The Walking Hills (1949)

During a poker game in a Mexican border town, a group of strangers decide to band together to search for some gold worth five million dollars said to be lost in the California desert in an area referred to as the walking hills. But greed, suspicion and bad blood as well as an approaching sandstorm will tear the band apart. Written by Alan Le May (THE SEARCHERS) and directed by John Sturges (THE GREAT ESCAPE), this contemporary western with noir-ish trimmings is a solid effort. It's an unpretentious minor western that moves swiftly and with enough interesting characters to hold you in its grip until the film's end. A group of people falling out over gold isn't a particularly fresh cinematic concept but Charles Lawton Jr.'s (LADY FROM SHANGHAI) evocative B&W images and Sturges' firm directorial hand bring a strong sense of creativity to the project. As always, Randolph Scott as a horse breeder brings a quiet authority to his role and underplays beautifully and Ella Raines (the only woman in the movie) makes more of "the girl" role than the script suggests. The movie boasts a rare film score composed by Arthur Morton, one of the great orchestrators (he orchestrated most of Jerry Goldsmith's scores) in film. The strong cast includes Arthur Kennedy, John Ireland, Edgar Buchanan, Jerome Courtland, Russell Collins and Josh White.