This aired on one of my cable stations earlier tonight, and I decided to watch it as a longtime fan of gorgeous, sweet-seeming (but tragically ill-fated, short-lived [died age 36 from severe alcoholism]) Gail Russell ever since seeing and loving her in 1944's The Uninvited.

She's wonderful and perfect (and while still fully lovely, in her prime, and at her best) in this film as well. Actually all of the actors do a great job. I was very pleased, too, to see some familiar stars of earlier decades, such as beautiful Irene Rich of the Silent screen era, ditto Harry Carey Sr., too Bruce Cabot of Pre-Code era days; also various familiar lesser others appearing amongst the supporting cast of characters.

I've never been a John Wayne enthusiast (though have always liked him well enough and never minded him - just never have been much into Westerns so haven't paid him a lot of attention), but found this to be another of his films that I've enjoyed, thought he did a first-rate job in, and was glad to have watched. The chemistry between him and Gail Russell is delightful and entirely believable.

Since I was so pleased with tonight's viewing of this well-done, entertaining, enjoyable oldie but goodie (and despite it airing in a very poor-quality wanly colourized 1983 unrestored public domain release that lacked in visual quality and didn't do the film much justice), as well as liking the cast so much (particularly the five first and second leads, namely Wayne, Russell, Rich, Cabot, and Carey), I, right after the broadcast completed, went ahead and ordered the Olive Films 2013 restoration of the movie, that according to many is the one and only actually good DVD release of this (otherwise all there is on the market is an array of various crap public domain releases put out throughout the years by inferior budget labels). I've read, multiple times, that the Olive release is definitely the version to get, though not surprisingly - like is the case for restorations in general - its more costly.