Invitation to a Gunfighter (1964)

Well, it’s my pleasure to introduce the ever‑present and always‑insightful blogger Mr Brian Hanna’s The Magnificent 60s, a sharp, curated look at one of cinema’s most transformative decades, mixing weekly reviews with production histories, box‑office insights, and behind‑the‑scenes stories. Its archive spans spy thrillers, westerns, biopics, musicals, and modern films that echo the era’s spirit. So, without further ado…

Here’s the latest from The Magnificent 60s

If ever a movie was in sore need of reappraisal it’s Richard Wilson’s western, which encountered both audience and critical indifference on initial release. If you’ve heard of Wilson at all it will, hopefully, either be down to his connection with Orson Welles or from his crime duo Capone (1959) with Rod Steiger and Pay or Die (1960) with Ernest Borgnine. On the other hand, you may be more familiar with the name from the Ma and Pa Kettle series in the 1950s or perhaps raunchy comedy Three in the Attic (1968). Or because he was an unlikely contender for the triple-hyphenate position (writer-producer-director) held on the Hollywood scene by the likes of Billy Wilder and less-heralded figures such as John Lemont ( The Frightened City, 1961).

Wilson was not first choice to direct since the western had been on the Stanley Kramer company slate since 1957 when it was planned for Paul Stanley before it moved in 1961 into Hubert Cornfield’s orbit with a script by James Lee Barratt and then repossessed by Kramer when Rod Steiger was briefly attached. The film, backed financially by Kramer, barely rates a paragraph in the director’s autobiography in which he describes the picture as “an adult western with a somewhat complicated plot.” There’s no getting past the fact that the plot is complicated, but it’s not the plot but the characters that held me in thrall…

…Read the Full Article @ The Magnificent 60s