User reviews

Raoul Walsh was perhaps the most entertaining director of the '40's, with movies like "Objective, Burma!", "They Died with Their Boots On" and "Gentleman Jim" behind his name, plus he also made some good early westerns. Sounds like the perfect guy to direct a movie like this, especially since this movie is a western remake of his earlier directed movie classic "High Sierra", with Humphrey Bogart and Ida Lupino. This movie might not be as 'star-filled' as the original but it's just as entertaining, arousing and intriguing on its own.

Westerns from the '40's were much different from the later spaghetti-westerns everybody knows. The early westerns from the '40's and the decades before that are a bit forgotten movies, probably mainly because they differ so much from the later westerns from the '60's and '70's that everybody from that- and later generations, basically grew up with. Westerns from the '40's were much darker and possibly less formulaic. This movie is basically more 'film-noir' than real western. It has all the basic film-noir ingredients in it; Backstabbing characters, treacherous woman, a criminal plot and mysterious unpredictable characters. It makes this movie also real perfect to watch for persons who don't like spaghetti-westerns.

Leave it up to director Raoul Walsh to tell a story well and entertaining. The story of "Colorado Territory" really isn't the most spectacular story you could think of but the way it is told and brought to the screen all can be called spectacular. The movie is filled with some real good action sequences and spectacular looking stunts. But granted that the storytelling is not completely flawless. The movie is perhaps a bit too short and the love story of the movie also doesn't quite work out as good as it could had been. I don't know, for some reason it just doesn't feel right, or connects with the rest of the movie.

The storytelling also makes sure that the movie remains for most part unpredictable, which also helps to make the film-noir elements work out. "Colorado Territory" is a rare both unpredictable and entertaining movie.

The cast is solid. It isn't filled with the most known actors of its period. Perhaps Errol Flynn was expected to play a role in this, since he worked a lot with Raoul Walsh in the '40's but instead the main part is played by Joel McCrea, who was an expert at playing characters in westerns. He plays a good and convincing tough-guy who has a good heart. Perhaps a bit too much of a good heart to make the story entirely believable but that's just common and entirely fitting for '40's movie-making standards.

An interesting to watch- and spectacular entertaining noir-western, that just like its original version "High Sierra", deserves to be seen.

8/10

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The commenters who called this "Western noir" are on the money. Just about everyone in this movie is a ratlike scheming double- or triple-crosser. Bad guys suffer fates not noticeably worse than the handful of schmo's who are honest (mostly in the relative, honor-among-thieves sense). It's all bleak for the ones who don't get out alive and also for the ones who do.

The one aspect of this movie that may have lost its punch for 21st century viewers is the script's banal dialogue for the two key women characters. Virginia Mayo in particular is better than her lines and her costume, which is fashioned entirely from clichés about wanton women who aren't 100 percent Anglo. But the story arc treats the women just differently enough from the "classic" Western that it held my interest.

The cast, top to bottom, is excellent. Joel McCrea does that thing he does so well *especially* well here. I'd like to see Peter Sarsgaard reprise a McCrea role some day, in either a Western or a Sturges classic.

Just one, before our aging outlaw's final retirement and start of a new life.

But there are complications--crafty colleagues, traitor accomplices and--women.

One woman turns out to be helpful, the other merely selfish. But that's just the start of our antihero's problems.

It's a Raoul Walsh film, and by golly, if any director knew how to make a movie move, it's Walsh. Made the same year as his classic, "White Heat," this western also ends with an "On Top o' the World" finale.

Joel McCrea is an intriguing actor. A sort of neutral entity that could be cast in any kind of role and come off looking and sounding natural and acceptable. No one ever especially went to see, nor stayed away from a picture because of him. He was just there, always doing a dependable job. And what an array of fine directors used him.

Likewise, Virginia Mayo is a solid pro, and this role allows her more opportunity than merely being decorative. Her character work is most convincing.

Taking what could have been a routine script, Walsh turns it into a picture that, once one starts watching, one cannot stop till the end. It moves, surprises and stimulates.

Some directors just have it, and Walsh is clearly strutting his stuff in "Colorado Territory."

Not typical, but exceptional. Director Raoul Walsh presents all that you look for in a western. An outlaw(Joel McCrea)has two things on his mind after getting out of jail. One is another railroad heist and the second is romancing "bad" girl Virginia Mayo. Fast moving action with great images of Colorado Territory. Super supporting cast includes: Dorothy Malone, James Mitchell, Henry Hull and John Archer. One of the best of the genre.

This is as superb western by a director who knows his stuff. Raoul Walsh hasn't received the credit he deserves and this film is all but forgotten. It doesn't have any big stars or overacting, agreed, and perhaps people are looking for Oscar material rather than a great film. It's their loss. The film covers much territory (no pun intended) but certainly not too much and the many surprises work quite well. The characters' motives unravel as the film progresses, the way they should work. There aren't any easy answers here and the clichés are nowhere to be found, unlike so many by-the-numbers westerns. This is an action film from the beginning and keeps things going until the very end. It should be much better known.

Curtis Stotlar

HIGH SIERRA was an exceptional Bogart film and it helped to make him a bonafied star. However, like Hollywood tended to do in the 30s and 40s, they remade this film less than a decade later! However, considering how good HIGH SIERRA was, Colorado TERRITORY can't help but come up a bit short even if it is still a good film.

Joel McCrea gets the unenviable task of repeating Bogie's role, though in this case the film is set in the Old West. The plot is basically the same and everyone associated with the film did a fine job--but I still am asking why bother remaking such a good film? It's worth seeing, but unless you are a huge Western or McCrea fan, it's skip-able.

By the way, in an unusual move, director Raoul Walsh was at the helm of the original AND this re-make.

Outlaw Wes McQueen (Joel McCrea) gets sprung from a Missouri jail on the day before he is to be transported to Leavenworth by his old gang who need him for a big train robbery somewhere out in the Colorado Territory. The characters couldn't be more different. McCrae plays the part of an outlaw struggling with his own moral scruples while his partners Duke (James Mitchell) and Reno (John Archer) compete to see who the meanest one is. The presence of Virginia Mayo in this group doesn't make a lot of sense, but her part increases as the film moves along. One of the film's best plot lines is the jealousy that comes to the surface of Reno's character as Mayo's Colorado Carson is clearly taken with the cool McQueen played by McCrae. On the other side of the law is a ruthless and relentless US Marshall played by Morris Ankrum who leads an impressively sized posse out to catch up with and either shoot or hang McQueen. The film zeroes in on treachery and deceit at every opportunity. Dorothy Malone's character is especially memorable.

Colorado Territory is directed by Raoul Walsh and adapted to screenplay by Edmund H. North and John Twist from the novel "High Sierra" written by W.R. Burnett. It stars Joel McCrea, Virginia Mayo, Dorothy Malone and Henry Hull. Music is by David Buttolph and cinematography by Sidney Hickox.

Raoul Walsh remakes his own High Sierra from 1941 but supplants it into a Western genre setting - with tremendous results.

McCrea plays outlaw Wes McQueen who springs from prison and vows to go straight, but with a price on his head he is coerced into one last railroad robbery. If he can escape the law then he can make a go of it as a new man, with a new name, and comforted by a new found love of a good woman, Colorado Carson (Mayo). Can he escape the law and those who would sell him out for money?

A remake of a classic film noir, Colorado Territory is itself classic film noir. Whilst not reaching the dizzying star heights of Bogart's 41 version, this is a film of great strengths. Thematically it's noir gold dust, the great Walsh not pandering to anyone and ensuring the dark edges of Burnett's novel play out on screen - including the shattering finale.

The photography is grade "A", both in chiaroscuro textures and sumptuous location framings. Cast can't be faulted either, McCrea a genuine horseman is firmly at home in a Western setting, Mayo and Malone positively light and sex up the screen, while classy performer Hull lends weighty support.

High end Western staples are adhered to, with robbery actions, fights, stunts, villainous betrayals and back stabbers, these marry up to the noirish cement of a man unable to escape his fate, his past weighing heavy on his shoulders, all ensuring there's constantly a doom laden feel permeating the story.

Rarely mentioned when talk turns to film noir Westerns, but it should be since it's one of the best. 9/10

Eight years on and Raoul Walsh has returned to 'High Sierra' with a screenplay by John Twist and stark noirish cinematography by Sid Hickox that suits the Western milieu ideally. The bleak, craggy landscape is an active participant in the plot and the final shoot out is impressively staged.

Joel McCrae stars as an outlaw whilst Dorothy Malone is a milquetoast and Virginia Mayo is untamed. Miss Mayo really shines here and as always steps up a gear for this director. Underrated and understated McCrea is inspired casting as he would seem to be cast against type. One never catches him acting and many fine directors have made excellent use of what one critic described as his 'determined simplicity'.

Walsh's reworking of his own High Sierra into western format works in every conceivable way. In the reweaving, he has created a western noir more lyrical and more resonant than his original gangster noir. The background is used magnificently, both in terms of the landscape and in terms of the native cultures. Morris Ankrum, best known as a judge in myriad Perry Mason episodes and a General in several science fiction cult classics, is a revelation as the Marshal hunting antihero McCrea down relentlessly. At first he seems easy to outwit, but turns out to be much more formidable. Henry Hull, Ian Wolfe, Jim Mitchell, John Archer, also give excellent supporting performances. But it is half-breed Virginia Mayo, tough as nails but as loyal a woman warrior as ever walked the Earth, who steals the film's acting honor's from her excellent co-star.

In 1871, notorious outlaw Joel McCrea (as Wesley "Wes" McQueen) breaks out of jail with a hacksaw, and heads for the western "Colorado Territory" where he hopes to go straight. Along the way, Mr. McCrea (now calling himself "Chet Rogers") defends a stagecoach from some even nastier outlaws. Thus, he becomes a hero saving fellow passenger Henry Hull (as Fred Winslow) and his shapely dark-haired daughter, Dorothy Malone (as Julie Ann). McCrae and Ms. Malone look romantically inclined, but she is promised to another. Then, McCrea makes the decision to join fellow thieves John Archer (as Reno Blake) and James Mitchell (as Duke Harris) in one last heist…

If you think the last train robbery for McCrea goes without a hitch, you'd be wrong.

First thing McCrea finds problematic is pretty "half-breed" Virginia Mayo (as Colorado Carson), who hangs out with the gang. McCrea orders Ms. Mayo back to El Paso, but she refuses to budge. Mayo hikes up her skirt, whenever possible, to show off her legs - she also wears her blouse pulled down over one shoulder, so it always looks like it's going to slip down and expose her bosom. It never does, but McCrea falls in love. "Colorado Territory" is an great-looking picture, with beautiful black-and-white photography by Sid Hickox. In this westernized version of "High Sierra" (1941), director Raoul Walsh corralling the cast and crew through a rollicking train robbery and aftermath.

****** Colorado Territory (6/11/49) Raoul Walsh ~ Joel McCrea, Virginia Mayo, Dorothy Malone, James Mitchell

Who could have been a better choice for doing a western re-make of High Sierra than the original director of High Sierra, Raoul Walsh. He pretty well followed the plot line of High Sierra and had every character in there, but the dog who was an alleged jinx.

It could have been a better film and the trouble is with the miscasting of Joel McCrea. McCrea in my opinion was the solidest of western heroes, at his best when he's playing straight as an arrow good guys. Wes McQueen is not a straightforward good guy at all here and McCrea just can't get a handle on the character. You want to see McCrea at his heroic best, look at stuff like Union Pacific, Four Faces West, or The Virginian to name a few. I think Randolph Scott or Dick Powell would have been better casting here.

That being said it's not a bad film, but it could have been better. The women here are Virginia Mayo and Dorothy Malone playing the parts that Ida Lupino and Joan Leslie did in High Sierra. Mayo is the tough as nails broad in this just like Lupino. Malone's character is far from the innocent that Joan Leslie portrayed. It was another rung up the ladder for Malone to that Oscar she got for Written on the Wind.

The rest of the cast is populated with such veterans as Henry Hull, Basil Ruysdael, Harry Woods, Monte Blue, John Archer, and James Mitchell, stalwarts one and all. Frank Puglia plays a Franciscan Friar who winds up the real "winner" in this film.

The ending is different than High Sierra and I think Walsh took some inspiration from Duel in the Sun. I won't say more.

Joel McCrea stars as the outlaw Wes McQueen who makes one last train robbery in Raoul Walsh's exceptional and sprawling Western remake of his own "High Sierra." As many commentators have pointed out, "Colorado Territory" is a major improvement over "High Sierra", a better-than-average Bogart vehicle marred by John Huston' tepidly moralizing screenplay. Walsh's breathtaking use of the landscape (especially toward the end) in "Colorado Territory" makes it more fascinating and exciting work. Walsh's heroes are often characterized by adventure. McCrea's Wes McQueen recalls such Walsh protagonists as Eddie Bartlett, George Custer, Gentleman Jim, Capt. Nelson, and Jeb Rand. They have a way of going too far. They are really existentialist heroes. Walsh's depiction of McQueen and his loyal bad girl's (Virginia Mayo) final descent into self-destruction is truly grim and pessimistic. Although "Colorado Territory" is devoid of the psychoanalytic verve of Walsh's "Pursued"(arguably his greatest Western), it is nonetheless a brilliant and memorable film that needs more following and appreciation.

In Colorado Territory (CT), Joel McCrea is a good bad man who intends to reform after participating in one last holdup job. He is helped by good bad girl Virginia Mayo in this endeavor. Along the way, he meets Dorothy Malone and her father, Henry Hull. Malone in particular is more than she seems to be. All of this takes place in a bleak and almost noir-like desolate exterior setting. Familiar faces like John Archer and Frank Puglia appear and enliven the proceedings. The ending of this tale is quite exciting and memorable.

CT is part of a small yet significant genre that includes other remakes of earlier successful films which were helmed by the same director who gave us the original movies. Why would such a director want to remake one of his prior movies? Generally, it might be from any of the following motives: (1) the original film was a silent one, which he felt could be enhanced by the use of sound; (2) the original film was made in black and white, which he felt could be enhanced by the use of color and/or (3) the director has reconsidered the original story, and believed that he could now tell it in a different and perhaps better way. Raoul Walsh himself was involved in a totally different remake situation.that is analogous to his High Sierra/Colorado Territory matter being discussed here. He also remade his The Strawberry Blond (1941) into One Sunday Afternoon (1948). Many of our most famous film directors have similarly remade one or more of their own hit movies including William Wyler, Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, George Marshall. Frank Capra and Cecil B. De Mille-----the latter of whom remade The Ten Commandments once-----and actually directed three different cinematic versions of The Squaw Man as well!

Invariably the question comes up as to whether the remake is valid in its own right apart from satisfying some important personal or ego need of the director. A few observations: Joel McCrea's being cast against type in the leading male role in CT was probably more grounded in reality than Humphrey Bogart's spent old man performance in High Sierra. Also, there would seem to be no real dispute that Dorothy Malone's more age-appropriate and complex character in CT is a better fit for the role than Joan Leslie's somewhat pallid effort in High Sierra. Ida Lupino does a fine job as Bogart's loyal and self-sacrificing girl friend in High Sierra------but Virginia Mayo (in one of her greatest film portrayals) creates a much stronger part and commands our attention throughout CT. The dramatic black and white photography in both films was exceptional, and each offered a supporting cast that greatly enhanced the story. Walsh's direction in CT may have been somewhat sharper than his earlier effort in High Sierra------but the latter film has the advantage of its novelty in casting Bogart in an unusual (for him) part, and the stark and exciting use of location shooting to enhance the movie's overall sense of reality.

In the end, both versions can legitimately stand on their own merits and it is interesting to compare and contrast them with each other. If you are familiar with and a fan of High Sierra, you might feel that CT is unnecessary and even superfluous. But there are pleasures in seeing CT that are unique and not to be found in High Sierra. Watching McCrea play a (somewhat) bad man is really a special experience, and Mayo's showing what she could do in a similar multi-faceted role makes us long for more. Walsh had every reason to be proud of having directed both films.

Everything about this film has been said elsewhere here except for this film's tip-top HORSE ACTION. Few men in Golden Age Hollywood could sit a horse like Joel McCrea. I've been at the racetrack all my life and I've seen the best riders---Joel McCrea was right up there with the best of them. At a full gallop,, he's stock-still, one with his horse, an ice-man. Joel McCrea has the coolest horse, a chestnut with a nice blaze on his nose. The way he handles this horse is a tell---this was J.M.'s own personal horse, for sure. You don't get horse action this fine out of some crap nag from some corral somewhere. Director Raoul Walsh was a master at staging/photographing top-quality horse action, a real delight and revelation for horse fans. Consider this scene towards the end, one of many in this classic: J.M. is at a full-out gallop coming straight at the camera, when J.M. brings the horse to a sharp halt while AT THE SAME TIME getting the horse to do a half-pivot, stopping with the horse's left side---in perfect profile---at just the right amount of horse visible in the shot, as if the horse hit PREDETERMINED marks. This horse is then perfectly still, doesn't even move his head a little bit. You don't get that level of performance out of a horse you just met for the first time this morning: It takes THOUSANDS of hours of working together with a horse to achieve what J.M. does with this horse. And J.M. and his ultra-cool horse have real Old School star quality---they make it look easy. These "actors" today (hawk-*ptoo*) when they make what passes for westerns, they sit a horse like scared little boys. These modern-day "westerns" come unglued when it comes to horse action. If you are fed up, give yourself a break and stream you some JOEL McCREA and see what REAL horsemanship is all about.

Bank robber Wes McQueen (Joel McCrea), awaiting transportation to a penitentiary, breaks out of jail in Missouri and rides off to the far west to meet up with his boss (Basil Ruysdael), who has another crime planned. But there's no honour among thieves, and the gang that has been put together for the job is as much a danger to its success as is any lawman.

An entertaining western, "Colorado Territory" has a more complex plot than many of its genre, with changing loyalties and more than a few betrayals. As McQueen states in a good turn of phrase, there is "so much double-dealing from this deck, it's dog-eared." The film does not have an unusually long running time (94 minutes) but puts a lot of story into that hour and a half.

"Colorado Territory" is more than a little reminiscent of a film noir, which should come as no surprise as this is a re-make of "High Sierra" (1941), also directed by Walsh. The choice of setting - the American west of 1871 - is a good one, however, and the script does more than simply drop the plot into an earlier century; it is, for the most part, tailored for the world of cowboys and outlaws.

There is a problem with the script in that it contains words and phrases - slang, mostly - that just don't ring true to the era. The robbers use the word 'heist', which, even if it had been used in that time-period, nonetheless comes off as too characteristic of the 1940s and later. In fact, here, 'heist' means 'to raise' - men are told to "heist 'em" (put their hands up) - while 'hoist' is supposedly bandit-jargon for a robbery. A former Pinkerton detective is referred to as a 'gumboots', the equivalent of 'gumshoe' that I found far too early a usage.

This element aside, there is little to complain about in the film. Nothing looks like it was filmed on a stage, and some interesting locations are used, such as an abandoned Spanish settlement, the ruins of which become the outlaws' hide-out, and an old Indian Pueblo, high on a cliff.

The characters are more than normally deep for a western; the genre often gives the protagonist a past, but a simple, one-incident past that defines his present. Here McQueen's past is entangled with his new acquaintance of a settler's daughter (Dorothy Malone), while his future may involve another woman (Virginia Mayo) with a strong personality of her own. The other actors are all very capable, notably Henry Hull (who was in High Sierra, as well), James Mitchell and John Archer (father of actress Anne Archer).

The direction is very good, as might be expected from the man behind the camera on "White Heat" and "They Drive By Night". The action includes run-away stage-coaches, train robberies and shoot-outs, but also leans heavily on tension and revelation in conversations.

While its film noir origins are plain enough, "Colorado Territory" also makes a credible and creditable western, with McCrea on the wrong side of the law for once. Well-written, well-directed and well-acted, it is well worth a look.

Scathing Dialog that evokes Film-Noir (as does the Story), solid Performances by the entire Cast, Excellent and slightly askew Locations and Settings, Gunplay and Violence that doesn't Pull Punches, a Hard-Boiled tone with an Ending that is Downbeat and foreshadows the Cynical Mann, Boetticher Fifties Standouts in the Genre.

Yes, the Story is a Remake of High Sierra (1941) also done by Director Raoul Walsh, but this is every bit as Powerful in its Western Setting, and in some respects even more so. Virginia Mayo melts the Screen with Her Beauty and stands by Her Man with as much Heart and Dedication that befits the Noir Anti-Heroine, and thankfully there is no Dog this time.

The Script is loaded with many Quotables. Speaking of a Cemetery, the always intense but likable Joel McCrea reminisces..."It was the prettiest bone orchard you ever seen, looked over by stone Angels." There are many others. A slightly overlooked Film that is as Good as the Genre gets and is one of those that should attract Movie Buffs not usually enamored by Westerns.

Interestingly, Joel McCrea has been in two of the very best Westerns ever made...neither of which have the reputation of the big ones we all know. Colorado Territory & Ride The High Country are both films every fan of the genre should see.

In Colorado Territory, Virginia Mayo definitely takes the cake for the best babe ever in a Western. She's brave, fiercely loyal & can shoot straight. What more could we want?

The script is superior, with some very witty dialog among the gang of crooks and the action scenes are more believable than most. It's worth going out of your way to see.

W.R. Burnett's book "High Sierra", filmed in 1941 with Humphrey Bogart as a jewel thief, gets a rousing (and uncredited) western reworking here, with the main character's vocation changed to train robber. In 1871 Missouri, a criminal set for execution breaks out of prison and holes up in the valley with two of his cronies, where they plot another railroad heist. Director Raoul Walsh (who also helmed "High Sierra" for Warner Bros.) gets superlative usage out of the dusty, craggy locations, with cinematographer Sid Hickox capturing the mountain terrain and cloudy skies in gorgeously expressive black-and-white. Joel McCrea is surprisingly comfortable playing the semi-bad guy (though definitely one with a heart of mush...and a yen for marriage!), however some of the supporting characters are a bit of a stretch. Virgina Mayo (she of the glassy-eyed stare) does what she can in the insane role of an ex-dance hall girl, Dorothy Malone is completely lost in the underwritten part of a well digger's daughter who wants a better life, and John Archer and James Mitchell are two cardboard villains. The picture gets by on the strength of its considerable technical merits and by McCrea's performance; with his easy gait and benign personality, McCrea is likable even when he's shooting down the law (he's shrewd and sturdy, a good man to have around). However, the writing is overheated, and the nutty finale provokes unintended laughs. Story filmed yet again by recycle-happy Warner Bros. in 1955, entitled "I Died a Thousand Times". **1/2 from ****

Wild west baddie Wes McQueen consents to participate in just one more heist before reforming and settling down, but is double-crossed by his partners, and prospective girlfriend.

Why Raoul Walsh thought he could go one better on his 1941 masterpiece 'High Sierra' is beyond me, and 'Colorado Territory' is a pretty poor Western remake of a great action movie, none too subtly disguised and most of the time just going through the motions. It has none of the original movie's vividness or whirling virtuosity.

McCrea does well in a part that would become second nature to him through the 1950s, but all in all the movie is a huge disappointment for fans of Raoul Walsh.