Tonight's Movie: Star in the Dust (1956)

A good cast elevates STAR IN THE DUST (1956), a solid Universal Pictures Western.

Sheriff Bill Jorden (John Agar) holds a convicted murderer named Sam Hall (Richard Boone) in his jail. Sam is due to be hung at sundown, but a war is brewing between ranchers and farmers who want to break Sam out of his cell for varied reasons. Bill, aided only by two older deputies (Paul Fix and James Gleason), intends to hold them all off and carry out the sentence in due course.

One by one we're introduced to characters around town who are interested in the unfolding jailhouse drama, including wealthy George Ballard (Leif Erickson); his sister Ellen (Mamie Van Doren), who loves Bill; Nellie Mason (Coleen Gray), a seamstress shunned by some in town because of her love for Sam; and Nan Hogan (Randy Stuart), who fears her husband Lou (Harry Morgan) will die breaking Sam out of jail.

Other actors appearing in the film are Stanley Andrews, Robert Osterloh, Terry Gilkyson, and, in a very early role, Clint Eastwood.

It's a reasonably good Western, but there are two main drawbacks to the movie. The most important one is that I found the film's unending focus on a hanging and the attendant details distasteful, simply not an especially appealing theme.

The other issue, which is more of a good problem to have, is that the cast is so big, with a number of good actors and interesting characters, that one wishes some of them had more screen time than 80 minutes allows.

Additionally, Agar is almost a little too stoic as the sheriff, who walks in the shadow of his late father, also a sheriff. Agar constantly looks pained but doesn't bring many shadings to the character to make Bill more interesting. I like Agar's work in Ford's FORT APACHE (1948) and especially SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON (1949) very much, and he's by no means poor here, but he does seem on the tired side in his depiction of a serious man with a big problem. His numerous scenes with Fix are a relief as Fix is much more lively as his righthand man.

Boone, as he did in the later THE TALL T (1957), makes a fascinating villain; in this case it's a bit problematic that he isn't playing opposite someone equally dynamic.

Van Doren is acceptable as the leading lady, torn between her love for Bill and her weasel of a brother, but there's nothing particularly noteworthy about her character. The supporting ladies are far more interesting, starting with Coleen Gray as Nellie, the woman Sam has dallied with. Nellie has apparently led a lonely life, starved for affection until Sam came to town, and she desperately wants to break Sam out of jail and run away with him. Nellie has quite a knock-down, drag-out fight with Nan (Stuart) over some critical letters.

The characters I most wanted to know about were Nan and Lou (Morgan). Nan is apparently a former saloon girl who was once George's lady friend, but she's now happily married to Lou. It was interesting watching the characters and doing some reading between the lines; both Stuart and Morgan brought a lot to their roles and might have been the most interesting people in the movie.

STAR IN THE DUST was directed by Charles F. Haas. It was shot by John L. Russell, who coincidentally filmed the last movie I reviewed, TOBOR THE GREAT (1954).

STAR IN THE DUST is not available in the U.S. in any format, but it's been released on a Region 2 DVD in Europe, and it's also had a Blu-ray release there. Let's hope that at some point there will be a U.S. DVD release in the Universal Vault Collection.