Retrospective Review: Buchanan Rides Alone
Randolph Scott is an actor who means what he says, and when he utters the immortal phrase ‘I’ll be back’ — though it’s fair to say it was immortalised by Arnold Schwarzenegger in sci-fi classic, The Terminator (1984), nearly three decades after the release of Buchanan Rides Alone (1958) — those that have wronged the cleaner than clean hero, will be made to pay for their treachery.
Scott plays Texan cowboy Tom Buchanan, who’s robbed and wrongly framed for murder when riding through an archetypal western border town.
Though acquitted by a jury — made up from the local wild bunch — Buchanan finds justice behind the barrel of a gun, with more than one score to settle.
The fourth of seven collaborations between Scott and director Budd Boetticher, Buchanan Rides Alone has a deep sense of morality, in an era where the villains were plain mean and the good guys weren’t given a needlessly complicated backstory.
Not one of the mainstream westerns of the period, Buchanan Rides Alone clicks along under 90 minutes to the burst of a six shooter in disposable delight.
