Search - The Great American Western: Randolph Scott, Gene Autry on DVD

Movie Release: 2004 DVD Release: 03/30/2004 Format: DVD - Black and White SwapaDVD Credits: 5 Number of Discs: 5 Run Time: 25 hrs 53 mins Studio: Platinum Disc Members Wishing: 0 Genres: Action, Western, Hybrid Western, Religious Drama

Former evangelist Marjorie Gortner had a brief flurry of activity as an actor in the early 1970s. Gun and the Pulpit was a made-for-TV movie designed as the pilot for a potential Gortner series. Marjoe plays a gunslinger who disguises himself as a preacher to escape a false murder charge. He finds that his somewhat direct proselytizing technique--wielding a six-gun whenever faced with hostile nonbelievers--makes him popular throughout the west. Gun and the Pulpit was filmed on location at the Old Tucson studios, originally built in 1940 for the Columbia feature Arizona and currently a major Southwestern tourist attraction. The film's premise was workable, but not with Marjoe Gortner; Merlin Olsen came along in 1981 with a more successful variation on the theme, Father Murphy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide