appeared in a handful of scenes and wasn't really prominent in the story. Oh, and can't forget little Manuel Padilla Jr. who gave Santee something to think about when he told him - "It's sad to be a bad man".

Black Spurs is directed by R.G. Springsteen and written by Steve Fisher. It stars Rory Calhoun, Linda Darnell, Lon Chaney Junior, Terry Moore, Bruce Cabot, James Best, DeForest Kelly and Scott Brady. Music is by Jimmie Haskel and Technicolor/Techniscope photography is by Ralph Woolsey.A brisk and ebullient Oater out of Paramount, Black Spurs finds Calhoun as Santee, a sharp shooting gunman turning to bounty hunting and then paid to corrupt the town of Lark. Lark has been pencilled in to receive the on coming railway, so wealthy town owner of nearby Kile, Gus Kile (Chaney), hires Santee to discredit Lark in order to have the railroad routed through Kile instead. Once in Lark, Santee finds lots of resistance, particularly from an ex-lover and her husband, the sheriff!Plot holds few surprises as per outcome and characterisations, but the pic is no less entertaining for it. There are a number of live wire action sequences, with Santee often proving he is the number one gun in the West, and there's even some evil nastiness portrayed when things start to come to a head. The seedy saloon set up by Santee is awash with beautiful girls in beautiful costumes, and these girls drink beer out of pint pot tankards! The villains are a gruff, rough and tough bunch, and naturally there's a big good versus evil heart thundering away in the story.Calhoun has swagger and dangerous sexuality in abundance and he's surrounded by a good cast of pros. Darnell and Chaney, however, were winding down their careers, and in truth there two characterisations could have been played by any studio actors of the time, but they don't disgrace themselves as Springsteen wisely keeps their screen time to a minimum. The Techniscope photography doesn't really add much as more could have been made of the exterior locations, while Haskel's score is a bit too jaunty for its own good.It feels like a 50s Oater at times, which is no bad thing at all. Not prime Calhoun or a prime 60s Western, but much to enjoy here for the discerning Duster fan. 7/10

"Black Spurs" was one of producer A.C. Lyles now famous series of low-budget westerns featuring onetime big names. This one starred Rory Calhoun, Linda Darnell, Terry Moore, Lon Chaney, Bruce Cabot, Scott Brady and Richard Arlen. The supporting cast included future director Jerome Courtland, in his last acting role as a small town newspaper publisher living in sin! The story followed the adventures of an ambitious ranch hand (Calhoun) who deserts his pregnant girlfriend (Moore) for the life of a bounty hunter. Eventually this career demoralizes him to such a degree, that he instigates a plot to corrupt the morals of a small town for a fat fee. Thus, a planned railroad franchise will be diverted to a neighboring town owned by crooked businessman Chaney, who is in on the scheme. Calhoun sends for bouncer Cabot, new Orleans Madam Darnell and her "girls" as well as card sharp Joe Hoover, all of whom trash the town. Not so coincidentally, the sheriff happens to be the husband of Calhoun's former love, Moore. What happens is not what one might expect. Sadly, the film was Linda Darnell's last screen appearance. She died in an accidental house fire before it was released. And for many, the sight of the once gorgeous actress looking bloated and middle aged was not a pretty one. She did, however, turn in a reliably good performance, as did her co-stars, and Black Spurs remains an enjoyable nostalgia fest, one of Lyles' best.