After breaking out of the death cell, four cruel outlaws (among them Vic Morrow and Lee Van Cleef) descend upon the sleepy little town of Paradise. Shooting the marshall and four other men and then robbing the local bank, they ride out of town, taking a young woman hostage with them.
With his dying breath, the marshall deputizes his friend Banner Cole (Audie Murphy), a loner who has lost faith in people. Though Banner would really prefer to track the outlaws himself, he puts together a posse of seven men.
The hodgepodge of a posse includes Jeremiah Brown (Robert Keith), who, based on his Civil War career, thinks he ought to be in charge and, thus, often bucks Banner's authority; the kidnapped girl's weak-willed, drunken uncle (Royal Dano); a local Indian (Rudolph Acosta), looking for acceptance by the townspeople; and city slicker, Seymour Kern (John Saxon), a banker in town on business. Goaded by the local bank president into joining the posse, his manhood grows while on the trail of the killers. For once, he feels like a man at a man's game.
The men's relentless search for the outlaws first leads them to the woman hostage (Zohra Lampert), left---raped and abandoned---on the trail. Although her despair over the treatment she received at the hands of the outlaws has left her with little desire to live, she warns Banner that the gang is vicious and that with a posse of his size, he won't be able to stop them. More determined than ever, however, Cole spurs his posse onward. Little by little, the posse grows smaller, as men are either killed or desert. In the end, two men remain. Which two and how it all plays out is the balance of the film.
Posse from Hell is a very solid 3-star film for me...3.5 stars really. On my rating scale, it falls somewhere between "like it" and "really like it." It's interesting and exciting and even sports a couple very touching moments. There's terrific character development, particularly in Audie's and John Saxon's characters. Both men bring their characters to life beautifully, and it is interesting watching them change. Zohra Lampert, as the kidnapped/raped young woman, is fantastic!
This film is not on the TCM schedule anytime soon; nor, to my knowledge, is it out on DVD. It is, however, available in its entirety on YouTube. I think it is definitely worth watching.
Happy viewing!!
NOTE: All photos in this post were obtained through the Audie L. Murphy Memorial Website (HERE).
