Reprisal! *** (1956, Guy Madison, Felicia Farr, Kathryn Grant, Michael Pate, Edward Platt) – Classic Movie Review 11,437

‘A HANGING TREE AT ONE END OF TOWN… and a wanton girl in jeopardy at the other.’

Director George Sherman’s strong and sterling 1956 Columbia Pictures Technicolor Western film Reprisal! is based on the novel by Arthur Gordon and stars Guy Madison, Felicia Farr and Kathryn Grant.

Guy Madison as half-Indian Neola but posing as white in order to own land as new ranch owner Frank Madden, but racial clashes in town force him to choose sides.

An all-white jury finds the three white Shipley brothers (Michael Pate as Bert Shipley, Edward Platt as Neil Shipley, Wayne Mallory as Tom Shipley) who lynched three Native Americans innocent. Frank is accused and put in jailed when the brother of one of the victims kills a Shipley, and the other two organise a lynch mob and head for the jail.

The villains want to see him dead: ‘You’re in trouble, mister… right up to your neck!’ But a woman comes to his rescue: ‘He couldn’t have done it – he was with me last night –all night!’

Arthur Gordon’s novel is set in Georgia rather than Oklahoma and takes place during a much later period, the post-World War Two South and the lynching is of an African-American not a Native American as in the film.

It is the first film from Guy Madison’s Romson Productions

Wayne Mallory, who plays Tom Shipley, was Guy Madison’s brother.

Columbia Pictures’ executives added the exclamation point to the film’s title to make it sound more exciting.

It runs 74 minutes.

The cast are Guy Madison as Frank Madden aka Neola, Felicia Farr as Catherine Cantrell, Kathryn Grant as Taini, Michael Pate as Bert Shipley, Edward Platt as Neil Shipley, Otto Hulett as Sheriff Jim Dixon, Wayne Mallory as Tom Shipley, Robert Burton as Jeb Cantrell, Ralph Moody as Matara, Addison Richards as Judge, Frank DeKova as Charlie Washackle, Buddy Roosevelt as Juror, Ethan Laidlaw as Juror, Kermit Maynard as Lyncher, Fred Aldrich as Lyncher, Malcolm Atterbury as Luther Creel, John Zaremba as Mr Willard, Stuart Holmes as Trial Spectator, and Herman Hack as Blacksmith.

The sets are designed by Walter Holscher.

Felicia Farr was born Olive Dines on 4 October 1932. She had earlier appeared (as Randy Farr) in Big House, USA (1955). She got herself into Westerns at the start of her career. Her earliest screen appearances include three Westerns directed by Delmer Daves: Jubal (1956),The Last Wagon (1956), and 3:10 to Yuma (1957).

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 11,437

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