This is a Warner Bros.' roaring story of Nevada's Border-War . Powerful people from a bustling town become desperate that their gold and silver shipments from Carson City to Virginia City are the helpless targets of thieves and they become convinced that the only way to foil the robbers is to build a railway . Moving western dealing with the laying of railroad lines to forestall raids on the stagecoaches , as a banker , William Sharon : Larry Keating , finds his stagecoach is robbed , the villain results to be Big Jack Davis : Raymond Massey , the main owner of the Golden Elephant Mines , his hold-ups hallmarked by the Champagne supper he lays out in the scenario for his victims . Then the banker commissions the building of a railroad with Jeff Kinkaid : Randolph Scott , contracting to build a tunnel through a mountain . As the employers will take an extraordinary engineer , a former resident of Carson City , as Jeff is a foot-loose mining expert who takes things very much as they come , but who , once laconically committed , stays committed . Kincaid doing his damnedest to stop them , as well as he has to fight the town's hostility to his boisterous railhands and ongoing efforts by the outlaws to sabotage the project. Meanwhile , there emerges a loving triangle among Susan Mitchell : Lucille Norman , Jeff : Randolph Scott , and his brother Alan : Richard Webb , who works for the local newspaper. Kinkaid comes tearing in with a gun and a grin ... to carve a new notch in the Silver Belt of Nevada !
A well-done example of a B western with nice acting , as the plot is plain and simple , so shipments of gold from Carson City are vulnerable to holdups , as a powerful entrepreneur hires Randolph Scott who knows the difficult terrain very well in such mountainous territory, while the villain and his band of outlaws called "The Champagne Bandits" prepare a peculiar supper , in true Robin Hood-fashion, after robbing the stage of its bullion, they treat its passengers to a fried chicken picnic replete with champagne . This enjoyable picture gets Western action , shootouts , thrills , a love story , go riding , an assault on the Virginia and Truckee 22 locomotive and results to be quite entertaining . And the pace of action , tightly edited , never drops, and including a glamorous as well as glimmer cinematography in WarnerColor , a type of brilliant Technicolor created by Warner Bros production company . The film is set in Carson City , which was one of the main railhead cattle towns till railway arrival . This is no exactly a really distinguished Western , but it is an acceptable and passable oater . Finely played by Randolph Scott as a brawling adventurer called Jeff Kincaid, an experienced hand at difficult jobs .
Veteran Western star , Randolph Scott , once again proves his tough skills in this agreeable Western . As the picture being well starred by Randolph Scott . He was a prolific actor in Western, his career is divided in films directed by Budd Boetticher in Seven men from now, The tall T, Decision at sundown, Buchanan rides alone, Comanche station, Westbound. Henry Hathaway as : Heritage of the desert, Wild horse, Sunset Pass, Man of the Forest . Ray Enright directed him in : The spoilers, Trail street, Alburquerque, Coroner creek, Return of the bad men. Andre De Toth directed him in Men in the saddle, Carson city, The stranger wore a gun, Riding shotgun, The bounty hunter. Finally, his main testament, Ride the high country along with Joel MacCrea directed by Sam Peckinpah . He is perfectly accompanied as his partenaire by Lucille Norman playing Susan Mitchell, the publisher's daughter who soon finds rivals for her affections from the two brothers. And beautifully judged acting from Raymond Massey as the villain , a mine boss doubling as thief . Scott is competently supported by an ideally suited support cast such as : Richard Webb , George Cleveland , James Millican ,Don Beddoe and Larry Keating .
It contains a well made cinematography in color by John Boyle . This was Warner Bros.' first movie filmed in WarnerColor. Thrilling and atmospheric musical score by David Buttolph . This bullet-a-minute Western about bandits attempting to hold up the progress of a railroad was directed in sure visual eye .This typical Western was professionally directed by Andre De Toth . At his beginnings De Toth entered the Hungarian film industry, obtaining work as a writer, editor , second unit director and actor before finally becoming a director . He directed a few films just before the outbreak of WW II, when he fled to England . Alexander Korda gave him a job there, and when De Toth emigrated to the US in 1942 , Korda got him a job as a second unit director on Jungle Book (1942) . Andre De Toth was a classical director , Western usual (Indian fighter, Man in the saddle , Ramrod , Last of Comanches , The stranger wore a gun), but also made Peplum (Gold for the Caesar , Revak) and adventure (The Mongols , Morgan the pirate , Tanganyika) . Probably his best known film is House of wax (1953), a Vincent Price horror film shot in 3D . Rating : 6/10 . Decent Scott Western .
