Star in the Dust ** (1956, John Agar, Mamie Van Doren, Richard Boone, Coleen Gray, Leif Erickson, James Gleason) – Classic Movie Review 10,106

Director Charles F Haas’s 1956 Western film Star in the Dust stars John Agar as Sheriff Bill Jorden, who finds a bunch of trouble when he is about to supervise the hanging of no-good killer called Sam Hall (Richard Boone), who has gunned down some young cattlemen. Farmers are out to lynch the killer and cattlemen seek to help him escape, while he plans to escape with his girl Nellie Mason (Coleen Gray).

Star in the Dust is one of producer Albert Zugsmith’s undistinguished B-movies at Universal International Pictures studios, greatly enlivened by an above-par cast (especially Richard Boone in his usual impeccable display of villainy) and John L Russell’s Technicolor cinematography. There is also an early glimpse of Clint Eastwood, who appears, uncredited, as ranch hand Tom.

Otherwise, with too much talk and too little action – and it is poorly staged when it comes – there is little to recommend it, even for diehard Western fans. But then again, there is cast, colour and Clint to recommend it.

Also in the cast are Mamie Van Doren as Ellen Ballard, Coleen Gray, Leif Erickson as George Ballard, James Gleason, Randy Stuart, Terry Gilkyson (The Music Man), Paul Fix, Harry Morgan, Stuart Randall, Robert Osterloh, Stanley Andrews, John Daheim, Stafford Repp, Lewis Martin, Renny McEvoy, Jess Kirkpatrick, James Parnell and Anthony Jochim.

Oscar Brodney’s screenplay is based on the novel Law Man by Lee Leighton.

The film is scored by Frank Skinner for an acoustic guitar.

See also A Day of Fury (1956), Ambush at Cimarron Pass (1958), with Clint Eastwood, The Proud Ones (1956) and Bullet for a Badman (1964).

Zugsmith outwitted Jack Kerouac by copyrighting the term The Beat Generation, which he used as the title of his exploitation film The Beat Generation (1959). He is also known for Welles’s masterly Touch of Evil (1958), Sappho Darling (1968), The Cult (1971) and Evils of Chinatown (1962), starring Vincent Price.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,106

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