The Devil's Mistress

Now the basic premiss of this Western is quite decent. A band of unsavoury cowboys pass the home of a preacher and his much younger, mute, wife. After accepting the hospitality of the couple, they kill him then violate the woman "Athaliah" (Joan Stapleton) before taking her captive on their journey. One by one they meet a grisly fate - much to their increasing chagrin and to her obvious joy. Who might be responsible for the deaths, though, as there is no clear common denominator? Well that's actually pretty obvious - however puzzling - to the audience, but by now the story has long been overpowered by some seriously shoddy production and actors that would have struggled to get cast in a pilot for the "High Chaparral". Arthur Resley's rather puritanical "Jeroboam" is the stuff of third rate ham, and though only an hour or so long, it seems longer and really does quickly fall into the realms of films best avoided. This is poor, sorry.