The Died With Their Boots On? Santa Fe Trail? Dodge City? No. Rocky Mountain is Errol Flynn's best western.
A huge surprise. Shot in B&W after the Technicolor Montana, Rocky Mountain was a low-budget film on the Warner Brother 1950 slate. It's been said that the lead was originally supposed to go to Ronald Reagan, but Warners took it away from Reagan because it was still pissed at him for the disastrous That Hagen Girl flop. This would explain why Flynn did two westerns back-to-back, and followed up a big Technicolor big budget film with a B&W low budget, almost western film noir movie.
A surprisingly complex and well written story line, and a very unusual role for Flynn. There is no Errol female love interest. The female lead, Patrice Wymore, plays the fiance of his nemesis, Scott Forbes (ironic, since Flynn and Wymore later married). This was the first movie role for Slim Pickens and Sheb Wooley, staple actors in westerns for years to come. The cast included several seasoned horseback riders, including Flynn, and the horsemanship is one of the big attractions of the movie. The ending is unexpected, and not a typical happy ending you'd expect from the standard 1950s matinee western genre.
A really underrated film, this was one of Errol's best. Definitely looking a little older, it fit well with his character, a war-weary Confederate Army officer. Flynn gives an outstanding, understated performance, a big change from the campiness of some of his earlier westerns. Flynn was allowed to be an actor, and not just a matinee idol. This was Flynn's last western - he went out of the genre on a definite high note.
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