Rogue River (1951)
Director:
John Rawlins
Writer:
Louis Lantz
Stars:
Rory Calhoun, Peter Graves, Frank Fenton
Rogue River stars Rory Calhoun as Ownie Rodgers, the nephew of crooked Oregon police chief Joe Dandridge (Frank Fenton). A $70,000 windfall, bequeathed to Dandridge by a man he'd once framed on a bank robbery charge, unleashes innumerable family skeletons. Ownie is obliged to solve the long-ago bank job himself, and in so doing he discovers that his "faithful" girl friend Judy (Ellye Marshall) was in on the scheme. The last-minute return of Dandridge's estranged son Pete (Peter Graves) leads to an ending that cannot truly be described as happy. More talky than most westerns of the era, Rogue River still contains much to please the eye, especially when one is lucky enough to see an original Cinecolor print.