In this grim western the prologue involving Sammy Ogg is essential in that it keeps our sympathy with hero/protagonist Mark Stevens playing the title role of Jack Slade. Ogg plays a child version of himself and he sees his father just gunned down in cold blood during a stagecoach holdup when he protested the outlaw slapping his young son. Kindly stage driver Harry Shannon takes him in but can't cure him of his anger. Ogg grows up to be Mark Stevens a man with a fast gun and a nasty disposition.
Paul Langton hires Stevens to maintain law and order on the stagecoach line plagued by outlaws. The meanest of them is Barton MacLane who plays one of the nastiest parts I ever saw him in a career filled with nasty villains. Even the love of a good woman Dorothy Malone can't turn Stevens into a settled member of society in the changing west.
Elements of High Noon and Robert Taylor's Billy The Kid are present in the plot of Jack Slade. Stevens who was now reduced to working for Allied Artists from his glory days of starring roles for 20th Century Fox gives one of his best screen performances. Jack Slade is one western definitely not geared to the Saturday matinée kid's crowd.
Paul Langton hires Stevens to maintain law and order on the stagecoach line plagued by outlaws. The meanest of them is Barton MacLane who plays one of the nastiest parts I ever saw him in a career filled with nasty villains. Even the love of a good woman Dorothy Malone can't turn Stevens into a settled member of society in the changing west.
Elements of High Noon and Robert Taylor's Billy The Kid are present in the plot of Jack Slade. Stevens who was now reduced to working for Allied Artists from his glory days of starring roles for 20th Century Fox gives one of his best screen performances. Jack Slade is one western definitely not geared to the Saturday matinée kid's crowd.