The Batjac Suspense Collection
(Paramount, $49 for the set; $15 each)
Plunder of the Sun - In the early 1950s, John Wayne and producer Robert Fellows created Wayne-Fellows Productions — later renamed Batjac — and this taut little 1953 melodrama was their second film.
Sturdy, handsome leading man Glenn Ford plays an American tourist in Cuba who has run into financial trouble. To pay his hotel bill, he agrees to smuggle a small package containing a Mexican antiquity.
Ford's Al Colby discovers that several people, including an oily American (a scene-stealing Sean McClory), want the package. Shot on location in Mexico, the John Farrow-directed suspense thriller also stars Patricia Medina and Diana Lynn as women Colby encounters.
Extras: Breezy commentary from the star's son, Peter Ford, and film historian Frank Thompson, a well-crafted tribute to McClory, who appeared in several Wayne films, photos shot by Glenn Ford during production, the original trailer and a historical documentary on Mexican antiquities.
Ring of Fear - Quirky, fun 1954 thriller set in Clyde Beatty's big-top circus. When puzzling accidents befall the circus, Beatty, the famed lion tamer, asks mystery writer Mickey Spillane to play detective and discover who is responsible.
McClory gives the film's best performance as the man who is behind the problems besetting the show — the circus' former ringmaster, who has spent several years in a mental institution harboring a violent obsession with a trapeze artist (Marian Carr). When he escapes from the mental institution, he lands again at the circus, where he is hired by Beatty's character to return to his ringmaster duties.
The circus sequences were shot at show performances during an engagement in Phoenix. "Ring of Fear" was the last movie featuring Beatty, who died in 1965. James Edward Grant, who penned numerous Wayne films, including "Hondo," directed. Pat O'Brien plays the circus manager.
Track of the Cat - William Wellman directed this 1954 western drama — sort of a Eugene O'Neill horse opera. Set during the winter at a California mountain ranch in the 1890s, the story revolves around the dysfunctional Bridges family.
Robert Mitchum plays the domineering oldest brother, Curt, who is determined to track down the mountain lion that has been picking off the livestock. William Hopper plays the softer, quieter brother Arthur, and Tab Hunter is the innocent young brother Hal.
Filling out the family are their spinster sister (Teresa Wright), their cold-hearted mother (Beulah Bondi), their alcoholic father (Philip Tonge) and Hal's strong-willed girlfriend (Diana Lynn), who has picked the wrong time for a visit.
Carl Switzer, who played Alfalfa in the "Our Gang" movies, is unrecognizable as an old Indian ranch hand, Joe Sam — Switzer was just 27 at the time.
Wellman and his cameraman William Clothier experimented with the look of the film — it is quite literally black and white in color. Though shot in color, the props, costumes, snowy winter landscape and even the horses were in various hues of black and white, so that the only colors were the actors' flesh tones and Mitchum's vibrant red jacket.
Extras: Reflective commentary with Hunter, the director's son William Wellman Jr. and historian Thompson; a featurette on Walter Van Tilburg Clark, who wrote the bestselling novel on which the film is based; a lovely documentary on Wellman; a fun featurette on Black Diamond, the main horse used in the film; and an interview with a female animal tracker.
Man in the Vault - Though it has the threadbare production values of an Ed Wood film, this fast-paced 1956 thriller is an enjoyable little B movie.
William Campbell plays a Los Angeles locksmith who gets involved in a bank robbery. Karen Sharpe plays his rich girlfriend. Andrew V. McLaglen, the son of Oscar-winning actor Victor McLaglen, directed. He had been an assistant director on several Wayne films.
— Susan King
