Executive producer: Alan Ladd. A Jaguar Production. Copyright 1960 by Jaguar Films. Released through Warner Bros. No New York opening. U.S. release: March 1960. U.K. release: May 1960. Australian release: 25 August 1960. Running times: 93 minutes (Aust), 91 minutes (USA), 88 minutes (UK). NOTES: Location scenes filmed in Northern California. Film debuts of rock star Frankie Avalon, and Alan Ladd's daughter Alana. COMMENT: Disregarding Ladd's jaded appearance, Guns of the Timberland is pretty much a typical Ladd vehicle. This time our hero sees the error of his logging ways and comes down firmly on the side of the environmentalists. This action is not only the catalyst for Romance (in the person of Jeanne Crain, looking very beautiful here) but Conflict with his longtime partner and friend, forcefully yet sympathetically played here by Gilbert Roland. A fair amount of action ensues, culminating in a rip-roaring forest fire.A surprise was my belated discovery that the film was supposed to be set in 1895. I thought it was more or less contemporary. There's no period flavor about the movie at all. The costumes, the props, the furnishings could pass for backwoods modern. Mr. Avalon even has a couple of songs that certainly do not jive with 1895!In addition to Mr. Roland and Miss Crain, it's always good to see Lyle Bettger. Producer Ladd doubtless cast him in the movie because of his small size, but he's big enough to run rings around Alan in the acting department. His role is comparatively small and not exactly characteristic (he's one of the goodies this time), but with his distinctive voice and forceful manner, he's a guy you remember long after Ladd's more routine dramatics have faded from memory. The director is at his best in the action spots. These are suspensefully staged. Production values also benefit from extensive location lensing. I love the conclusion on the logging train when Ladd's companions snatch up Miss Crain and the ensemble steams off into the distance to a rousing chorus of "Cry Timber". This is the sort of stuff that director Webb does best -- including of course that frighteningly realistic forest fire in which both Ladd and Roland seem to be doing their own death-defying stunts. They're both braver men than I am, that's for sure!

Of the five reviews contributed here for GUNS OF THE TIMBERLAND so far, four are quite negative, so today, on the date of Alan Ladd's centennial, please allow me to balance out the critical consensus. I'm a big fan of Ladd and a huge fan of westerns (I've reviewed a few dozen on IMDb) and I had a good time with this film, which I watched on TCM when it aired last week. Sure, Ladd was old and tired and near the end of his career, but he still has that movie star quality that put him at the top of the box office chart so consistently in the 1940s and early '50s. There's a sense of sincerity and conviction he brings to every role he played. We believe him. Here he plays the fair-minded boss of a logging crew at odds with neighboring ranchers in timber country. The ranchers have powerful arguments against logging and one can't help but agree with them. One of the ranchers, a pretty but tough lady named Laura Riley (well played by Jeanne Crain), even gives Ladd a tour of a ghost town that was made uninhabitable by flooding after logging on adjacent hills led to erosion and mud slides. Ladd listens to the arguments and eventually gets into a confrontation with his stubborn partner, Monty, played by Gilbert Roland, leading to an action-packed forest fire climax.The plot moves well, is reasonably suspenseful, and boasts lots of action. We see plenty of train action, trees falling, and the dynamiting of a mountain pass at one point, all enhanced by extensive location shooting. The townsfolk present a united front against the loggers, leading to a big brawl in town in one sequence where the loggers have come on a Saturday night to take over the saloon. One of the ranchers is played by Lyle Bettger, who usually played particularly vicious heavies in westerns throughout the 1950s. (He's Ike Clanton in GUNFIGHT AT THE O.K. CORRAL.) He masterminds a couple of devious maneuvers against the loggers here, but he's actually, overall, a good guy, which is quite surprising.Ladd would have turned 100 today (September 3, 2013), but died 50 years ago, in January 1964, from a lethal (and probably accidental) combination of alcohol and pills. He had a good run in Hollywood for 20 years and made far more films I like than films I didn't. He was a quintessential Hollywood movie star, studio-created but fan-supported. He may not have had much range, but was very dependable within his range and always gave the fans what they wanted.

Aside from a plot that would become more and more relevant as the decade progressed as well as a chance to see Alan Ladd's daughter, Alana, I can't see much about this dull little film that would encourage me to recommend it or see it again. Like most of Alan Ladd's later films, it's very listless and dull. Plus, I really am not sure what the message was nor do I think the folks making the film knew either.The film begins with some loggers coming to clear the land. However, the locals are very unhappy as they are concerned about the ecological effects this might have on the town below. This is understandable. However, instead of trying to work with the loggers or go through the courts to stop them, some of the locals (led by Lyle Bettger and Jeanne Craine) decide that pretty much anything is fair to stop the tree cutting. During most of the town's dirty tricks, the boss of the logging outfit (Ladd) is amazingly complacent. In fact, this is his mood through almost all the film--like he's only semi-conscious. As a result, one of his men, Monty (Gilbert Roland) has had enough and has decided to fight fire with fire, so to speak. Then, and only then, does the boss rouse out of his near slumber.I know it might sound rather nasty, but at this point in his career, Alan Ladd was a hard-core alcoholic. Because of this, he began to look puffy and his acting became much more muted and slow. I really think this is a serious problem in "Guns of the Timberland". However, it's NOT the biggest problem. This problem is the writing. The film doesn't seem to know WHAT the message is and many of the characters are, as a result, very inconsistent. Too often, folks behave in ways that defy common sense as well as who they have been throughout the film--particularly Ladd and Craine. Overall, the film is sluggish and dull and this is rather sad, as in his prime, Ladd was an exciting actor. Here, he's as dull as dish water.

Alan Ladd is cast as Jim Hadley, who, with his crew of lumberjacks, is looking for a new forest to cut... But Hadley and crew soon find that they will have to fight for their next load of wood...The residents of the valley town of Deep Wells, led by Laura Riley (Jeanne Crain), realize that without the natural protection provided by the surrounding woodlands, their ranches and homes would be buried by mudslides during the first heavy rains...The interests of the inhabitants to drive out the intruders start with their refusal to give horses or supplies of any kind, and increases to blow out the logging road...Although the obligatory spark of romance lights up between Hadley and Riley (as the lady rancher is called), the two remain at cross purposes. The efforts of the townspeople to force the intruders to move on begin with denials of horses and supplies and escalate to the dynamiting of the logging road...Hadley, bracing himself for a fight, still insists on legal means to reach the lumber. But his hotheaded partner, Monty (Gilber Roland) favors a more direct approach...The fast friendship between the two loggers is strained to the breaking point when Monty decides to open the road by the method that closed it: dynamite... The film, set against some spectacular scenery, and climaxed by a forest fire, remains a routine and simple outdoor melodrama... Frankie Avalon's musical numbers are among the more ludicrous moments in an already sorry film... As Avalon's love interest, Alana Ladd is cute but makes no great impression as an actress...