Main Cast: Audie Murphy, Faith Domergue, Stephen McNally, Susan Cabot, Gerald Mohr
Release Year: 1952
Country: US
Run Time: 77 minutes
Plot
A group of vicious claim-jumpers is killing the miners in a Western settlement. Their latest victim is Cromwell (Harry Harvey), who is shot to death at his mine just after his son Luke (Audie Murphy) leaves for town. Luke has three passions in life -- poker, guns, and the silver ornamentation he likes -- and is better known to most people as the Silver Kid; he kills one of the claim-jumpers but can't catch the rest. The marshal of Silver Creek, "Lightning Tyrone" (Stephen McNally), is also trying to cope with the claim-jumpers, and he has a problem of his own, thanks to a well-placed bullet in his shoulder -- he can still draw faster than almost anyone, but he can't pull the trigger like he used to, and he doesn't know how long he can bluff some of the tougher citizens he's been riding herd on, especially a fellow named Johnny Sombrero (Eugene Iglesias), who's been itching to draw on him. These two cross paths and the Silver Kid ends up as Lightning's deputy, just in time to become suspicious of newcomers Opal Lacy (Faith Domergue) and her brother Rod (Gerald Mohr), who are in the mining business. Lighting's attraction to Opal and the Kid's distrust of her could just cost him the services of a deputy who is, literally, his good right arm. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Review
Don Siegel was still a journeyman director at the time he made The Duel at Silver Creek at Universal. Most of the studio's B-Westerns of this period looked as though the cast directed themselves, and their scripts were filled with so many clicheé that they're almost a joke to watch today. Siegel did better with this film than most, adding the occasional unexpected close-up, treating the chase scenes with unusual energy, and focusing in on the violence of the story -- including the shooting of a key female character -- in ways that anticipate his treatment of more conventional crime subjects, such as The Lineup and The Killers. The result is the most unconventional of these assembly-line Universal oaters. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Alexander Golitzen - Art Director, Bernard Herzbrun - Art Director, Bill Thomas - Costume Designer, Don Siegel - Director, Russell Schoengarth - Editor, Hans Salter - Composer (Music Score), Herman Stein - Composer (Music Score), Joseph E. Gershenson - Musical Direction/Supervision, Bud Westmore - Makeup, Irving Glassberg - Cinematographer, Leonard Goldstein - Producer, Russell A. Gausman - Set Designer, Joe Kish - Set Designer, Leslie I. Carey - Sound/Sound Designer, Corson Jowett - Sound/Sound Designer, Gerald Drayson Adams - Screenwriter, Joseph Hoffman - Screenwriter
