THE SPOILERS—third and most popular of the five versions churned out of the 1906 Rex Beach novel about claim-jumping, double-dealing and two-fisting in the Nome of ’98. Also one of seven flicks ground out by John Wayne in 1942, and his second go-round with Marlene Dietrich.  They boldly carried on an off-screen dalliance between filming.

It’s a fair outdoor shoot-’em-up, feeling familiar and occasionally lackluster as directed by Ray Enright.  Harry Carey comes off best in the supporting mob. An Oscar nomination was drawn for the Art Direction, and the Alaskan frontier fracas sleds along at 87 minutes.

The highlight is the famous haymaker free-for-all between Wayne and villain Randolph Scott. Studio press agents circulated blab that the director just turned the two actors loose and they really slugged it out. That was just hype, of course, since doubles are often visible, with over thirty different stuntmen covering the wilder bits of the six-minute brawl, careening over balconies, crashing through doors, shattering tables, chairs and mirrors. It’s a neat piece of vintage action, no doubt helping the movie to recover three times its production costs, the $5,000,000 gross elbowing place in line at #44 in ’42.

Yukon master-poet Robert W. Service has a small role, and others in their period duds include Margaret Lindsay, Richard Barthelmess, Roy Barcroft, William Farnum, Russell Simpson, Charles Halton, Glenn Strange and Mickey Simpson. The screenplay was worked up by Lawrence Hazard (Strange Cargo, Gentle Annie) and Tom Reed (Soldiers Three, Night People). The star trio followed this later in the year with another brawler, Pittsburgh.