COLORADO TERRITORY (1949)

This loose retelling of HIGH SIERRA, finds Joel McCrea in the Bogart character as a criminal who's hired for a big robbery job, but troubled by his growing conscience.  Along the way to meet his new partners, he foils a stagecoach robbery and takes a liking to a old man and his beautiful daughter.  Once he arrives at the ghost town where his team is waiting for him, he finds them not to his liking and even worse is there's a woman with them.  As expected, the tension among the men grows and the robbery doesn't go as planned.  Now on the run from a bloodthirsty posse, McCrea has to make some quick decisions.

Strong cast and a great director, but for whatever reason COLORADO TERRITORY didn't do a whole lot for me.  It was an entertaining watch, but I felt like I'd already seen all of this before...probably because I did in HIGH SIERRA!  Also, I didn't care for seeing McCrea as a bad guy.  I understand that he was having a change of heart, but he's still a criminal and a killer.

Worth watching, but unfortunately it doesn't bring anything new to the table.

Original - High Sierra (1941)
Remake 2 - I Died a Thousand Times (1955)

ALONG THE GREAT DIVIDE (1951)

Excellent western.  Kirk Douglas (in his first western) plays a law man who, along with his two deputies, come upon a man (Walter Brennan) about to get lynched.  Kirk rescues the guy and hears from the lynching party that he's guilty of murder.  Kirk reminds them that it's not up to them to take the law into their own hands and he's gonna take the accused man into town for a fair trial.  Easier said than done cause the town is a long way off and the men from the lynching party are hellbent on killing this dude.  Added to the direct threat of getting shot by the men trailing them, Douglas has to deal with the psychological warfare being dealt out by the accused man (and his daughter Virginia Mayo) who will do anything to free him including turning Kirk's own deputies against him.

I don't know what the earliest example of the "transporting-the-prisoner" sub-genre is, but this does a great job of it.  Quick pace, top-notch acting, well-written script, beautiful desert scenery, good camerawork.  Overall ALONG THE GREAT DIVIDE is a solid film.  Recommended.

Double-feature with THE NAKED SPUR.

WHITE HEAT (1949)

Now this is more like it!  I double-featured THE PUBLIC ENEMY with WHITE HEAT and while I found TPE to be dated and not as hard hitting as I had hope, WHITE HEAT was awesome!

After an exciting train robbery, gangster James Cagney is on the run with his gang which includes a few tough guys, his two-timing wife and even his overbearing mother!  Stuff happens and Cagney ends up in prison doing a bullshit two-year stint to cover up for his real crime.  The coppers are onto his game and put undercover agent Edmond O'Brien inside the prison to try and get the straight dope on Cagney.

There's much more to it than just that, of course, but you should just watch it for yourself.  Severe mother complex, murder left and right, prison fights, shoot outs, headaches, cheating wife, boiling hot steam to the face, robbery, classic vehicles, secret messages, car chases and one of the greatest freakout scenes in the history of classic Hollywood.

Even being as old as it is WHITE HEAT still packs quite a wallop.  Great movie.  Highly recommended.