Tuesday's Overlooked Movies: The War Wagon

A Western fan could do worse than setting out to watch all the movies based on novels and stories by Clair Huffaker, many of them with screenplays by Huffaker himself. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about GUNS OF RIO CONCHOS, which I'd never seen before. This week it's THE WAR WAGON, which I had seen, but not in the past thirty years, at least.

THE WAR WAGON certainly has plenty of star power with both John Wayne and Kirk Douglas in it, playing former enemies who team up to steal a fortune in gold from evil mining tycoon Bruce Cabot, who framed Wayne for a crime and stole his land to get his hands on the gold in the first place. The shipment that Wayne and Douglas are after is being transported in the armored, Gatling-gun-equipped wagon of the title. To pull off the robbery—and THE WAR WAGON is very much a caper film—Wayne also recruits an Indian (an oddly cast Howard Keel), an alcoholic explosives expert (Robert Walker), and a cantankerous old-timer (Keenan Wynn) with a beautiful young wife who complicates things. Along the way, Bruce Dern has a small role as an ambitious but not very smart gunman.

Mostly this movie works very well. It's a little odd seeing good old stalwart Bruce Cabot as a slimy bad guy, but he does a decent job. There are a lot of humorous touches to go along with the well-done action scenes, and Wayne and Douglas are clearly having a good time. Douglas, still very athletic, does most of his own stunts, one of which is played for laughs at the end of the movie.

THE WAR WAGON was directed by Burt Kennedy, a good director who's better known for his screenplays. Clair Huffaker wrote the script based on his novel BADMAN, which was reissued in paperback in a movie tie-in edition under the same title as the movie (an edition I read when it was new). BADMAN, in turn, was an expansion of a novella called "Holdup at Stony Flat", which appeared in the 2nd April, 1957 number of the pulp RANCH ROMANCES, an issue that I happen to own and wrote about a few years ago as part of the Saturday Morning Western Pulp series. The story and the novel are much different, and the movie is even more different, but all three are well worth your time. (Covers are below.)

Sunday Morning Bonus Pulp: 5 Detective Novels Magazine, November 1949

A reprint detective pulp from the Thrilling Group. With a reprint magazine, you'd expect a pretty good line-up of authors, and you've got one in this issue: George Harmon Coxe, George Bruce, Ray Cummings, Paul Ernst, Steve Fisher, and Richard Sale. Lots of good reading there, I suspect.

Saturday Morning Western Pulp: Western Aces, December 1940

Another fine-looking issue of WESTERN ACES, with a good cover and stories by L.P. Holmes, Walker A. Tompkins, Gunnison Steele, Barry Cord, Wilfred McCormick, and WESTERN ACES perennial J. Edward Leithead. Four of those authors, Leithead, Tompkins, Steele (Bennie Gardner), and Cord (Peter Germano) also wrote Jim Hatfield novels for TEXAS RANGERS as Jackson Cole.

Forgotten Books: Ki-Gor--and the Secret Legions of Simba - John Peter Drummond

KI-GOR—AND THE SECRET LEGIONS OF SIMBA takes up right where the previous entry in the series, KI-GOR—AND THE GIANT GORILLA MEN, left off. In this story that originally appeared in the Winter 1939 issue of JUNGLE STORIES, Ki-Gor (Lord of the Jungle), Helene Vaughn (beautiful redhead American aviatrix), and their friend George Spelvin (former railroad porter from Chicago who has become the chief of an African tribe) are about to leave Africa for England and eventually America, where Helene will be reunited with her family after crashing in Africa, being rescued by Ki-Gor, and having several adventures with him. At the last minute, though, Ki-Gor decides he doesn't want to leave Africa after all, even though he's curious about his real family. (He knows by now that he's actually Robert Kilgour, the son of a Scottish missionary.)

It's a good thing Ki-Gor backs out on the trip, because before you know it, he's being recruited by British Intelligence to investigate a plot by an old enemy of his who's working with the Nazis to stage a continent-wide uprising that will leave the villain as the dictator of all Africa. This story soon turns into a hardboiled espionage yarn, the sort of menace that would be tackled a couple of decades later by fictional secret agents such as Sam Durell or Joe Gall. How it all plays out is still pretty pulpish, of course, but still, there are no fantastical elements at all and it's a significant departure from previous stories in the series.

The style is different, too, more realistic and almost literary in places. All this leads me to conclude that a different author penned KI-GOR—AND THE SECRET LEGIONS OF SIMBA, the second or possibly third writer to contribute a story to the series. I've enjoyed all of them, but this is probably my favorite so far because it's better written. Although, admittedly, it does lack some of the goofy charm of the earlier ones. It's still a good jungle adventure novel and left me eager to read the next one.

Stormfall - John Hegenberger

L.A. P.I. Stan Wade is back in STORMFALL, the latest in John Hegenberger's fine series of historical mysteries. It's 1959 this time, and Stan is on his way to Texas, hired by legendary director John Ford to investigate a murder that takes place during the filming of THE ALAMO. The case seems pretty simple, but John Wayne is involved and Ford doesn't want anything to damage Wayne's reputation and stop him from completing his pet project about the iconic battle. Naturally, things turn out to be a lot more complicated than they appear at first, and before the book is over, Stan Wade winds up back in Los Angeles, battling a deadly conspiracy that threatens widespread death and destruction.

As always, Hegenberger does a great job of vividly recreating a time and place, adding plenty of period details without overwhelming his breakneck-paced plot. The Stan Wade series is one of the most purely entertaining around, and STORMFALL is another great one. Highly recommmended.

Tuesday's Overlooked Movies: Lucy

Combine a bloody action thriller about a gang of Korean drug smugglers with ruminations about human intelligence and cerebral capacity, throw in Scarlett Johansson as an unwilling drug mule who gets superpowers when a bag of experimental drugs starts leaking inside her, and you have LUCY. This movie was written and directed by Luc Besson, which means it'll be nice to look at, have some nifty action sequences, and will strain your suspension of disbelief so much your brain will probably need an Ace Bandage after you watch it. All that said, I found it an enjoyable enough way to spend an hour and a half.

Now Available: Death and the Naked Lady/The Lady and the Cheetah - John Flagg (John Gearen)

DEATH AND THE NAKED LADY

Mac McLean, successful international singer, boards the Dauphiné on his way to New York, unaware that his patron, Georges Fournier, has just been murdered in Paris. But death is also on the passenger list of the luxury liner as it makes its way across the Atlantic. It starts innocently enough when McLean finds a case under his bed filled with Fournier’s precious jade figurines. Everyone seems interested in these statuettes. Lady Harcourt, playing around on her husband Albert, is intrigued when she finds them under McLean’s bed. The unsavory Gonzales makes it clear that he wants them. So does Joseph Pasquela. But why does a man so rich ask McLean to spy on his wife Elisabeth, formerly the Naked Lady of the Folie Bergère? And why does movie star, Lili Fenwick, keep showing up in his stateroom? When death makes an appearance, it is not entirely unexpected.

FACES TURNED AGAINST HIM

Bert Mason’s wife Myra has disappeared. Was she cheating with Milt, as everyone says? Bert laughs them off. Milt wouldn’t cheat on his wife. Not Lillian. Then they find Myra’s body...

THE LADY AND THE CHEETAH

After a bogus interview is published, everyone thinks that Rafferty Valois is an international man of adventure when, in fact, he is simply an out-of-work newspaper man. But that doesn’t stop him from accepting a job from the Countess Becellini to retrieve a packet of stolen letters for her. The Countess is trying to make sure nothing comes between the marriage of her daughter Bianca and the deposed King of Movania, soon to be reinstated to the throne. But there are others who want the letters, and are prepared to offer Valois large sums for their deliverance—Bianca’s grandmother for one, “the bitch of Rome;” and Carlo Cattoriere, a deported gangster who has other plans for the former king that involves his niece, Maria. They all think Valois such a clever man that surely he can find them for him. Because if he doesn’t, his life won’t be worth a damn.

As you can see from the cover, I wrote the introduction to this collection of two novels and a short story by John Flagg, and good yarns they are, too. If you're a fan of the Fifties Gold Medals and haven't read these, this volume is highly recommended.

The Communion of Saints - John Barlow

When good and evil come home...

Following the murder of his father, John Ray is getting his life back on track, and putting the criminal past of his family behind him. But when Shirley Kirk of the West Yorkshire Police asks him for a favour, he's sucked into a mystery that is as confusing as it is devastating. Discreetly.

John soon begins to uncover a complex mystery involving blackmail, kidnap and murder. But why are the police really asking for his help? There are people on the Force still out to get John Ray for his past misdemeanours. And they are not the only ones who know about his family's past.

A novel set in the city of Leeds, THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS is novel about innocence, vengeance, and the power of good and evil. It is the third crime thriller in the John Ray / LS9 series.

I read and enjoyed the first book in this series several years ago, and I liked this one quite a bit, too. The plot has some nice twists, and John Ray is a flawed but sympathetic protagonist. The best thing, though, is John Barlow's writing, which is really smooth and skillful. An excellent British thriller and well worth reading.

The Fire of Asshurbanipal - Robert E. Howard

It's traditional for fans of Robert E. Howard's work to read something by him on his birthday. This year I picked one of his stories that I hadn't read in a good number of years, "The Fire of Asshurbanipal". What a wonderful yarn it is, too. You've got a lost city in the desert, ancient and abandoned and sinister. You've got a skeleton sitting on a throne clutching an enormous red gem supposedly forged from the fires of Hell itself. You've got two brave adventurers, American Steve Clarney (I'll bet he's a Texan, although the story doesn't say so) and his Afghan sidekick Yar Ali, who are after the gem and pursued by a gang of Bedouin outlaws who want revenge. Oh, and did I mention that the gem is supposed to be cursed? And that this story is connected to the infamous Cthulu Mythos? Throw in one of my all-time favorite pulp covers, the work of J. Allen St. John, and you've got an excellent way to spend the evening and pay tribute to the great Robert E. Howard.

Bob's Birthday

Today is the 111th anniversary of Robert E. Howard's birth in Peaster, Texas, about twenty miles as the crow flies from where I'm sitting. CONAN THE USURPER, bought brand-new in 1967 at Barber's Bookstore in downtown Fort Worth, was my introduction to his work. I know now that there's 'way too much de Campian meddling in this book, but I wasn't aware of that then, and anyway, I was 14 years old and look at that great Frazetta cover! Look at that giant snake and all those cool monsters and skeletons in the background! What more does a 14-year-old boy need on a paperback cover? (Well, maybe a scantily clad McGinnis babe, but that's a different post.) Anyway, happy birthday, Bob, and thanks for all the great reading over the years.