“Hollywood frequently used--or distorted--both the traditions and the myths of the West to reflect on contemporary conditions, in so doing often enlarging upon accepted conceptions of the ‘real West' (whatever that is). Tonight's two films show Hollywood relating the West to the gangsterism of the '30s, and using the Western epic as a propagandist tool in the face of war threats from Europe. Gun Smoke is a lively western from a period when most Hollywood westerns were rather slow and pedestrian.... Actually it is more related to that strange group of semi-Fascist gangster movies which proliferated in the 1931-34 period which literally advocated vigilante law when official law seemed powerless.... But while it's tough and actionful, it is also a little too far removed from reality to be really alarming--except as part of that disturbing early '30s cycle.” William K. Everson