Don't let the fact this is a black & white, post-World War II, public domain western dissuade you from watching it. The Randolph Scott oater "Abilene Town" exemplifies what makes a great western and great filmmaking. Scott is capably cast as a strong, level-headed lawman of the eponymous cattle town in 1870. Predictably, the cattlemen behave like a rambunctious, trigger-happy, liquor-swilling horde that dictate their demands to the merchants. Although our stalwart town marshal is sworn to uphold the law, the obsequious townspeople--who depend on the trail drovers for their livelihood--don't want Town Marshal Dan Mitchell to enforce the law in such a way that would alienate the cattlemen and incite them to drive their herds to other towns. Change, it seems, is rarely a good thing initially, and the arrival of Lloyd Bridges and a crowd of homesteaders from Ohio sparks conflict between not only the cattlemen and the homesteaders but also with the merchants and the homesteaders. At one point, the cattlemen resort to stampeding their cattle so they can drive the ornery sodbusters out.
"Ride ‘em Cowboy" scenarist Harold Shumate adapted Ernest Haycox's novel "Trail Town" for the screen, and the characters are as interesting as they are charismatic. For the record, Haycox had written the short story “Stage to Lordsburg” earlier that inspired the classic John Ford western “Stagecoach” with John Wayne. The brilliance of “Abilene Town as western is we get to see the townspeople behave for a change as if they have minds as well as spines, and they don't cower for long after Scott mobilizes them into action. The impetus for the merchants to side with the homesteaders comes when the chief storekeeper's daughter, Sherry Balder (Rhonda Fleming of “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral”) falls in love with Henry Dreiser (Lloyd Bridges of “High Noon”), the leader of the homesteaders.
"Abilene Town" is one of the few American westerns containing a scene where our lawman hero has a shoot-out in the saloon and plugs one of his adversaries in the same pictorial frame in which he appears. In other words, we see the hero shoot a villain in the same visual shot as he pulls the trigger! This unusual event occurs roughly 75 minutes into this 89-minute oater. 'Cap' Ryker (Dick Curtis of “The Texas Rangers”) refuses to be arrested by Sheriff Mitchell and takes a slug. Typically, old fashioned Hollywood westerns refrained from having anybody shoot another somebody in the same visual frame. Moreover, "Abilene Town" differs also because the hero doesn't stick with the sweet, innocent young thing, Sherry Balder, that he starts out romancing. Instead, he winds up with a cantankerous saloon girl, Rita (Ann Dvorak of “Scarface”) who has a passion for kicking our hero in the shins.
"Tall in the Saddle" director Edwin L. Marin makes sure this 89-minute horse opera doesn't wear out its welcome. He is adroit at swirling humor into this largely straightforward yarn about good citizenship. Edgar Buchanan steals the show as a craven County Sheriff 'Bravo' Trimble. Veteran heavy Jack Lambert of “Vera Cruz” makes a first-rate murderous villain. He is as slimy as he has ever been and swaps blows with Scott in one scene. Later, he manages to break out of jail, and our hero has to blast him out of the saddle on main street before he can flee. Everybody who calls themselves 'western movie' fans must see "Abilene Town!"
