The First Films of Samuel Fuller

For proponents of the auteur theory, Criterion's budget-priced Eclipse brand is a godsend. Each set collects a director's “lost, forgotten, or overshadowed classics in simple, affordable editions.” Translation: no extras, except for illuminating liner notes that put each film in context and parse its significance. Thus, we learn that former journalist and pulp fiction writer Sam Fuller's first three films for producer Robert L. Lippert—I Shot Jesse James, The Baron of Arizona, and The Steel Helmet—were a training ground for the fiercely independent, iconoclastic “warrior-director.” The Steel Helmet (1951) is the best of the trio, a racially-charged Korean War drama, starring a cigar-chomping Gene Evans, that boasts a visceral, gritty power born out of Fuller's own wartime experiences (Indiana Jones fans will also note the Korean orphan tagalong named Short Round). The Baron of Arizona (1950) affords Vincent Price what is said to be one of his favorite roles, that of James Addison Reavis, who perpetrated an audacious scam in 1880 to claim the state of Arizona in an elaborate land swindle (the climactic lynch mob sequence is quintessential Fuller). Fuller's first film, I Shot Jesse James (1949), is one of those new-fangled psychological westerns that paints a tortured portrait of the “dirty little coward” Robert Ford, who assassinated his notorious outlaw friend (an eyebrow-arching bathtub scene raises some provocative Brokeback implications about the relationship between Ford and James). Not widely known, Fuller has a strong cult following, but these modest, low budget films offer enough cheap thrills to engage a wider audience. Recommended. (D. Liebenson)