AllMovie

Worthless from a historical aspect, Black Bart is nonetheless an enjoyable fabrication about the fabled Western outlaw. Rescued from a "necktie party," outlaws Charles E. Boles (Dan Duryea) and Lance Hardeen (Jeffrey Lynn) decide that it would be best to part as friends and go their separate ways. When next seen, Boles is a prosperous rancher who supplements his income by robbing the Wells Fargo gold shipments under the alias of Black Bart. Upon learning this, Hardeen rides back into Boles' life demanding a piece of the action. Both of the hero-villains are foiled when they succumb to the charms of the bewitching international courtesan Lola Montez (Yvonne DeCarlo). The story is related in flashback-from a jail cell by the outlaws' erstwhile partner Jersey Brady (Percy Kilbride). Obviously forgotten or ignored by the screenwriters was the fact that the actual Black Bart was really black, an ex-slave who "made bad" in the Wild West . Black Bart was remade in 1967 as Ride to Hangman's Tree.