I honestly don't know if I should do a review of Robert N. Bradbury's Blue Steel. After all, it was created on Poverty Row, that infamous conglomeration of ultra-low budget studios who pumped out cheap B-movies for pennies. They didn't aspire to any lofty artistic ideals or pretenses of great entertainment. They were made purely to squeeze as much profit as possible out of the masses. And yet, it was from such films that the mythology of the Western was largely imprinted within the minds of the public. It also served to provide work for many Hollywood stars before they made their big break. And so we come back to Blue Steel. This film was one of dozens of cheap Westerns made on Poverty Row that featured a young John Wayne before he made his name in John Ford's Stagecoach. It features an entirely preposterous plot, hokey acting, and some hilarious attempts at special effects. John Wayne plays John Carruthers, an undercover US Marshall on the hunt for the Polka Dot Bandit who is responsible for a string of robberies in the area. Of course...we never really learn where this area is...it's just a place full of cactus, dust, and cowboys which is uniformly referred to as "the West." Well, Carruthers is mistaken for a thief by a local sheriff. Together, they team up to stop the Polka Dot Bandit and the sinister man behind him who is using the robberies to convince the townsfolk to leave. Why? Because there's GOLD 'neath the town! GOLD, I tells ya! Anyway, this plot is merely an excuse to fill the film's 50+ minute run time with as many action scenes and set pieces as possible. It's...terrible. Yet I can't lie and say that it isn't entertaining.
4/10 (Professional Critic Rating)
8/10 (So Bad It's Good Rating)
No comments:
Post a Comment