Errol Flynn Westerns Collection (Montana / Rocky Mountain / San Antonio / Virginia City)

Flynn's Westerns - A Unique Sub-Genre
There are westerns (with John Wayne, Gary Cooper, directed by John Ford, Howard Hawks, not to mention Roy Rogers and Gene Autry) and then there are Errol Flynn's westerns. I think I saw some of Flynn's westerns on TV before I saw any of the others and was therefore very surprised to find that DODGE CITY, VIRGINIA CITY, THEY DIED WITH THEIR BOOTS ON, etc., were unlike any of the other films in the genre. That said, these films created a unique western sub-genre on their own terms, mainly because Flynn was a unique screen presence and Warners figured out how to tailor stories to his personality.

This four-film collection brings together the less celebrated films. 1940's VIRGINIA CITY is basically a "prequel" to 1939's DODGE CITY with Flynn, Alan Hale, and Guinn "Big Boy" Williams playing virtually the same characters they did in the first film. My guess is that the romantic subplot with Miriam Hopkins (she and Flynn have absolutely NO screen chemistry)would have confused the...

Essentially a volume 3 of the Flynn Signature series
Only "Virginia City" has an A-film feel about it with Michael Curtiz directing and notable Warner costars. The other three are B Westerns in my opinion, but Flynn's presence always made any film much better. His performances in all of these films are very good, he just doesn't always have the best material with which to work, and in some cases he is working with some very bizarre casting. The extra features bring this package up to four stars in my opinion, but I don't understand why WHV just didn't go ahead and add "Silver River" to the set and make it the usual five film classic box set. Someone else has already done an excellent job of summarizing each film. So I'll just mention the extra features for the set, the director in each case, and my personal rating of each film on a five star scale:

Montana (1950) directed by Ray Enright. (3/5)
The weakest of the four films in the set.
Extra Features:
Vintage Newsreel
Warner Night at the Movies 1950 Short...

Fine Showcase of Flynn's Less-Celebrated Westerns...
Despite Errol Flynn's legacy as the screen's greatest swashbuckler, he, in fact, made more war films and westerns than sword-swinging adventures. While a collection of his often-worthwhile war films hasn't been released, yet, "Errol Flynn Westerns Collection (Montana / Rocky Mountain / San Antonio / Virginia City)" does provide an opportunity to enjoy some of Flynn's lesser-known westerns (chosen, I suspect, because two are in color). While Flynn hated making 'oaters', in general (with the exception of "They Died With Their Boots On"), his natural grace, charm, and riding and shooting skills certainly offset his incongruous Australian accent!

"Virginia City" (1940), is, arguably, the only 'A-list' title of the collection, a quasi-sequel to Flynn's hugely successful 1939 Western debut, "Dodge City", again directed by Michael Curtiz, scored by Max Steiner, and featuring Alan Hale and Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams as his sidekicks. This time around, Flynn is an undercover Union...

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