Yuma (1971)

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Aaron Spelling produced this made-for-television western that gets awfully plotty for a seventy-three minute film, playing like a failed series pilot.

Clint Walker is U.S. Marshal Dave Harmon, who wanders into Yuma, Arizona Territory in time to kill one of the brothers of a local bigwig rancher, and takes another brother to jail where he meets homeless kid Andres (Miguel Alejandro goes from "cute" to "aneurysm-inducing annoyance" quickly), who sleeps at the jailhouse. Two men kill the remaining brother, pinning the murder on Harmon. Harmon visits the local Army fort, and rankles the chains of the commander. The bigwig hears of his brothers' deaths, and rides back to town in time to get his chains rankled as well. The local Native population, who get short-changed by the Army on their beef, also get rankled in the chains area. With all these chains getting rankled, Harmon still has time to woo the local hotel owner before an unlikely climactic showdown.

There is a subplot involving the death of Harmon's family at the hands of Army raiders, and I think this would have been the force behind the series, had it been picked up. Instead, the film ends abruptly, and I kept waiting for scenes from next week's exciting episode. Because of the fade-outs for nonexistent commercial breaks, the pacing is off and its story jumps in fits. Walker is handsome, rugged, and has a voice deeper than a well. The rest of the cast is full of television actors you have probably seen before. Much of the action is lame, and the violence is tepid. The first brother killed gets a shotgun blast mid-torso, and falls without a scratch on him.

If you dislike westerns, then you will dislike "Yuma." If you like westerns, then you will still dislike "Yuma." I cannot recommend it.

Stats:
(1971) 73 min. (* *) out of five stars
-Directed by Ted Post
-Written by Charles A. Wallace
-Cast: Clint Walker, Barry Sullivan, Edgar Buchanan, Kathryn Hays, Peter Mark Richman, Morgan Woodward, Miguel Alejandro, John Kerr, Robert Phillips, Bing Russell, Bruce Glover, Rudy Diaz, Bill McLean
(PG)