Jay Novello

Bad Man of Deadwood is a 1941 Republic Pictures western directed by Joseph Kane, starring Roy Rogers and George "Gabby" Hayes. Rogers plays sharpshooter Brett Starr, who rolls into the town of Deadwood with Professor Blackstone's traveling medicine show, alongside singer Sally Payne. The show's tuneful pitch gets a hostile reception from the crooked businessmen who run the town and the hired guns who enforce their rule, so Starr sticks around to help the townsfolk — including a reform-minded judge's daughter — break the gang's grip. A classic singing-cowboy oater from Rogers's peak Republic years, the film entered the public domain through non-renewal.

Western · Music

One of the first features shot in CinemaScope, this Twentieth Century-Fox adventure drops a Romeo-and-Juliet romance into the sponge-diving wars of Tarpon Springs, Florida. Robert Wagner plays Tony Petrakis, son of a Greek sponge-boat captain (Gilbert Roland), who falls for Gwyneth Rhys (Terry Moore), daughter of the rival clan led by Richard Boone. Directed by Robert D. Webb, the film is remembered less for its melodrama than for Edward Cronjager's Oscar-nominated underwater cinematography and a shimmering early score by Bernard Herrmann. Shot on location in Florida and the Bahamas, it entered the public domain in the United States after its copyright was not renewed.

Adventure · Drama