I remember going to the local cinema to see this film – The Maverick Queen. I often get this film mixed up with another Barbara Stanwyck film a couple of years earlier ‘Cattle Queen of Montana’ with Ronald Reagan for RKO Pictures

Directed by Joe Kane
Starring Barbara Stanwyck, Barry Sullivan, Scott Brady, Mary Murphy, Wallace Ford, Howard Petrie, Jim Davis, John Doucette

The Maverick Queen (1956) paired Barbara Stanwyck and Barry Sullivan a year before Sam Fuller’s Forty Guns. For Republic, this was a pretty lavish picture — color, widescreen and location work in Silverton, Colorado.

”The Maverick Queen introduces Republic’s wide screen process, called Naturama.

Republic reportedly spent two years developing this anamorphic system. (Its projection aspect ratio of 2.35 to 1 is somewhat narrower than that of CinemaScope). Thus equipped, the film has plenty of room to show, in colour, and the wide open spaces of Colorado, where it was made.

It’s ironic that since its original release, Naturama has not been seen at it’s best but that’s about to change. It’s coming to Blu-Ray — from a 4K scan of the original camera negative.

Director Joe Kane: “The studio was scraping the bottom of the barrel to get a big moneymaker and they finally let me have colour and Naturama and Barbara Stanwyck… It was a real pleasure to work with a grand trouper like Barbara Stanwyck. She’d do anything.

Other films in Naturama

Other films in Naturama – not that well remembered though

Other films in Naturama

Other films in Naturama

Films in Naturama