Please don't spend money on this.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Drake Robey (Pate) has to be the gabbiest vampire in blood-sucking history. Then again, maybe he was prepping for a spot on TV's Dark Shadows (1966-71). I just wish the Deins (director and co-scripters) spent a tenth of the time on atmosphere instead of all the talk- talk. Plus, the last part smacks of padding with repetitive dialog. Clearly, the movie has little feel for building dread or suspense, surprising for a vampire flick. Instead, it's like everyone is being paid by the word. Happily, Pate looks the undead part, but the rest of the production comes across like a standard B-western. Too bad, because the idea of a neck-biter in the Old West was a novel one. As I recall, kids turned out in droves to catch the novelty. Now, the movie just looks bland, despite a good turn from Pate, along with Bruce Gordon as the roughneck. All in all, reviewer Malin is on target, contrary to the negative votes.

Trying to resolve matters in a land-border dispute, a family's hiring of a strange gunslinger eventually causes them to realize he's the culprit behind a series of ghastly murders around town by draining women of blood and race to stop him before he completes his task.This is an overall curious and quite enjoyable effort. Basically this here turns out to be a cunning combination of Western and vampire horror, but for once the mixture is not a detriment to the other as they usually result in forsaking one part of the story for the other if the two chosen topics really have little in common with each other. Here, we get a typical Western about a ranch family involved in a border dispute with their neighbors who resorts to underhanded tactics to keep his side of the property without repercussions, involved in numerous shady deals with the authorities to keep himself in line and offers up plenty of shoot-outs, beatings and scenes of everyone wandering around on horse- back to fulfill that part of the storyline, and basically turns the script around by having the loner coming in to deal with the situation being a vampire. By still incorporating those tactics, where he resides in coffins, can't stay out in the sunlight for long periods of time and resorts to blood-drinking to carry out his orders all fall in line with known vampire lore, as well as the defense tactics used to stop his rampage that carries out on the outskirts of the story before being brought in by the land dispute where everything finally makes sense. The only real problems here is the last half, where the vampire far more often than necessary taunts the hero with long-winded speeches about humanity and faith of God, which really hurts his effectiveness as a villain since it all comes off so lame and stupid. Overall, though, it more than makes up for that one little flaw.Today's Rating/PG: Violence.

A black-clad, gaunt stranger (Michael Pate) arrives in town, becomes a farmhand for a pretty rancher (Kathleen Crowley), eventually turns out to be the vampire terrorizing the countryside. This really is a clever, moody piece, another well-done 1950s Universal-International terror film, featuring good performances, creepy music, and an astonishing climax.

I've always liked this movie: it takes a theme that could easily have been preposterous (a vampire Western?) and handles it with restraint, dignity, a nice feel for its two respective folklores, and deep, handsome B&W photography. It's an easy step from natural to supernatural for that classic Western icon, the mysterious, black-clad gunslinger who rides into town by night, and the rest of the movie is just as comfortable a blend. The laconic vampire, Drake Robey ("The dead don't bother me, ma'am, it's the living that give me trouble") is a noble monster who first preys on, then falls for the feisty rancher heroine, and there's a neat iconic scene involving a bullet mounted with Preacher Dan's precious fragment of the True Cross. Really a classy little movie and most unfairly overlooked - I can't believe this is the first comment on it!