Raw Edge (1956)

It's 1842 Oregon and there's no law and order except that of a power mad land baron (Herbert Rudley) whose barbaric rule of law is that since men outnumber women by a substantial amount that the women are chattel and can be forced into marriage by the first man to claim her. When a rancher (John Gavin) is wrongfully accused of attempting to rape the land baron's wife (Yvonne De Carlo), he is lynched. But the dead man's brother (Rory Calhoun) arrives in town bent on revenge for his brother. Directed by John Sherwood, this programmer is an odd little western but odd in a good way. It's unsettling right from the start where women are victims of a savage patriarchal community. Poor Yvonne De Carlo spends the entire movie fending off potential rapists. Men are more than willing to kill husbands in order to get at their wives. Add to that, Indians preparing to attack to avenge their own slaughtered by townspeople to get an Indian woman (Mara Corday) for a wife. By no means is this a particularly good western but it's different enough in theme and execution to rise above the usual Universal "B" westerns. With Neville Brand, Rex Reason, Emile Meyer, Robert J. Wilke and Ed Fury, who would go on to be a sword and sandal star in 1960s Italy.