There Was a Crooked Man...

There Was a Crooked Man... is a 1970 western comedy starring Kirk Douglas and Henry Fonda and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. It was written by David Newman and Robert Benton, their first script to be produced after Bonnie and Clyde. This was the only western made by Mankiewicz, director of such notable films as All About Eve, Guys and Dolls and Cleopatra. The cast includes Warren Oates, Hume Cronyn, Burgess Meredith, Alan Hale, Jr., Victor French, Bert Freed, John Randolph, Michael Blodgett, Arthur O'Connell and Gene Evans. Paris Pitman has pulled off a $500,000 robbery and is the only one who knows where the money is hidden. In a bordello, he is captured by Sheriff Woodward Lopeman, tried, convicted and sentenced to an Arizona penitentiary. A corrupt warden, LeGoff, is willing to cut the prisoner a deal. He will let Pitman break out of jail for an even split of the half-million dollars. Pitman agrees, but the plan goes awry when LeGoff is murdered by a Chinese convict, Ah-Ping....