Civil war veteran John Parrish (Glenn Ford) plans to sell his ranch to local cattle baron Lew Wilkinson (Edward G. Robinson). When Wilkinson’s high pressure tactics result in the death of one of his farmhands, Parrish reconsiders – setting up a range war that encompasses the whole valley.

It is testament to just how prevalent Glenn Ford was in the mid-century American western that, just seven days after the release of RKO’s The Americano, he starred in The Violent Men for Columbia Pictures. While The Americano was a small, low budget affair directed by William Castle, The Violent Men was a much more impressive enterprise. It was directed by Rudolph Maté, a cinematographer-turned-filmmaker whose 1951 feature When Worlds Collide had been an award-winning hit. It co-starred Barbara Stanwyck and Edward G. Robinson, reunited following 1944’s Double Indemnity. The whole film was shot very handsomely in Cinemascope.

The general narrative of The Violent Men is certainly not particularly original, and would largely be duplicated later in 1955 by King Vidor’s Man Without a Star (reviewed here). What sets this earlier effort apart is the strength of the cast – which also includes Dianne Foster, Richard Jaeckel, and Brian Keith – and the brilliantly over-dramatic interplay of the film’s antagonists.

Patriarch Lew Wilkinson is an uncompromising and difficult man. His daughter Judith (Foster) resents him. His scheming wife Martha (Stanwyck) is cheating on him with his brother Cole (Keith), who aspires to take over the entire expanded ranch that Lew has built single-handedly. It is the sort of family relationship one would expect to see in something by William Shakespeare: a veritable Elsinore transported to 19th century Arizona.

Glenn Ford is playing his well-established and long-perfected persona as the reluctant hero. He begins the film with one intention – to leave town – and even ignores the murder of a local sheriff rather than get involved. It is only when Wilkinson’s strong arming of local farmers to sell their land becomes too egregious and violent that Parrish feels compelled to act. Is it a cliché? Almost certainly, but the bottom line is that Ford simply plays the part too well.

Despite its very male title The Violent Men runs a very strong line in powerful women. Stanwyck’s manipulative Martha comes straight out of a film noir, while Dianne Foster infuses Judith with strength, intelligence, and resolve. May Wynn has a less engaging role as Parrish’s fiancée Caroline, to be fair, but Lita Milan is vibrant as the passionate Elena – girlfriend to Cole Wilkinson.

While playing with many stock stereotypes of the genre (and adapting a Donald Hamilton novel) screenwriter Harry Kleiner (Carmen Jones) does a properly decent job of the dialogue and character. This is an attractively framed and well performed western.

1955 West is a review project to watch as many western features from 1955 as possible, in order to gain a ‘snapshot’ view of the genre at its height. According to Letterboxd, there were 72 westerns released that year. You can see all of FictionMachine’s reviews of them to date by clicking here.