Just purchased and watched The Snorkel – actually bought  it with Spanish sub titles – but it was an English version. Very good too with Peter Van Eyck as the sinister murderer and Mandy Miller as his stepdaughter who suspects he has murdered her Mother who he had married and before that her Father a few years before.

Also in the cast was Betta St.John playing Candy’s governess – More about her in a later post.

Quite an ingenious plot

The Snorkel (1958)

On holiday from a British boarding school, Candy Brown (Mandy Miller) visits her mother and stepfather at their villa in a Italian coastal town. To her shock, Candy learns that her mother has committed suicide by sealing herself in a room and turning on the gas. Candy immediately suspects foul play, but the police inspector insists that’s impossible: the servants found Candy’s mother in a locked room completely sealed from the inside. The young woman remains unconvinced. She believes the murderer is her stepfather Paul (Peter Van Eyck). As a girl, Candy claimed that she saw Paul drown her father. No one believed Candy then and no one believes her now, not even her companion, Jean (Betta St. John). It appears that Paul has a perfect alibi. And besides, as the inspector pointed out, how could murder be committed inside a locked room?

Peter Van Eyck Above

 Mandy Miller was very believable as Candy. Peter van Eyck was sometimes downright creepy.

The Snorkel may not be the best movie produced by Hammer Films, but it’s a good film

The film had its premier aboard the luxury liner Queen Elizabeth, during a crossing of the Atlantic in May 1958

Paul Decker murders his wife in her Italian villa by drugging her milk and asphyxiating her by gas. He cleverly locks the bedroom from the inside and hides inside a trapdoor in the floor until after the body is discovered by servants. He uses a scuba snorkel connected to tubes on the outside to breathe during the ordeal. Decker’s stepdaughter Candy suspects him immediately, especially since no suicide note was found. She also is convinced that he murdered her father years before, but her accusations fall on deaf ears. The ruthless Decker even poisons the family spaniel when the pet takes too great an interest in the mask and realizes he will ultimately have to get rid of Candy too.

 William Franklyn pictured above also featured in the film. He had a long career in both films and television where he was a familiar face – one thing he is remembered for is the Schweppes advertisements which he was in for a long time.

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There is a very exciting swimming sequence in the film – which looked like ending in disaster for Candy but for the intervention of Betta St John who swims out to the two of them and effectively saves Mandy Miller.

I has read that Peter Van Eyck commented after the film was done that the Producers when casting his role had not asked him if he could swim. Luckily he could because, as he said, there was quite a bit to do in this sequence – mind you they could have used a double I reckon. Mandy Miller also swam just as much as he did – maybe more – as in this shot below :

It is

This film I remember was shown in the local village hall where I live sometime in the mid fifties. We had at that time a full film programme every Tuesday evening and we loved it – and the films we saw there as youngsters were memorable to say the least. This was one of those – a film about the Battle of Britain with terrific sequences filmed at Kenley Airfield in Kent – over which the famous battle was fought. One scene from the film – which was on BBC TV in England today Saturday 7 th. January 2017 – showed the RAF fighters scrambled and then we saw maybe seven Spitfires / Hurricanes taxiing out to the runway – a scene that could not be done today – and then even better, as Dulcie Gray  walked beside the airfield the fighters took off two at a time in a spectacular sequence that would be more impressive today than when the film was released I reckon because people would still remember it well from only 7 or 8 years earlier and also they would not be looking at it with the same nostalgic eyes that we would today.

Above: Spitfires and Hurricanes  over Kent.

There was a cast of stalwart British Actors taking part – many of them would have served in the forces only a few years earlier so knew exactly what it was all about.

Filmed mainly at RAF Kenley and at the real operations block at RAF Uxbridge.

Above: A German Fighter is shot down over Kent.

Based around events at a RAF fighter station in the summer of 1940,  T.B. ‘Septic’ Baird (John Gregson) arrives in a heap by landing his Hurricane on its nose in a garden at the end on the runway.  Captain ‘Tiger’ Small is played by  Jack Hawkins.

This picture was in a Film Book of  1957

Jack Hawkins with his wife and son Nicholas. They have another son Andrew and a daughter.

They live close to the Thames so maybe this is where they are in this shot. Lovely picture though.

She will be remembered for the film Mandy from 1952 in which she starred as the deaf girl – her parents being played by Jack Hawkins and Phyllis Calvert.  I remember in the early days of Television this film was reviewed and discussed a lot on its release – and the focus was on the acting on the very young Mandy Miller.

and a few years later she is famous for  her song Nellie The Elephant.

And below in The Snorkel – a film I have just purchased – is Mandy in a grown up role in this Hammer Film

Paul Decker murders his wife in her Italian villa by drugging her milk and asphyxiating her by gas. He cleverly locks the bedroom from the inside and hides inside a trapdoor in the floor until after the body is discovered by servants. He uses a scuba snorkel connected to tubes on the outside to breathe during the ordeal. Decker’s stepdaughter Candy suspects him immediately, especially since no suicide note was found. She also is convinced that he murdered her father years before, but her accusations fall on deaf ears. The ruthless Decker even poisons the family spaniel when the pet takes too great an interest in the mask and realises he will ultimately have to get rid of Candy too.

Filmed in VistaVision and Technicolor this is lovely to watch at Christmas.

The music of Irving Berlin is at the centre of this pleasant holiday film, and is a perennial favorite of audiences that discover this charming film, or just go back to visit from time to time.

Directed by Michael Curtiz, a versatile Director who seemed at ease with drama as well as comedy, or musicals. He shows a light touch that helps make this a cherished film for movie fans of all ages.

The main reason for watching, besides Mr. Berlin’s wonderful tunes, is hearing those standard songs delivered by the likes of Bing Crosby and Rosemary Clooney, who were at the top of their game at this time. They had such wonderful and melodious voices, they enhance the songs they interpret.

The story is just a pretext to bring together the talented principals plus Danny Kaye, Vera Ellen, Dean Jagger, and the marvellous Mary Wickes, in a film that will delight anyone, anytime, but especially at Christmas.

Incredibly, the three actors who played the Bailey children have remained firm friends since the film was released in 1946. Karolyn Grimes, Carol Coombs and Jimmy Hawkins recently reunited for an interview to mark the movie’s milestone. Carol, who played Janie, beamed: “We’ve had a wonderful life – we’re three really good friends. “Young kids who grew up to really admire each other and love each other. It’s true friendship.”Karolyn added: “We’re like brother and sister in many ways.”The actress, who played Zuzu, also revealed that the Christmas classic was never actually meant to be a Christmas film at all.

Facts About ‘It’s a Wonderful Life

Mary Owen wasn’t welcomed into the world until more than a decade after Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life made its premiere in 1946, 70 years ago this month. But she grew up cherishing the film and getting the inside scoop on its making from its star, Donna Reed—who just so happens to be her mom. Though Reed passed away in 1986, Owen has stood as one of the film’s most dedicated historians, regularly introducing screenings of the ultimate holiday classic, including during its annual run at New York City’s IFC Center. She shared some of her mom’s memories with us to help reveal 25 things you might not have known about It’s a Wonderful Life for the 70th anniversary of its premiere.

1. IT ALL BEGAN WITH A CHRISTMAS CARD.

After years of unsuccessfully trying to shop his short story, The Greatest Gift, to publishers, Philip Van Doren Stern decided to give the gift of words to his closest friends for the holidays when he printed up 200 copies of the story and sent them out as a 21-page Christmas card. David Hempstead, a producer at RKO Pictures, ended up getting a hold of it, and purchased the movie rights for $10,000.

2. CARY GRANT WAS SET TO STAR IN THE ADAPTATION.

When RKO purchased the rights, they did so with the plan of having Cary Grant in the lead. But, as happens so often in Hollywood, the project went through some ups and downs in the development process. In 1945, after a number of rewrites, RKO sold the movie rights to Frank Capra, who quickly recruited Jimmy Stewart to play George Bailey.

3. DOROTHY PARKER WORKED ON THE SCRIPT.

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By the time It’s a Wonderful Life made it into theaters, the story was much different from Stern’s original tale. That’s because more than a half-dozen people contributed to the screenplay, including some of the most acclaimed writers of the time—Dorothy Parker, Dalton Trumbo, Marc Connelly, and Clifford Odets among them.

4. SCREENWRITERS FRANCES GOODRICH AND ALBERT HACKETT WALKED OUT.

Though they’re credited as the film’s screenwriters with Capra, the husband and wife writing duo were not pleased with the treatment they received from Capra. “Frank Capra could be condescending,” Hackett said in an interview, “and you just didn’t address Frances as ‘my dear woman.’ When we were pretty far along in the script but not done, our agent called and said, ‘Capra wants to know how soon you’ll be finished.’ Frances said, ‘We’re finished right now.’ We put our pens down and never went back to it.”

5. CAPRA DIDN’T DO THE BEST JOB OF SELLING THE FILM TO STEWART.

After laying out the plot line of the film for Stewart in a meeting, Capra realized that, “This really doesn’t sound so good, does it?” Stewart recalled in an interview. Stewart’s reply? “Frank: If you want me to be in a picture about a guy that wants to kill himself and an angel comes down named Clarence who can’t swim and I save him, when do we start?”

6. IT WAS DONNA REED’S FIRST STARRING ROLE.

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Though Donna Reed was hardly a newcomer when It’s a Wonderful Life rolled around, having appeared in nearly 20 projects previously, the film did mark her first starring role. It’s difficult to imagine anyone else in the role today, but Reed had some serious competition from Jean Arthur. “[Frank Capra] had seen mom in They Were Expendable and liked her,” Mary Owen says. “When Capra met my mother at MGM, he knew she’d be just right for Mary Bailey.”

7. BEULAH BONDI WAS A PRO AT PLAYING STEWART’S MOM.

Beulah Bondi, who plays Mrs. Bailey, didn’t need a lot of rehearsal to play Jimmy Stewart’s mom. She had done it three times previously—in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Of Human Hearts, and Vivacious Lady—and once later on The Jimmy Stewart Show: The Identity Crisis.

8. CAPRA, REED, AND STEWART HAVE ALL CALLED IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE THEIR FAVORITE MOVIE.

Though it has become a quintessential American classic, It’s a Wonderful Life was not an immediate hit with audiences. In fact, it put Capra $525,000 in the hole, which left him scrambling to finance his production company’s next picture, State of the Union.

9. A COPYRIGHT LAPSE AIDED THE FILM’S POPULARITY.

Though it didn’t make much of a dent at the box office, It’s a Wonderful Life found a whole new life on television—particularly when its copyright lapsed in 1974, making it available royalty-free to anyone who wanted to show it for the next 20 years. (Which would explain why it was on television all the time during the holiday season.) The free-for-all ended in 1994.

10. THE ROCK THAT BROKE THE WINDOW OF THE GRANVILLE HOUSE WAS ALL REAL.

Though Capra had a stuntman at the ready in order to shoot out the window of the Granville House in a scene that required Donna Reed to throw a rock through it, it was all a waste of money. “Mom threw the rock herself that broke the window in the Granville House,” Owen says. “On the first try.”

11. IT TOOK TWO MONTHS TO BUILD BEDFORD FALLS.

Shot on a budget of $3.7 million (which was a lot by mid-1940s standards), Bedford Falls—which covered a full four acres of RKO’s Encino Ranch—was one of the most elaborate movie sets ever built up to that time, with 75 stores and buildings, 20 fully-grown oak trees, factories, residential areas, and a 300-yard-long Main Street.

12. SENECA FALLS, NEW YORK IS “THE REAL BEDFORD FALLS.”

Though Bedford Falls is a fictitious place, the town of Seneca Falls, New York swears that it’s the real-life inspiration for George Bailey’s charming hometown. And each year they program a full lineup of holiday-themed events to put locals (and yuletide visitors) into the holiday spirit.

13. THE GYM FLOOR-TURNED-SWIMMING POOL WAS REAL.

Though the bulk of the film was filmed on pre-built sets, the dance at the gym was filmed on location at Beverly Hills High School. And the retractable floor was no set piece. Better known as the Swim Gym, the school is currently in the process of restoring the landmark filming location.

14.  THE TEENAGER BEHIND THAT SWIMMING POOL PRANK.

Though he’s uncredited in the part, if Freddie Othello—the little prankster who pushes the button that opens the pool that swallows George and Mary up—looks familiar, that’s because he is played by Carl Switzer.

15. DONNA REED WON $50 FROM LIONEL BARRYMORE … FOR MILKING A COW.

Though she was a Hollywood icon, Donna Reed—born Donnabelle Mullenger—was a farm girl at heart who came to Los Angeles by way of Denison, Iowa. Lionel Barrymore (a.k.a. Mr. Potter) didn’t believe it. “So he bet $50 that she couldn’t milk a cow,” recalls Owen. “She said it was the easiest $50 she ever made.”

16. THE FILM WAS SHOT DURING A HEAT WAVE.

It may be an iconic Christmas movie, but It’s a Wonderful Life was actually shot in the summer of 1946—in the midst of a heat wave, no less. At one point, Capra had to shut filming down for a day because of the sky-high temperatures—which also explains why Stewart is clearly sweating in key moments of the film.

17. CAPRA ENGINEERED A NEW KIND OF MOVIE SNOW.

Capra—who trained as an engineer—and special effects supervisor Russell Shearman engineered a new type of artificial snow for the film. At the time, painted cornflakes were the most common form of fake snow, but they posed a bit of an audio problem for Capra. So he and Shearman opted to mix foamite (the stuff you find in fire extinguishers) with sugar and water to create a less noisy option.

18. THE MOVIE WASN’T REQUIRED VIEWING IN REED’S HOUSEHOLD.

Though It’s a Wonderful Life is a staple of many family holiday movie marathons, that wasn’t the case in Reed’s home. In fact, Owen herself didn’t see the film until three decades after its release. “I saw it in the late 1970s at the Nuart Theatre in L.A. and loved it,” she says.

19. ZUZU DIDN’T SEE THE FILM UNTIL 1980.

Karolyn Grimes, who played Zuzu in the film, didn’t see the film until 1980. “I never took the time to see the movie,” she told Detroit’s WWJ in 2013. “I never just sat down and watched the film.”

20. THE FBI SAW THE FILM. THEY DIDN’T LIKE IT.

In 1947, the FBI issued a memo noting the film as a potential “Communist infiltration of the motion picture industry,” citing its “rather obvious attempts to discredit bankers by casting Lionel Barrymore as a ‘Scrooge-type’ so that he would be the most hated man in the picture. This, according to these sources, is a common trick used by Communists.”

21. THE MOVIE’S BERT AND ERNIE HAVE NO RELATION TO SESAME STREET.

 

Yes, the cop and cab driver in It’s a Wonderful Life are named Bert and Ernie, respectively. But Jim Henson’s longtime writing partner, Jerry Juhl, insists that it’s by coincidence only that they share their names with Sesame Street’s stripe-shirted buds. “I was the head writer for the Muppets for 36 years and one of the original writers on Sesame Street,” Juhl told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2000. “The rumor about It’s a Wonderful Life has persisted over the years. I was not present at the naming, but I was always positive [the rumor] was incorrect. Despite his many talents, Jim had no memory for details like this. He knew the movie, of course, but would not have remembered the cop and the cab driver. I was not able to confirm this with Jim before he died, but shortly thereafter I spoke to Jon Stone, Sesame Street‘s first producer and head writer and a man largely responsible for the show’s format … He assured me that Ernie and Bert were named one day when he and Jim were studying the prototype puppets. They decided that one of them looked like an Ernie, and the other one looked like a Bert. The movie character names are purely coincidental.”

22. SOME PEOPLE ARE ANXIOUS FOR A SEQUEL.

Well, two people: Producers Allen J. Schwalb and Bob Farnsworth, who announced in 2013 that they would be continuing the story with a sequel, It’s a Wonderful Life: The Rest of the Story, which they planned for a 2015 release. It didn’t take long for Paramount, which owns the copyright, to step in and assure furious fans of the original film that “No project relating to It’s a Wonderful Life can proceed without a license from Paramount. To date, these individuals have not obtained any of the necessary rights, and we would take all appropriate steps to protect those rights.”

23. THE FILM’S ENDURING LEGACY WAS SURPRISING TO CAPRA.

“It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen,” Capra said of the film’s classic status. “The film has a life of its own now and I can look at it like I had nothing to do with it. I’m like a parent whose kid grows up to be president. I’m proud… but it’s the kid who did the work. I didn’t even think of it as a Christmas story when I first ran across it. I just liked the idea.”

This Christmas at the famous Kinema In The Woods in this beautiful Lincolnshire village of Woodhall Spa, is a special showing of the seasonal classic film ‘Its a Wonderful Life’.

Also as we have said before this is the home of The Dam Busters Squadron during the War – and that stylish hotel The Petwood Hotel was the meeting place for the RAF personnel at the time – and also many times afterwards at the many reunions which quite often had Richard Todd as a guest. His connection was of course his playing of Guy Gibson in the film and the fact also that he lived in Lincolnshire for many years – plus he was a real war hero as a paratrooper having taken part in the taking of Pegasus Bridge.

I couldn’t resist including this picture – as a Lancaster Bomber swoops low over the Petwood Hotel at Woodhall Spa in Lincolnshire

Watched this on Television this weekend 4 December 2016 – and took these stills from the film.

Glenn Ford as the reluctant fast gun demonstrates his skill by first shooting holes in three coins when they are tossed in the air – and secondly this scene where he asks (quite forcibly) one of the townspeople to hold his glass of beer out as far as he can – and then on  command drop the glass which he does.

Glenn draws and shoots the glass into pieces – in an impressive way.

This film was a big hit in the mid fifties – Glenn Ford was nearing his peak at this time  – and was soon to make 3-10 to Yuma and The Sheepman having just completed Jubal and Blackboard Jungle.

Stills from the film above

Not a name that is well remembered in film terms – although she had roles throughout the 50s in films mainly associated with her Dad, Arthur Askey.

PERT AND pretty, sweet and very petite, Anthea Askey was the delightful daughter of one of the country’s all-time favourite funny men, Arthur Askey, who might very well have called himself “sweet and petite” if only in jest. The only child of Arthur and his beloved wife, May, both of whom might be described as pocket-sized, Anthea inherited her father’s spirit of comedy and her mother’s good looks. Domesticity and producing grandchildren for her parents deprived her of a fulsome career in television and faithful viewers of a major star.

Anthea Shirley Askey was born in 1933. A few weeks later  Arthur Askey was to make his first BBC radio broadcast in Saturday Night Music Hall. He felt his daughter’s birth brought him luck for within a few years he would become the star of radio’s first regular comedy series, Band Waggon, which would lead him into a string of major comedy films over the next decade.Anthea’s education at a nearby convent was interrupted by the Second World War. The Askey family evacuated themselves to Worthing, then in 1940 to Lytham in Lancashire while Arthur starred at the Blackpool Opera House, then to Portmeirion in Wales, moving to Lake Windermere in 1941, a cottage in Little Milton in 1942, after which Anthea was put into a boarding school at Bletchley.Finally in 1944 the Askeys bought a house in Sussex. Moving in at Christmas they discovered their gardener was augmenting his income by selling their prize vegetables to the local greengrocer. She made her first stage appearance in 1945 at the age of 12. She was attending boarding school on the Isle of Wight at the time. In 1948 the 15-year-old Anthea passed her radio audition and was cast as the lisping Violet Elizabeth Bott in the latest series of sit-coms based on Richmal Crompton’s Just William. Naughty schoolboy William Brown was played by David Spenser, the former newsreader Bruce Belfrage played Mr Brown, while his wife was played by none other than Enid Trevor, wife and straight-woman to comedian Claude Hulbert.By 1949 Anthea Askey was a hardened “pro” and joined her father on stage in his play The Kid from Stratford. Then the Askeys upped and went to Australia, where they starred in The Love Racket. They intended to stay for three months but were such a hit they ended up spending a full year. When she finally returned home Anthea was cast in her first pantomime at Bolton.In 1954 Arthur threw her a star-studded 21st birthday party at the Dorchester Hotel. The 150 guests included his old Band Waggon partner Dickie Murdoch, Norman Wisdom, Bobby Howes and his film-star daughter Sally Ann, and the entire Crazy Gang not forgetting “Monsewer” Eddie Gray. Askey, knowing his daughter’s heart, invited as a surprise guest her secret love, the cinema heart-throb Herbert Lom.The same year Anthea made her cinema debut, backing up father in his starring vehicle The Love Match. This John Baxter production based on Glenn Melvyn’s successful play also featured Thora Hird as her mother, James Kenney, the handsome son of the popular “miserable” comedian Horace Kenney, and a guest star appearance by veteran comedian Robb Wilton in his radio role of Mr Muddlecombe JP.The following year she played her father’s daughter once again in Ramsbottom Rides Again, a comic western about the timid grandson of a tough guy sheriff.

In the cast were the pop star Frankie Vaughan, Sharni Wallis and Sabrina, her father’s busty discovery from his BBC television series.Anthea Askey made her last film in 1959. This was father’s final starring vehicle, Make Mine a Million. He played a television make-up man while she did a guest star walk-on with her television co-star, Dickie Henderson. For by this time she had become one of the new stars of London’s latest television channel, the Independent Commercial Company, Associated-Rediffusion.She began as ever in a production starring her father. This was a serialised version of Love and Kisses, shown in five episodes at the end of 1955 and not much more than a direct full-frontal filming of the Glenn Melvyn stage play currently performing in Blackpool. The programmes were made by Jack Hylton Productions, who would make Arthur Askey’s final cinema films and most of his, and all of Anthea’s, television series. Hylton, once a dance band leader, now an impresario, was the contract comedy producer for ITV and, of course, agent for the Askeys.Next came Before Your Very Eyes (1956), taken over from the BBC and again starring father and daughter, followed by Living it Up (1957), a television version of Askey’s first ever radio series reuniting him with Dickie Murdoch 18 years later, this time they were living (on the programme) in a flat atop not Broadcasting House but Television House. Anthea played herself.In 1957 came the show that would make her a full-blown star at last. Beginning as The Dickie Henderson Show and later retitled The Dickie Henderson Half-hour, the series ran for several years. Dickie, whose first contact with Askey was singing with his sisters, the Henderson Twins, in the stage version of Band Waggon, played husband to Anthea’s wife.  In the later programmes, Anthea’s role was taken over by June Laverick.In 1956 Anthea had married Bill Stewart, her father’s stage manager in Love Match, and now fell pregnant. Unhappily their firstborn died when only three weeks old. Later she was able to present her father with three grandchildren, Jane, Andrew and William.She returned to work in the 1980s and, although she had largely fallen from the public eye over the last decades, she continued to work in pantomime and on radio shows. In 1982 she had good reviews for her role of the Good Witch of the North in the play The Wizard Of Oz, and in 1984 she was, as the Financial Times observed a ‘splendidly articulate cat’ in the Richmond Theatre’s Dick Whittington. 

Tragically Anthea Askey died just a week before she was due to marry Will Fyffe Jnr, the pianist son of the Scottish comedian Will Fyffe.

Will Fyffe Jnr.  had his own musical spot at the keyboards of ocean-going cruise liners, the QE2 among them. He lived mainly in Brighton.

One of his best friends was Anthea Askey,  daughter of the comedy star Arthur, with whom he wrote and performed in a cabaret act as the offspring of two famous entertainers.

With Will Fyffe Junior. she appeared often in a show which drew on memories of both their fathers, and she died at a time when she was to due appear again with him. (They had planned to marry next month.)

Fyffe and Askey, also wrote a stage musical remembering Will Fyffe Sr. Sadly, it failed to catch the attention of today’s showbiz impresarios. Askey Jr and Fyffe Jr were close friends up to her death.

She usually managed to treat her cancer with good-humoured fortitude. She was told recently that a new cancer ‘cure’ had worked on mice. ‘Well,’ she observed, ‘I’m no bigger than a mouse.’ She leaves Will Fyffe Junior; and two sons and a daughter from her first marriage to Bill Stewart.

Anthea Shirley Askey, actress: born London 2 March 1933; married 1956 Bill Stewart (two sons, one daughter, and one son deceased); died Worthing, West Sussex 28 February 1999

This film was on TELEVISION on TCM in the UK yesterday Sunday 20th November 2016 – and it has actually been on a few times as is the case with TCM but I welcome that – it gives you more than one chance to view. The Two male stars are Dan Duryea and Jeff Richards  THE MARAUDERS (1955)

Jeff Richards had appeared as Benjamin in  SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS (1954). For that matter, leading lady Jarma Lewis also had a scene in this famous musical.” She also appeared as one of Frank Sinatra’s girlfriends in THE TENDER TRAP (1955), and she and Richards co-starred in another film, IT’S A DOG’S LIFE (1955).

Richards plays Corey Everett, a desert homesteader whose newly dug well makes his property highly desired by powerful ranch owner John Rutherford (Harry Shannon). Rutherford, his son (John Hudson), and his consumptive bookkeeper Avery (Duryea), along with a bunch of mercenaries headed by the one-armed “Hook” (Keenan Wynn), plan to drive Corey out with guns blazing. Another homesteader (James Anderson), who’s giving up and heading east, stumbles onto Corey’s property, along with his wife Hannah (Lewis) and their son (David Kasday), just as the invaders launch their first skirmish. Although the man initially seems to be a good sort, helping Corey in the fight, it turns out he’s the friendly con man type, and as soon as he can he runs off to Rutherford’s camp to try to strike a deal for safe passage for his family — and is promptly killed for his trouble by the psychotic Avery.

The siege set up is made interesting by the location, which is a small ranch with a water well backed up against a mountain, and the fact that it will ultimately be one man, one woman and one child against a whole gang. As the gang come to be led by Duryea’s clearly unhinged Avery, they find Everett a most resourceful foe. With cunning tactics of war, including the manufacture of a grenade launcher, there’s a fascinating battle between brains and brawn.

Extra bite comes from the respective character dynamics at work in the two camps. In the Everett ranch a turn of events offers up a neat twist that scores high for dramatic impact, while in the Avery camp his General Bastardo/Napolean Complex has the men under his charge thirsting for his blood.
Sawtell provides a dramatic musical score and the Mecca, California locale is well used by Mayer and Marzorati for claustrophobic and sweaty peril purpose. Characterisations are colourful, especially Duryea on overdrive villainy and Wynn as the hook handed second in command who finds himself caught between loyalty and fear.

It’s classic B Western stuff and firmly of interest to fans of such productions.MARAUDERS was directed by Gerald Mayer , nephew of Louis B. Mayer. It was filmed by Harold Marzorati, who had a fairly short career but had a good Stewart Granger Western, GUN GLORY (1957), among his credits.