Cinema Revisited: Gentlemen With Guns (1946)

Gentlemen with Guns

Directed by Sam Newfield. Cast: Buster Crabbe, Patricia Knox, Al St. John, Steve Darrell, George Chesebro, Karl Hackett, Bud Buster, Frank Ellis. Released March 27, 1946. Running time: 53 minutes

There is a scene on an episode of the television series “All in the Family” where Bea Arthur is guesting as Maude. Always at odds with Archie, she complains that when he and Edith were dating, “they used to love to go to the movies. In an era of Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy, he took her to see Buster Crabbe!” Archie responds triumphantly, “You’re damned right, a hell of an actor!”

Even as late as the early 70s, former Olympic medalist Crabbe was dismissed as a bad actor. Crabbe himself once said, “my acting rose to the level of incompetence and then leveled off.”

However, somehow Crabbe managed to have something of a lasting impact via the B westerns and serial chapterplays in which he starred. He was Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers in the cliffhangers, and in low budget cowboy movies, he played good guy Billy “The Kid” Carson. Crabbe told me in 1980, “My biggest asset in these movies was having the best sidekick in western pictures.” Crabbe was referring to Al St John, who, as Fuzzy Q. Jones, always enhanced every movie with his amusing comic antics. St. John was a real veteran, his career dating back to the Keystone comedies where his real-life uncle, Roscoe (Fatty) Arbuckle was among the biggest stars. St. John had his own starring series of comedies, and his feats as a trick bicyclist was a hit at live appearances.

“Gentlemen With Guns” is a low budget western quickie for Saturday matinees at neighborhood movie houses. Released in 1946, it features both Crabbe and St. John at somewhere near their best. In this one, Fuzzy owns land for which some bandits want the water rights. In order to secure them, Fuzzy is framed as a murderer. However, when a woman with whom he has been corresponding decides to visit, he breaks out of jail to be with her. The woman sees what’s going on, and connects with the bandits with plans to marry Fuzzy, and inherit his land once the bandits kill him or he himself is hanged for the phony murder rap. Of course Billy straightens everything out with his pragmatic thinking, quick fists, and commanding demeanor. It all breezes by in less than an hour, with fist fights, shootouts, and every baddie getting his or her comeuppance.

Producer’s Releasing Corporation was the lowest of low budget studios, grinding out cheap, quick B movies that mostly appealed to kids. In fact, “Gentleman with Guns” is quite entertaining on that level. Nobody is looking for “great cinema” with a movie like this, but the competence of the performers and director Sam Newfield’s expertise at keeping the action within the frame all add up to perfectly serviceable entertainment. The stock studio music swells up in all the right spots. Classic B western baddie George Chesebro is one of the heavies, while female lead Patricia Knox holds her own (Ms. Knox, remarkably, is still living).

Crabbe would eventually tire of these low budget oaters, would quit, and be replaced by Lash LaRue. St. John would remain with LaRue until he too eventually had enough. But while making this film, everyone was at least reasonably happy. Crabbe is billed as King of the Wild West. And, as far as “Gentlemen with Guns” is concerned, he sure is.