Underplayed Gems

The Last Challenge (1967)

The Last Challenge poster
Directed by
Richard Thorpe
Genre
Western film
Country
United States
Runtime
1h 36m
Rated
NR
Rating
6.3 of 10 from 30 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb
The 3D catalogue: film cases on wooden shelves, with the cat sitting at the counter next to its greeting.

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The film shelves have a room of their own that you can walk around in. The cat behind the counter is the AI Catbot, and they pick real films from the same catalogue when you tell them what you feel like watching. Nothing is for sale, here or in there. Go in from here and this film is already out on the counter, with more like it waiting on the shelf next to it.

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How it feels

A town sheriff must deal with his reputation as the fastest gun in the West. An adapted western about a lawman facing challenges to his status.

tenseslow-burnstylizedmelancholicgrittysparseself-reflectivebrooding

What happens

The Last Challenge is a 1967 American Western in Panavision, produced and directed by Richard Thorpe (marking his final film). The film starred Glenn Ford and Angie Dickinson and centered around a town sheriff contending with his reputation as the "fastest gun in the West". It is also known under the titles of Pistolero and The Pistolero of Red River. The Last Challenge was adapted from Pistolero's Progress, a novel by John Sherry (John Olden Sherry) and published by Pocket Books in 1966. It is widely and falsely reported that the screenplay for The Last Challenge was written by Albert Maltz, the blacklisted writer. The confusion is due to Maltz' use of the pseudonym John B. Sherry. Peter Ford in his biography of his father Glenn Ford: A Life noted, "Oddly the picture Dad made after The Last Challenge, called Day of the Evil Gun, was directed by Jerry Thorpe, Richard's son. This must be the only case in film history where the same star made back-to-back movies directed first by a father and then by his son." (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

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