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Another great Western Film from Jeanne Crain:
Guns of the Timberlands (1960)
In this action drama, ranchers and lumberjacks are at loggerheads over the proper usage of the land. When the logging team finds a prime stand, the ranchers beg the loggers not to harvest it because the lack of trees will cause deadly mud slides during the rainy season that will destroy their homes. The battle becomes quite heated as the ranchers and the lumberman begin blowing each other up. In the midst of explosive tempers and fighting, a romance blooms between lovers on each side. Finally the lead forester sees that he is wrong after the head rancher's daughter, the woman he loves, is almost blown to bits. Unfortunately, his partner doesn't and continues to fight until he is shot and killed.
Complete Cast Of Guns Of The Timberlands
Alan Ladd - Jim Hadley
Gilbert Roland - Monty Walker
Lyle Bettger - Clay Bell
Verna Felton - Aunt Sarah
Regis Toomey - Sheriff Taylor
Paul E. Burns - Bill Burroughs
Budd Buster - Amos Stearnes
Jeanne Crain - Laura Riley
Frankie Avalon - Bert Harvey
Noah Beery, Jr. - Blackie
Alana Ladd - Jane Peterson
Johnny Seven - Vince
Henry Kulky - Logger
George Seek - Amos Stearns
In Remembrance: Jeanne Crain
Jeanne Crain, the actress best known for her Academy Award nominated performance in the controversial 1949 film Pinky has passed away on Monday, December 15, 2003. She was 78.
Born May 25, 1925 in Barstow, California, Crain moved to Los Angeles with her family as a small child. As a teen she participated in many beauty pageants. After winning Camera Girl of 1942, she was approached by 20th Century Fox with a standard studio contract. Craine’s first role was an uncredited part in the 1943 Busby Berkely musical The Gang’s All Here. However, after successfully landing leading roles in Home In Indiana, In The Meantime, Darling and Winged Victory (all 1944) the studio renegotiated her contract for better terms making Craine one of the leading stars at the studio.
Craine’s slender figure and lovely features also made her a leading pin-up girl among GI’s during World War II and the post-War years. Reportedly her fan mail was second only to that of pin-up queen Betty Grable.
In 1949 director Elia Kazan cast her in Pinky, where she played a light-skinned southern black woman who passed herself off in society as white. It was a powerful performance in a powerful movie made at a time when Hollywood shied away from such progressive racial material. Ironically, although many black actresses campaigned for the role, including Lena Horne, studio head Darryl F. Zanuck demanded that a white actress play the part. The film was highly praised by critics but raised controversy in the South with its plotline of a white man wanting to marry Pinky despite knowing her race. The film was banned in Marshall, Texas, tough the town’s film censoring ordinance was later declared unconstitutional by the U. S. Supreme Court.
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