three miscreant youth and gary grime and ron howard and and charles martin smith find a wounded lee marvin on the road and take him to the barn of gary grime father farm . they patch him up and fee him and grime give him his horse and he make a getaway . that doesn not sit well with grime father who have lie to a posse about marvin not be around . he take off his belt and tan the hide off grime back . grime run away then and there and the other two join him . like a lot of youth back then and when i be young and when this picture be make and today while these kid be bore . but back then there just weren not any diversion . life be hard on those homestead farm and grime father be a hard man and he have to be . the story of these kid be the story i be sure of a lot of youth in the west . they take up bank rob like their new hero lee marvin and make a botch of it . they kill a state senator accidentally and do not even get away with the money . flee to mexico and they meet up again with marvin who take them under his wing now and to show them how to do it right . the rest of the movie be the unfolding of their disillusionment . they have kill a state senator and theyre hot . lee marvin do not turn out to be the hero they have in mind . but by his light and he operate quite logically . the three young actor convey nicely what it must have be like to grow up on a bleak prairie homestead and to get a chance at what they perceive will be adventure . lee marvin strike the right note in a difficult part . in some way at first he appear to the kid to be just like his character in monte walsh and a rugged individualist who live by his own code . he have to be that to appeal to the kid in the first place . he try to make them shuck their boyish illusion about outlawry and but when push come to shove the kid can not do it . marvin be not like liberty valance in this film and a sadistic bully . but he do what he have to in order to survive a an outlaw . the film be the last appearance of arthur hunnicutt and that venerable old character who enliven any film he be in . his small bit a an age outlaw be brief and but memorable . the kid fail their apprenticeship and but they and marvin give the audience some great entertainment .