BADMAN’S TERRITORY. RKO Radio Pictures, 1946. Randolph Scott, Ann Richards, George ‘Gabby’ Hayes, Ray Collins, Chief Thundercloud, Lawrence Tierney, Tom Tyler, Steve Brodie, Isabel Jewell. Director: Tim Whelan.

   Back in the late 1800s, or so, as the narrator of this film tells us, the Oklahoma panhandle was a land of without law, where gangs of gunslingers congregated and ruled the towns they lived in. Enter Randolph Scott, a lawman in search of his brother, facing every outlaw in the West.

   I messed up on this one. I watched a 98-minute movie crammed into a 90-minute time slot, less commercials. The plot is there. Little things like motivations are not. Maybe there weren’t any, but who could tell? A full report some other time, perhaps.

— Reprinted from Movie.File.2, April 1988.