Young Fury ** (1965, Rory Calhoun, Virginia Mayo, William Bendix, Lon Chaney Jr, Richard Arlen, John Agar) – Classic Movie Review 14,012

The 1965 American Western film Young Fury is the third of the A C Lyles Westerns for Paramount Pictures, and stars Rory Calhoun, Virginia Mayo, William Bendix, Lon Chaney Jr, Richard Arlen and John Agar.

Director Christian Nyby’s 1965 American Technicolor and Techniscope Western double feature film Young Fury is the third of the A C Lyles Productions Westerns for release by Paramount Pictures, and stars Rory Calhoun, Virginia Mayo, William Bendix, Lon Chaney Jr, Richard Arlen and John Agar.

Young Fury is okay enough, but with a soapy Western pulp fiction story, and too much talk and too little action. So basically a good old-time cast is battling a moderate script and a modest production, though actors, writer and producer are extremely competent and professional. Preston Pierce gets way too much screen time as Tige McCoy, the teenage son of gunslinger Clint McCoy (Rory Calhoun), who hates his father for deserting him and his mother when he was an infant. Virginia Mayo doesn’t have a particularly good time either as Sara McCoy, Clint’s unfaithful wife whose infidelity made him leave town years ago. Sara is now running the local saloon.

Clint McCoy should perhaps not have bothered returning to his old hometown and instead simply moved on. However, there is some action to liven proceedings. John Agar plays Dawson, whose gang are on Clint’s trail. Tige leads a teenage mob of young thugs, the Hellion gang (Jesse Wayne, Bob Miles, Eddie Hice, Fred Krone, Joe Finnegan, Kent Hays).

It runs 80 minutes, is written by Steve Fisher, shot by Haskell B Boggs, and scored by Paul Dunlap.

Sadly, it is William Bendix’s final film, as he died on December 14, 1964, aged 58, two months before the film’s release in February 1965.

Christian Nyby’s claim to fame is directing The Thing from Another World (1951), his first movie.

The cast are Rory Calhoun as Clint McCoy, Virginia Mayo as Sara McCoy, William Bendix as Joe the Blacksmith, Lon Chaney Jr as Ace the Bartender, Richard Arlen as Sheriff Jenkins, John Agar as Dawson, Preston Pierce as Tige McCoy, Linda Foster as Sally Miller, Robert Biheller as Biff Dane, Jody McCrea as Stone, Merry Anders as Alice, Marc Cavell as Pancho, Jerry Summers as Gabbo.

Rory Calhoun was supposed to star in the first A C Lyles Productions Westerns for release by Paramount Pictures, Law of the Lawless (1964), but got ill the night before filming started and Dale Robertson stepped in at six hours’ notice.

It is followed by Black Spurs (1965).

© Derek Winnert 2026 – Classic Movie Review 14,012

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