The Man from Bitter Ridge is a 1955 American Western film directed by Jack Arnold and starring Lex Barker, Mara Corday and Stephen McNally.
Plot
A special investigator, Jeff Carr (Lex Barker), is deployed to the cattle town of Tomahawk to collect evidence on a number of stagecoach holdups and killings. The town’s leading banker-politician Ranse Jackman (John Dehner) and his gunslinging brothers resent Carr’s inquiries, and blame the robberies on the upland sheepherders, led by Alec Black (Stephen McNally). Carr quickly discovers that Jackman and his henchman are the actual culprits, but a romantic conflict arises when Carr falls in love with shepherdess Holly Kenton (Mara Corday), the woman who Alec Black is also courting.
Carr and Black ultimately join forces, killing Ranse Jackman and his brothers in a climactic gunfight. Jeff and Holly make plans to marry.
Cast
Lex Barker as Jeff Carr
Mara Corday as Holly Kenton
Stephen McNally as Alec Black
John Dehner as Rance Jackman
Trevor Bardette as Sheriff Dunham
Ray Teal as Shep Bascom
Warren Stevens as Linc Jackman
Myron Healey as Clem Jackman
John Harmon as Norman Roberts
John Cliff as Wolf Landers
Richard Garland as Jace Gordon
Production
Filmmaker Jack Arnold on directing Lex Barker:
Film critic Dana M. Reemes reports “without doubt, The Man From Bitter Ridge is one of Lex Barker’s best performances.”
Critical assessment
Describing The Man From Bitter Ridge as “a superb example of its genre and period,” biographer and film critic Dana M. Reemes notes actor Mara Corday’s merits:
Reemes adds that “a fuller disclosure of Miss Corday’s charms may be found in the October 1958 issue of Playboy magazine.”
See also
List of American films of 1955
References
Sources
Reemes, Dana M. 1988. Directed by Jack Arnold. McFarland & Company, Jefferson, North Carolina 1988.