Review: Wyoming Renegades (1955)

From director Fred F. Sears, frequent collaborator of Sam Katzman and a B-movie maverick who literally worked himself to death at the age of 44, Wyoming Renegades tries hard to rise above the traditional low budget fare. After all, this film was made in 1955: Poverty Row was becoming a thing of the past, soon to be replaced by television. Gunsmoke had been a radio staple, but in September of 1955 it would be beamed into the homes of every TV owner in America. It wasn't just Gunsmoke, either; mid-fifties families could stay home and watch The Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok, Annie Oakley, Buffalo Bill Jr., Death Valley Days, Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Judge Roy Bean, The Lone Ranger...well, you get the picture, and that's not even all of the westerns playing on television in 1955. The theatrical product had to innovate and offer something that audiences couldn't see at home. 

For lower-budgeted pictures, that was easier said than done. Columbia's Wyoming Renegades rises to the challenge by filming in Technicolor and a widescreen aspect ratio (1.85:1), albeit not the larger "scope" that prestige westerns were often afforded. Most importantly, the film relies on a complex story that keeps the viewer asking questions until the final reel. 

Butch Cassidy (Gene Evans), Sundance (William Bishop), and their gang have been doing outlaw-type things all across the western territories. Nice guy Brady Sutton (Phillip Carey) has had enough, so he high-tails it out of the gang and makes for the town of Broken Bow, where he reunites with his best girl, played by glamorous blonde Martha Hyer, and sets his course for the straight and narrow. When Cassidy's gang robs the bank of Broken Bow not too long after, the citizens believe Brady never reformed and actually led his former outlaws right to the honey pot. Brady protests, but the mob quickly turns violent. Our harshly-judged hero says farewell to his lady and narrowly escapes with his life, thanks to the help of a mysterious rider named Veer (Douglas Kennedy), who has a secret of his own. Before long, all these threads weave together for a very satisfying climax. The film even has a special role for the women of Broken Bow, which I found to be refreshing and unconventional. All this in only 73 minutes.

Wyoming Renegades hit screens fourteen years before dreamboats Paul Newman and Robert Redford winked their way to superstardom as Butch and Sundance, but Butch as played by Gene Evans is a bone breaker, not a heartbreaker. He's squat and grizzled, a real piece of work that nobody likes, least of all the viewer. He is not handsome, he is not charming, and raindrops do not keep falling on his head. Keen-eyed viewers will realize that one of Cassidy's gang--a skinny comedic character named Petey--is the one and only Aaron Spelling, future mogul and mega-producer, but here only two years into his acting career. 

One of the big plusses for Wyoming Renegades is David Lang's script. Lang was a screenwriter who cut his teeth at MGM before going on to work for just about everyone, including PRC, Republic, Paramount, Warner Bros, and Columbia. He'd already written for television before Wyoming Renegades, but by 1958 he was working almost exclusively on small screen stories, writing for Tombstone Territory, Wanted: Dead or Alive, The Rifleman, Have Gun - Will Travel, Lawman, Riverboat, Maverick, The Tall Man, Laramie, Rawhide, Bonanza...pretty much every notable TV western except for Gunsmoke, which is honestly a little disappointing.

Another thing that elevates this film is the wonderful cinematography by Lester White, a DP who should be no stranger to B-western buffs. In his capable hands, the camera is often in motion and using the frame's fullest potential. In the establishing shot where we meet Cassidy's gang, the camera pans from right to left, introducing each outlaw before stopping on Butch himself, profiled like he's about to be featured on a commemorative stamp. When Sundance is introduced, he arrives in shadow, his face obscured until just the right moment. When a stagecoach is pursued, the camera is mounted right behind the driver, giving us a first-person perspective. When the driver turns to stare down his pursuers, he's essentially looking through us, the audience. When the shot switches to the pursuing robbers, they're riding directly into camera, again giving us the sense that we're right in the middle of the action, not off to the side. It's the kind of quality that one doesn't necessarily expect from a lower budgeted film, but that is frequently present. 

Like the penny candy in the general store, B-westerns are a dime a dozen--and yet they almost all offer something compelling. Don't get me wrong, Wyoming Renegades is not going to compete with the best (or even the worst) of Anthony Mann or John Ford, but then again, it's not trying to. It's a small story, but told with the technical proficiency of a filmmaking team that had been hardened into steel by a nonstop schedule that cranked out consistent meat-and-potatoes fare, week after week, month after month, year after year.