Backtrack!
Tags: murder

Plot synopsis:
Troubled psychotherapist Peter Bowers suffers from nightmares and eerie visions ever since the death of his daughter Evie in a street accident a year earlier, which he blames himself for after he was briefly distracted by something in a store window and failed to notice her veer off the sidewalk. His wife Carol suffers extreme depression and rarely gets out of bed while he works in his practice, meeting some clients referred to him by his mentor, Duncan. One client, Felix, apparently suffers from anterograde amnesia, believing that it is still the 80s; another, Erica, talks of her suicidal thoughts, but finds herself unable to commit suicide; and another, Elizabeth Valentine, is a girl who is apparently mute and who reacts with fear to the sound of the train passing by Peter's office, and before she flees, she writes a series of numbers on one of Peter's notepads: 12787.
Elizabeth returns unexpectedly, and Peter finds her looking out of his window to where the train will pass. Again, she is disturbed by the sound of it and begins to choke; she hits the window, leaving a handprint. Peter records her, but she disappears before he can speak to her further. He plays the recording to Duncan, who claims he hears nothing and believes that Peter is hallucinating Elizabeth out of guilt from failing to prevent his daughter's death, pointing out that her initials sound like Evie's name. Later, Peter hallucinates Elizabeth saying that "we have her" before turning into Evie and then vanishing, and later, he has a nightmare about Erica, who says she wasn't able to commit suicide because she's already dead. Doing research, Peter discovers that Elizabeth died in 1987, along with all over the other clients who had been seeing him. The numbers that Elizabeth wrote on his notepad was a date: July 12, 1987. Perplexed, he calls Duncan and asks to speak with him later, and then has a vision of his deceased patients on the train outside of his window.
Duncan comes over, and Peter worries about his sanity and questions how Duncan could have referred the patients when all of them have been deceased for decades. He then notices that Duncan doesn't appear in a mirror, and he, too, is a ghost. Now fully disturbed, Peter uses a map to discover that all the deceased patients lived along a train line leading to his hometown, False Creek. He travels there alone and meets with his father, William, a retired cop. Going to the bar, Peter meets with a childhood friend, Barry, and tells him that there is a weight on his conscience that he wants lifted. Barry alludes to a horrifying event that happened in their youth that they promised to keep a secret, and tells Peter to leave him out of any confession.
When the two were teenagers, Barry led Peter to a secret location that his brother mentioned, where couples would apparently have sex in their cars. The two left their bikes at the side of the train tracks and went to go spy on a couple in a car. Peter panics when he hears a train whistle, and he raced to move their bikes; in the process, he saw what he thought was Barry, running ahead of him. However, neither got there in time, and the train was violently derailed, killing 47 of the passengers on board. Peter saw several of the victims, all of whom would be his deceased future clients. He is then terrorized by the ghosts of Evie, Felix, and Elizabeth.
The next morning, Barry drives to the train tracks, and Peter goes to the police station. There, he meets Barbara, a constable, and confesses the incident to her. She tells him that he will likely face no charges, as it was an accident that happened when he was a teenager, and the statute of limitations has expired. Peter also discovers that she was the daughter of Erica. He apologizes, and Barbara tells him that her mother was the only local killed in the accident, and that William was kind to her at the funeral, inspiring her to become a police officer.
Barbara investigates the accident while Peter tries and fails to burn his newspaper clipping of the accident. He is drawn to a closet, where the ghost of Elizabeth briefly strangles him. Duncan then appears, telling him that there was no way that bicycles lying against the tracks would have derailed the train, and that there was more to the accident. He also urges Peter to remember exactly what distracted him on the day of Evie's death. Peter recalls looking into a toy shop window at a railroad set, specifically, a model of a switch tower. The next morning, he investigates the switch tower beside the tracks and finds Barry, who has committed suicide, inside. When the police arrive, Peter confesses to Barbara that Barry was there the night of the accident, but he intentionally left him out of the confession. Later, he tells her about his hallucinations since Evie's death. When she does not believe him, he tells her details about Erica that he wouldn't otherwise know. Rattled, she orders him to leave.
A police officer finds an old and encrusted pin lying on the floor of the switch house and gives it to Barbara, who discovers that it's the insignia of Elizabeth's high school. As Peter once more returns to the scene of the accident, she pays a visit to William and tells him that during her investigation, she has discovered that the road he apparently drove to get to the aftermath of the crash was blocked off, and he would have only been able to drive there if his car had already been near the tracks. Furthermore, Elizabeth was the only victim with a cause of death that the coroners deemed inconclusive. Meanwhile, Peter sees Elizabeth's ghost once more, and, taking the same path he did as the night of the accident, he realizes that it was not Barry he saw running ahead of him, but Elizabeth. Going up to the switch house, he suddenly remembers all of the night: he looked through the windows of the house to see his father strangling Elizabeth. In her struggle to survive, she left a handprint on the window (the same one he saw earlier), and she also accidentally pulled the levers of the train tracks, leading it to derail and kill the passengers. Afterwards, William placed her body at the scene of the crash.
Barbara asserts to William that she knows Elizabeth was not a victim of the crash, and she believes that Peter saw something that night that William wanted covered up. William knocks her unconscious and puts her in the trunk of his car. Peter returns and tells William that he knows the truth: the couple that Peter and Barry saw in the car was really William raping Elizabeth, and he saw William kill her; he asks William if Elizabeth was his only victim. William pulls a gun on him and tells him to get in the garage. Inside, Peter hears Barbara regain consciousness, and after a brief struggle, William knocks him unconscious as well.
The next morning, William drives out with both Peter and Barbara restrained in the car. A gun is on the passenger seat. However, the ghost of Elizabeth appears in the road and in the car, startling William and making him lose control of the car. In the process, Peter is thrown out of the backseat of the car and ends up a safe distance away, with the gun. William ends up on the train tracks, the engine dead and the doors locked as a train begins to approach. He tries and fails to escape and yells to Peter for help. Peter attempts to shoot out a window so William can escape, but only succeeds when the train is extremely close. The trunk opens and Barbara manages to climb out, and Peter pushes her off the tracks to safety. William, held back by Elizabeth's ghost, is crushed by the train. As Peter and Barbara stand on the side of the tracks, Peter can see the ghosts of the victims on the train, and sees a tranquil Elizabeth turn and depart.
Later, Peter is on the beach with the ghost of Evie, who gets up and walks into the ocean, finally moving on and at peace. His wife joins him and asks what he's thinking about; Peter tells her that he's thinking about kids. Carol smiles, and they embrace.

Review: delightful combination of "Laredo" and "The Virginian". This movie combines the characters from my favorite TV Western series, "Laredo", with the characters from another excellent 1960s TV Western series, "The Virginian". If you are a fan of either, but especially of "Laredo", check this movie out. In my opinion, the best part of the movie is the relationship between the three Texas Rangers, who are fast friends but also give each other a good deal of grief.. Amusing Western adventure in which Trampas/Doug McClure joins three Texas Rangers on a risked assignment into Mexico.. They Lived, Loved, and Battled Across the Face of Texas .This Backtrack introduces us to the Trampas character from "The Virginian" as well as the trio of Texas Rangers from "Laredo." This shoot'em up film deals with Medicine Bow, Wyoming-born , cowpoke Trampas (Doug McClure) wants to make some quick money and joins up a ranch called ¨Shilo¨ run by foreman Ramdod (James Drury) . Then the cowhand is sent to Mexico to buy a bull for his employer. The ranch foreman warns him to watch out for himself in Laredo, a tough town on the Texas/Mexican border. Trampas arranges to get himself engaged to fight three separate Texas Rangers (Neville Brand , Peter Brown , William Smith ) . As 3 Rangers have been sent by their Texas Ranger Capt. Edward A. Parmalee (Philip Carey) to investigate a train that was robbed and everyone aboard killed, except for one infant covered by his mother's body.
The quartet go across the Rio Grande to the nearest town, where they meet a cantina owner Mama Dolores (Ida Lupino) with innumerable children . After that , Trampas leads a posse against the marauding Yaqui Indians . Things go wrong when Trampas must take a hard decission . Gunfighting Was Their Business . The plot is plain and simple , it concerns about Trampas who is sent by his employer to Mexico to buy a bull but in Laredo he unwillingly joins three Texas Rangers on a perilous mission into Mexico. It is added by a particular version of the Dumas classic, "The Three Musketeers". In the film appears some usual roles in Virginian series such as Doug McClure as Trampas , James Drury ,Gary Clarke , Randy Boone , L.Q Jones , but isn't Lee J Cobb as Judge Henry Garth . The Virginian is set in the Shiloh Ranch in Wyoming Territory of the 1890s is owned in sequence by Judge Garth, the Grainger brothers, and Colonel MacKenzie. It is the setting for a variety of stories, many more based on character and relationships than the usual western. The first 12 minutes is season 2 episode 1 of The Virginian 'Ride a Dark Trail'.From the scene where Trampas, Belden and Randy ride into Shiloh ranch it is season 3 episode 30 'We've Lost a Train' . Being a crossover between The Virginian and Laredo series to forge a feature-length, 95-minute, Technicolor Western . Laredo being formed by 56 episodes during 1965-1967 , it stars Neville Brand as Reese Bennett , Peter Brown as Chad Cooper , William Smith as Joe Riley and Philip Carey as captain . Laredo series is formed Rustlers, bank robbers, and their own wild schemes: a band of Texas Rangers keeps getting in and out of trouble, under the jaundiced eye of Captain Parmalee. Backtrack is starred by 
Doug McClure who runs into the three Rangers--who turn out to be partners--, Doug gives a sympathetic acting as the famous Wyoming cowhand and gambler Trampas . He is accompanied by a large and prestigious support cast such as Ida Lupino , Rhonda Fleming , Fernando Lamas , Royal Dano , George Savalas , L.Q Jones , among others The Virginian is based on the 1902 classic novel by Owen Lister about a ranch-hand defeating the local bad guys .There are several adaptation about this novel : First silent retelling The Virginian 1914 by Cecil B DeMille with Dustin Farnum , Jack Johnston . Classic early talkie 1929 by Victor Fleming with Gary Cooper , Walter Huston , Mary Brian , Richard Arlen . 1962 popular TV series mostly directed by Earl Bellamy with James Drury , Doug McClure , Lee J Cobb , John McIntire , Stewart Granger . TV rendition with Bill Pullman , John Savage , Harris Yulin , Colm Feore , Diane Lane . 2014 by Thomas McKowsky with Trace Adkins , Steve Bacic, Victoria Pratt.The motion picture was well directed by Earl Bellamy . He was a good professional who served in the US Navy's photographic unit in the WWII and directed more than 1600 episodes of television and catastrophe films such as : Fire! and Flood! and a sequel titled Walking tall II . Rating : acceptable and entertaining .. Dumas's "Three Musketeers" Go West in this synthesis of "Laredo" and "The Virginian". "Toughest Gun in Tombstone" director Earl Bellamy's "Backtrack" synthesizes episodes from the NBC-TV series "The Virginian" and "Laredo" to forge a feature-length, 95-minute, Technicolor shoot'em up that introduces us to the Trampas character from "The Virginian" as well as the trio of Texas Rangers from "Laredo." In fact, Borden Chase's teleplay for the last episode of season three "We've Lost A Train" (21 April 1965) served as the pilot for "Laredo." Universal Studios later went back in and tweaked the Texas Ranger protagonists, but this cobbled together movie from the television series will give some viewers their first look at Reese Bennett (Neville Brand of "D.O.A."), Chad Cooper (Peter Brown of "The Lawman"), and Joe Riley (William Smith of "Red Dawn") along with their superior, Captain Edward A. Parmalee (Phil Carey). I saw this movie first when it came out in 1969 at the Columbus Air Force Base Theatre in Columbus, Mississippi, but all Universal Studios did was recycle elements of both shows. Indeed, you can tell that everything has been cobbled together because the first time that we meet Reese, Chad, and Joe they round up whiskey peddlers in a scene from the first season "Laredo" episode "Three's Company." The tip-off is that our heroes are dressed as they appeared later in "Laredo," while in "The Virginian" episode they are dressed like generic cowboys with the same hats. Ironically, Universal released "Backtrack" after they had released another compilation "Laredo" movie "Three Guns for Texas" the previous year."Backtrack" affords us our first glimpse of Trampas before he became the beloved cowhand on "The Virginian." Indeed, actor Doug McClure's Trampas is a far cry from the cinematic interpretations of the Owen Wister villain. Trampas has been made over into an amiable but roguish fellow. He spends time inside and outside of jails for his gambling habits and necessity compels him to go to work for Shiloh Ranch. The Virginian (James Drury) hires him and then later gives him an assignment to cross the Rio Grande and pick up a prize bull for Judge Garth (Lee J. Cobb who isn't in the movie) from Don Alvarez (Alberto Morin) in Mexico. Everything goes well enough until Trampas arrives in Laredo where he comes between jealous Reese Bennett and his girlfriend. During a saloon brawl, Trampas gets in Reese's way when Reese's spoken-for girl, dancehall gal Carmelita Flanagan (Rhoda Fleming of "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral") wraps her arms around Trampas and keeps him between Reese and her. Later, she steals Trampas' gun so that green-eyed Reese cannot slap leather with him. Afterward, Trampas runs afoul of Chad who is also one of Reese's rivals for the beautiful red-haired dancer. Finally, he crosses trails with Joe, but Captain Parmalee preempts a showdown. Parmalee dispatches the Rangers pronto find a lost train. Essentially, all Borden Chase has done is recycle Dumas' classic French adventure novel "The Three Musketeers" so that Trampas becomes the D'Artagnan and the King Louis' flamboyant swordsmen become three Texas Rangers.Trampas rides along with Reese, Chad, and Joe. They find the train, with everybody dead on it except for a baby, and a fortune in gold missing. The baby needs food so our heroes cross the border to visit Mama Dolores (Ida Lupino of "High Sierra"), and they run afoul of a corrupt Mexican Rurale, Captain Estrada (hammy Fernando Lamas), who doesn't want them in Texas. Our heroes find the gun runners, spike their repeating rifles, and then the Yaquis capture them. Estrada is only to happy to oblige our heroes when they ask for a military style firing squad, knowing full well that the spiked rifles will wipe out the firing squad. Trampas gets his bull and delivers it safely back to Wyoming.Neither the camaraderie nor the characters of Reese, Chad, and Joe is developed to the extent that both would be later in "Laredo." In fact, Reese is rather pugnacious, and Chad and Joe aren't as congenial. They are dressed in dark clothing like villains. For example, Joe doesn't wear his casual Native American outfit that accentuated his mesomorphic physique. The way that Reese dresses himself in a black vest, dark shirt, and bandana knotted at the throat makes him look more intimidating than friendly. Chad doesn't carry his six-gun backwards with the handle forward on his left hip. Captain Parmalee is still the stern, imposing authority figure who interprets everything that these three Rangers accomplish with considerable skepticism. Nevertheless, "Backtrack" is superficial, lightweight fun.