Gold of the Seven Saints (1961) Reviews

• Clint "Cheyenne" Walker on the big screen

  dinky-41999-05-21

  Warner Bros. tried to turn some of its TV stars into movie stars but with limited success. Clint Walker was one who couldn't seem to make the transition which, in retrospect, is rather surprising. After all, the "Cheyenne" actor looked mighty good on the big screen and had a pleasantly easy-going personality but even solid westerns such as this one never caught on with most of the movie-going public. Perhaps the glut of TV westerns in the late '50s and early '60s had something to do with it. Based on a 1957 novel ("Desert Guns") by prolific western writer, Steve Frazee, "Gold of the Seven Saints" was the third collaboration between Clint Walker and director Gordon Douglas. Together they'd made "Fort Dobbs" in 1958 and "Yellowstone Kelly" in 1959. "Gold" is easily the best of the three, benefitting from Joe Biroc's impressive black-and-white photography and from the unforced camaraderie between taciturn Walker and talkative Moore. Despite their occasional squabbling, one senses an abiding affection between these two and thus one can understand why the beauteous Leticia Roman can't lure either of them away. Clint's famous 48" chest is briefly on display here in all its hirsute glory when he bathes in a large barrel but it's co-star Roger Moore who gets to sweat in the "beefacke-bondage" scene. Stripped to the waist and staked out on the ground, Moore has strips of wet rawhide tied around his chest -- strips which will shrink in the sun and thus "encourage" him to tell the bad guys where his gold is hidden. (In Frazee's book an entire, freshly-cut hide is completely wrapped around the victim but doing so in the movie would probably cause the audience to go "Ick!" and besides, it'd hide Roger Moore's bare chest from view.)

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• The eminently likable Clint Walker stars

  audiemurph2012-02-22

  Clint Walker probably does not jump to anyone's mind anymore when thinking about B-Western stars, but he is worth remembering. Although a mammoth of a man, his characters tend to be genial and soft-spoken - imagine an appealing combination of Paul Bunyan and Henry Fonda. Too bad he didn't make more Westerns than he did. In "Gold of the Seven Saints", Walker and his partner Roger Moore are on the run, trying to escape basically everyone else, because the partners are carrying a large amount of gold that everyone wants a piece of. Walker never loses his cool when things go wrong, as they often do here. In a beautiful, and perhaps deliberate, contrast to the potential explosive violence contained in his titanic frame, Walker reacts to the wrong turns fate throws at him with a laconic acceptance that is pleasingly understated. His innately kindly and gentle personality always shines through. A very likable hero indeed. I am not sure Roger Moore was the best pick for this Western. His accent keeps changing, especially early in the film, until at some point he is definitively identified as Irish. And he definitely comes in a distant second in the battle of the chests: Walker's massive upper body dominates the screen, and Moore's hairless average looking torso contrasts poorly. The dialogue mostly avoids becoming to clichéd, and the action avoids unnecessary subplots, focusing relentlessly on Walker and Moore's striving to attain apparently unattainable safety and peace of mind. The camera-work is in spectacular black and white, with almost the whole movie shot outdoors in the desert, where majestic mesas and scrub brush dominate the landscape. One interesting moment occurs when Chill Wills, having just induced the delivery of a baby by blowing snuff up the mother's nose, says something along the lines of "it is amazing what wonderful things you can do with snuff!" Fans of Terry Gilliam will recognize an eerie similarity between this line and the one Gilliam's Baron Munchaussen delivers, "I have found that a modicum of snuff can be most efficacious!" Overall, this is a fine and satisfying way to spend an hour and a half in the West.

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• Die Rich...

  Spikeopath2014-06-23

  Gold of the Seven Saints is directed by Gordon Douglas and adapted to screenplay by Leigh Brackett and Leonard Freeman from Steve Frazee's novel. It stars Clint Walker, Roger Moore, Robert Middleton, Chill Wills and Leticia Roman. Filmed in Warnerscope, cinematography is by Joseph F. Biroc and the music is scored by Howard Jackson. Jim Rainbolt (Walker) and Shaun Garrett (Moore) strike it rich and quickly find themselves pursued across the sun scorched lands by money hungry baddies... OK! It's what can be termed as a poor man's Treasure of the Sierra Madre. It also has Roger Moore in a Western movie trying to do an Irish accent! And! It's also in black and white, which when you see how beautifully crisp Biroc's photography is - as the Utah landscapes scorch the eyes - seems such a waste of an opportunity. Yet there's a lot of fun here, some perky scripting and deftly staged action, even some genuine moments of suspense. While Chill Wills pops in for a dandy performance to please the Western faithful. Leticia Roman is a token lady offering, the resolution is a bit of a damp squib, but Walker, Wills and Moore are darn fine company to be in, which in this case is enough to make time spent with this movie time well spent. 6.5/10

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• How far will men go to pursue gold.

  segstef2001-10-07

  This movie is about two partners who encounter trouble as the try to take their gold to town to cash it in. They endure several hardships and their friendship is tested several times. I enjoyed the chemistry between Clint Walker and Roger Moore. Both actors showed their versatility in moving from light situations to more serious situations;their charisma made the movie. The plot was unlikely,an Irish cowboy traps furs with a westerner,they find gold,the Irish cowboy goes into town to steal two horses to carry the sacks of gold,he gets caught,is forced to buy one horse with a gold nugget and a chase is on.

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• There's gold in that chest of Walker's

  Poseidon-32002-11-26

  This presumably standard little western has a touch more to it than one might expect. For one thing, it has the unusual pairing of towering western figure Walker and lean British actor Moore (sporting a grating Irish brogue.) Additionally, despite continual references to "pretty girls" and a showy role for lifted and separated Italian actress Roman, the movie is rife with homoerotic images and subtext! Walker and Moore play fur-trappers who have recently acquired 125 lbs of gold. Once word gets out that they're packing it across the desert, villains come out from under every rock to steal it. The pair have a sort of Batman and Robin dynamic with Moore (referred to as "kid" by Walker even though they are only months apart in age) trying hard to be a good partner, but inevitably running into trouble. Walker, as the wiser and stronger hero, must come to his rescue. Walker's first appearance in the film presents him as a monument that nearly dwarfs the surrounding Utah scenery. His beefy body is regularly placed in various Greco-Roman positions. He sprawls out under a rock for a nap while Moore lays his head at his feet looking upward. Later, in a scene with Wills (as a questionable doctor who's come to get in on the gold), Walker wields a phallic gun between his legs. He tells Wills that there is no one besides Moore who he'd rather "have my back." When the trio lands at Middleton's hacienda, Walker (in the film's highlight) takes a bath in a huge barrel and is scrubbed down by Roman as Moore looks on longingly (supposedly due to butt-swinging Roman, but the audience knows better!) A publicity shot for the film actually shows Moore spooning in this tub with Walker snugly behind him! This (probably staged just for fun) shot isn't in the movie. If it had been, the flick would have outgrossed "The Guns of Navarone" that year! A later shot of an ostensibly nude Walker asleep on his bunk has him lit like an archangel taking a nap. By now, Walker has crossed the line into the gay cowboy fantasy stratosphere! By the time Moore is stripped to the waist and tied to a rock (in another Batman-esque move...one can almost hear an announcer ominously asking what will happen to our Boy Wonder) waiting for Walker to come and rescue him, Walker comes upon three skinny-dipping varmints, and then is asked to get on his belly with his granite behind on display, the film has taken on a whole new aspect. Moore (who should never be allowed to sing on film again) ekes out the final ditty (something to the effect of "if marriage is in store, I'm outta here") as the duo rides off together contentedly. The one major drawback to the film is its lack of color. The striking scenery and Walker's polar blue eyes deserved to be shot in vivid Technicolor. This was director Douglas' third time at bat with Walker, so he knew the value of Walker's treasure chest. Did Walker realize his own appeal and understand the way he was being presented? His gentle, "aw shucks" personality in interviews would suggest not. Thank God, however, that he exists on celluloid for later generations to appreciate.

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