Wagon Tracks
Not your typical western, this is a tale of the wagon trains that rolled west through scorching deserts and hostile Indian territory. It's got a twist: there's a murderer in this wagon train, and it's up to expedition leader William S. Hart to find him!There's a great sequence here in which Hart coerces a confession from the killer. Think of the climactic scenes of "Greed", add a dash of frontier justice, and you'll get the idea. And the movie only builds from there... the wagon train hasn't even met the Indians yet!This is just the kind of film that made Hart the leading western hero of the World War I era. Here he's rugged and tough, and there's barely a trace of the weepily over-sensitive persona that would diminish later films like "Wild Bill Hickok." Practically all of "Wagon Tracks" takes place on location, giving it a gruelingly authentic feel never found in your typical horse opera. Organ score by Bob Vaughn.Supplemental material: It's the very first king of the cinematic western, G.M. "Broncho Billy" Anderson, in "Naked Hands" (1918). The film was actually produced by Essanay in late 1915 as "Humanity," but was held back from release. Anderson took it with him when he left the company, and released it himself a couple of years later. Eventually, the feature-length "Humanity" was condensed into this two-reel version called "Naked Hands." Anderson again stars as Broncho Billy (more or less), a gold prospector who strikes it rich but loses his wife to another man. When she dies, and that man is responsible, Billy vows to take the guy apart with his naked hands... and does exactly that, in a surprisingly vicious fight scene!