A typical Al Adamson picture with him writing the story; producing the film; directing the film but giving the credit to his father Victor Adamson(Denver Dixon), which makes no difference as Al was no better a director than his dad, and also playing two roles under two different names, Lyle Felice and Rick Adams, neither of which was his name: Prior to the(non-identified nor dated)revolution, Senorita Maria San Carlos(Carroll Montour), the only daughter of a wealthy landowner,was betrothed to Escobar(Al Adamson as Lyle Felice), a self-designated "General",but Maria believes in marriage for love and runs away with her friend Joanne(Shirley Tegge).Soon they are in the dense desert between the border and Joanne's home in California.In Arizona one presumes.They are intercepted by a gang of American cut-throats sent by Escobar to bring Maria back, as Escobar can not leave his fight for Mexican freedom.This gives him a point for loyality and minus-two points for dumb, especially after his hired henchies get a load of Maria and Joanne(who was billed as a former winner of the Miss U.S.A title.)Escobar has also sent along Manuel(Sergio Virell), once a servant boy at Maria's hacienda, as their protector.Manuel is young and small.Give Escobar another minus-two points for dumbness.Along the way, no thanks to protector Manuel,the girls are threatned with torture by knives, rape and even---gasp---pawed in an attempted rape.(Adamson seldom took this long to get down to the nitty-gritty, which means this one had way too much plot and short on delivering the goods.)During the trip, two of the outlaws are killed---fighting over the goods---and Jeff Lawton(David Lloyd) shows up and helps the girls and Manuel, who was evidently given his protection orders in some language he didn't understand.But Manuel does fall in love with Maria, but does not mention it as he is smart enough to know Escobar might frown on such activities by a paid employee, although if Escobar was very bright he would have already noticed that Manuel hadn't done anything yet to earn his dinero.But Escobar slaps Maria and the fiesty Manuel challenges him on that breach of etiquitte, and Escobar and Manuel are soon fighting a duel with bull whips eight-feet long.But they are standing 10-feet apart and nobody is hurt but Escobar proclaims himself the winner and,just to show he is a good winner, he says it isn't fair for Maria to marry him if she doesn't love him but falls short of turning her over to Manuel.But the remaining gringo outlaws show up and kidnap Maria, and Escobar, Manuel and Lawton pursue them and the remaing question isn't whether they will rescue Maria but which one of the three will get killed doing it.

Full Cast and Crew for
Half Way to Hell (1961)

Directed by

Victor Adamson
 
(as Denver Dixon)

Al Adamson
 
(uncredited)

 

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)

Al Adamson
 
story

Alan Greedy
 
screenplay


Cast (in credits order)

Caroll Montour
....
Maria San Carlos

Sergio Virel
....
Manuel

Shirley Tegge
....
Joanne

David Lloyd
....
Jeff Lawton

Don Carlos
....
El Chato

Gene Sterling
....
Wesson

Al Adamson
....
Gen. Escobar/Slade (as Rick Adams)

Monte Joe Oyler
....
Blackie

Gene Walker
....
Diego

Joe Lane
....
Driver

Alfred Shelly
....
Guard (as Al Shelly)

Bob Regas
....
Guard








Produced by

Al Adamson
....
producer

Victor Adamson
....
executive producer (as Victor Adamson)

Gene Sterling
....
associate producer

 

Makeup Department

Gene Henderson
....
makeup supervisor

 

Sound Department

Harry Smith
....
sound

 

Other crew

Jose Delgato
....
location manager

J. Arthur Lane
....
technical advisor

Winny Logan
....
wardrobe supervisor

Rudy Lopez
....
dialogue director