3 Bad Men **** (1926, George O’Brien, Olive Borden, Lou Tellegen) – Classic Movie Review 7465

Director John Ford’s 1926 Western 3 Bad Men is an enduring, great Ford silent movie, in which the star trio of outlaw gunslingers turn kindly to help a girl whose father has been killed by horse thieves and then go on to play match-maker for her.

‘Bull’ Stanley (Tom Santschi), Mike Costigan (J Farrell MacDonald) and ‘Spade’ Allen (Frank Campeau) save Lee Carlton (Olive Borden) from the murderous criminals and decide that she needs to get married and select lonesome cowboy Dan O’Malley (George O’Brien) to be her husband.

Lou Tellegen plays the the corrupt Sheriff Layne Hunter, whose right-hand man Nat Lucas (Jay Hunt) murders Bull’s sister Millie Stanley (Priscilla Bonner).

Shot by George Schneiderman, Three Bad Men is good to look at and a typical Ford brew of sentimentality, knockabout and fisticuffs. It helps that there is good historical background of the 1876 Dakota land rush.

The screenplay by John Ford, John Stone (adaptation), Ralph Spence (titles) and Malcolm Stuart Boylan (titles) is based on Herman Whitaker’s novel Over the Border (or at least suggested by it).

The cast are George O’Brien as Dan O’Malley, Olive Borden as Lee Carlton, Lou Tellegen as Sheriff Layne Hunter, Tom Santschi as ‘Bull’ Stanley, J Farrell MacDonald as Mike Costigan, Frank Campeau as ‘Spade’ Allen, Priscilla Bonner as Millie Stanley, Otis Harlan as editor Zach Little, Phyllis Haver as prairie beauty Lily, Georgie Harris as Joe Minsk, Alec B Francis as the Rev Calvin Benson, Jay Hunt as old prospector Nat Lucas, Grace Gordon as Millie’s pal, George Irving as General Neville, Bud Osborne as Hunter’s henchman, Vester Pegg as Henchman shooting Lucas, and Walter Perry as Pat Monahan.

It is available with the 1928 John Ford film Hangman’s House on Region 1 DVD [US import].

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7465

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