Tension at Table Rock

Tension at Table Rock is a 1956 American Western drama film directed by Charles Marquis Warren, starring Richard Egan and Dorothy Malone. Wes Tancred (Richard Egan) is publicly vilified after killing a famous gunslinger who was a public hero. The same year this film was made Richard Egan would star in another western: Love Me Tender. That film would mark Elvis Presley's film debut. Despite Richard Egan being first billed in that movie, people went to see it mainly because of Elvis, but at the same time would discover how good an actor Egan was and he would become a known actor.

Plot

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After killing a man whom many thought was his friend, Wes Tancred is assaulted and immortalized in an uncomplimentary song about one man shooting his best friend in the back; when in fact Wes' friend was reaching for his gun to shoot Wes in the back as he started out the door. Wes leaves town and winds up working as a hostler at a Stagecoach Outpost. He adopts an alias and befriends the father and son who run the outpost. Three outlaws arrive with plans to rob the stagecoach when it arrives. The father is killed in a showdown with the three outlaws. Wes kills them and takes the boy to live with his aunt and uncle, who is the Sheriff in Table Rock. A reckless band of herders that are running a cattle drive come to town with revelry and kill a sodbuster. In court there is testimony presented that the murder was self-defense because the ramrodder had placed a weapon in the victim's hand. Both the Sheriff and Wes are aware of this; however, the Sheriff who was traumatized from a previous beating, states in his report, that it was self-defense. He revises his report when Wes steps forward with testimony to the contrary, challenging him to overcome his fear. Wes shoots down a hired gun that comes to town to kill the Sheriff and the Sheriff, in turn, shoots the man who hires the gunman when he attempts to shoot Wes in the back.