classicsoncall The movie was getting a little tedious for me until Victor Sen Yung showed up as the Chinese bartender Chang uttering that great line to Rory Calhoun's Hemp Brown quoted in my summary above. It brought to mind another terrific line from the comedy Western "Blazing Saddles" when Gene Wilder says to Cleavon Little - "What's a dazzling urbanite like you doing in a rustic setting like this?" The story here has a bit of the "Branded" TV show story line, in that Lieutenant Hemp Brown is discharged from the Cavalry after his contingent of soldiers is wiped out and an Army payroll strong box is stolen under his command. Convicted of cowardice, Brown puts on his civilian duds and sets out to find the former soldier (John Larch) who ambushed his squad, who was presumed already killed in action some months earlier when his soldier uniform and ID wound up on a corpse. I don't think I've come across that ruse before in a Western.Brown had his man too until he made a rookie mistake and took his eye off the ball at the Slaughter House. Rory Calhoun's not supposed to make those kinds of errors; I guess he had to take a hit for the sake of the story. But then he makes another one when he goes to sleep in the Bolanos show wagon and Mona (Beverly Garland) grabs his gun. Like I say, the back and forth manner in which Hemp Brown lost and regained the upper hand got a little tedious after a while.I'll say this for Beverly Garland though, she generally doesn't look as good as she did in this picture and those legs! - man, they went all the way up to there! The red saloon gal outfit helped too, so much so that after a while watching her get ready for the show, Hemp ran out of conversation topics.

bkoganbing I swear while watching Rory Calhoun in the title role in The Saga Of Hemp Brown I could hear the faint echo of that famous theme from Branded. Rory is a cavalry officer who loses an army payroll, his whole patrol but him is killed and also killed was the wife of the commanding officer who was hitching a ride back to the post. For reasons I'm not clear on the leader of the outlaw gang John Larch wants Calhoun to live. So he sends Calhoun back to the fort tied to his horse and they give him the Jason McCord treatment. Dishonorable discharge because they can't prove he stole the payroll. But he's discharged for cowardice.Calhoun accuses Larch, but the army says Larch was killed in action a few years earlier. So Calhoun goes out looking for Larch.Calhoun wants Larch back alive, why I can't figure that since a corpse with a couple of fresh bullet holes would have certainly proved that Larch was not dead. That should have gotten Calhoun clear if not the army payroll returned.Definitely not one of Rory Calhoun's better westerns though John Larch as always is one mean and swaggering villain.

virginiaac Can there have been any male actor in Hollywood to rival the handsome face of Rory Calhoun in his hey day in this film? Bland it may be, hackneyed plot, lack of reality but what the film may lose in greatness, it makes up for with Rory Calhoun's fine acting and general superb handsomeness.I thoroughly enjoyed the film which shows Rory being dismissed for cowardice and after quite a few adventures and fights he is able to regain his reputation, win the girl, AND get paid for being a handsome fine actor.Sorry chaps, this guy was GORGEOUS!

rc223 Rory Calhoun is a disgraced army officer trying to track down the only man who can clear his name in this bland western with all the standard elements. It does feature the World's most inept lynch mob. So that's something, I suppose. Poor: [4/