Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971)

one of my absolute favorites!

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Why was Support Your Local Gunfighter filmed most of the time at night? I could not even get into the movie with all the darkness, in addition to the craziness of Suzanne Pleshette shooting and screaming. Was the producer trying to save money on having no daylight background? I was looking forward to the western sets and scenery. Instead, all I got was dark, darker and darkest background at night. This was one of the worst westerns I have ever seen...not funny and not enjoyable.

A follow-up rather than a sequel to "Support Your Local Sheriff", this rollicking Western comedy shares the same director and some of the same cast, but works as a self-contained story. James Garner is at his most charming as Latigo Smith, a rascally con artist in the Old West who's currently trying to escape Goldie (Marie Windsor), the woman he just married. He gets off a train in the small time mining town of Purgatory, where he makes friends with amiable old cowhand Jug May (Jack Elam). He learns that two local bigwigs, Taylor Barton (Harry Morgan) and Colonel Ames (John Dehner), are at war over mining interests, and that Ames has hired a notorious gunslinger named 'Swifty' Morgan. Sensing the opportunity for a con, and a hefty payday, Latigo tries to palm off Jug as Swifty. Then, inevitably, the real Swifty turns up.I wouldn't be honest if I said that I laughed all that much at this movie (scripted by James Edward Grant, and directed by Burt Kennedy, both Western veterans). But it's just so lively, memorably performed, and incredibly LOUD (with explosions aplenty) that it's far from boring. Garner does have tremendous fun with his role, as Latigo attempts to remove an embarrassing tattoo from his chest and continuously has a weakness for the number 23. Elam delivers one of his most likable performances of all time. The cast is simply stacked with familiar faces; among them are Joan Blondell, Henry Jones, Dub Taylor, Kathleen Freeman, Dick Curtis, Willis Bouchey, Walter Burke, Gene Evans, Grady Sutton, and Ellen Corby. (You won't hear who plays the real Swifty from me; it's a special treat.) Everybody plays this material for all that they're worth. Sometimes they don't so much speak their dialogue as yell it. The only real drawback is the lovely Suzanne Pleshettes' love interest character Patience; this is a ridiculous woman who overreacts a LOT. Ms. Pleshette herself is fine; it's just the character as written that is a problem.Things get off to a bright start and remain fun right up through the final monologue by Jug that reveals the fates of key players. People will howl in appreciation at his final line.Seven out of 10.

Latigo Smith (James Garner) is a ladies man, a gambler and a con man. He escapes from brothel madam Goldie who intends to marry him and sneaks off the train at the mining town of Purgatory. He befriends Jug May (Jack Elam) and asks the doc to remove his Goldie tattoo. Taylor Barton (Harry Morgan) and his family mistakenly assume him to be gunslinger Swifty Morgan hired by rival mine owner Col. Ames. Taylor's impetuous daughter Patience "The Sidewinder" (Suzanne Pleshette) is quick to shoot and eager to go to a college back east. Smith comes up with a scheme to pass Jug off as Swifty but it all comes to bite him.This is a follow up to 'Support Your Local Sheriff!' but is not actually a sequel. Many of the same actors return in different roles in a different story. It's funny. James Garner is a great fun cad and I love Jack Elam. This one improves by getting Suzanne Pleshette who is a much funnier actress than Joan Hackett. This is simply a fun franchise that is anchored by the great Garner.

Well, a B for effort. It tries hard. Everyone except Garner overplays it in this rip off of "Yojimbo" or "For a Fistful of Dollars." (Take your pick.) Garner is a con man who rides into the town of Purgatory. Two sides are in battle over the contents of a gold mine and they mistake him for the manager of a hired gunslinger. He bilks both sides, meanwhile romancing Suzanne Pleshette.Garner is smooth and transparently phony. He smirks a good deal. But every other character seems to dash about, shout at one another, and shoot guns wildly. The mistaken assumption is that frenzy -- even pointless frenzy -- is in itself funny. The film itself disproves the theorem.For instance, if anyone can find anything amusing about a bar room brawl that breaks out for no reason at all, please let me know so I can send you a personal check for sixteen cents that will bounce. We've all seen a thousand such brawls, with men being pushed through windows, hit over the back with balsam wood chairs, looking cross-eyed when punched, and the bartender is frantically trying to save the mirror. They've been used to far greater comic effect in "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and even the unsuccessful "Donovan's Reef." And for dramatic effect nothing equals the fist fight in "Shane." This one could have been written, directed, and edited by a Magic 8 Ball.It was directed by Burt Kennedy, who developed some subtle and witty dialog in the movies he wrote for Randolph Scott in the 1950s. "Ma'am, if you was my woman I'd of come for you, even if I'd of died in the doin' of it." It's almost folk poetry. But, as a director, there's not much he can do with this script, whose funniest dialog runs along the lines of, "Madam, unhinge your jaw and DEPART!"