Lieutenant Crane of the U. S. Cavalry is assigned to clean up and bring law and order to a frontier town and area ruled by a gang of cattle rustlers. His only help is Molly Graham and her brother, Jim who run the town newspaper after their father was murdered by the outlaws.
Broncho Billy and the coward are both in love with the school teacher at Snakeville. Broncho is accepted, and the coward, mad with jealousy, induces the unsuspecting rival to carry through a mock hold-up. When Broncho Billy appears as a highwayman, the school teacher shoots at him. The coward has left the crowd and fires at Broncho.
In a frontier town between the USA and Mexico, Sancho and his gang assault a monastery, kill a few monks who try to oppose the invasion of the sacred building, and get away with a work of art in gold and diamonds. Andrej, a lonesome cowboy, is informed of his brother's death, one of the monks, and starts a search for the gang. Among the lawless and godless men, a fight for getting the better part of the loot is taking place and blood is flowing as much as bullets.
The Pony Express was one of the most legendary of the frontier trails in the American West. Riding for the Pony Express was a dangerous job. No one has an exact amount of riders that lost their life while delivering the mail. This short film was filmed on the actual Pony Express trail used over 150 years ago.
Easterner Robert Wagner has been lured West by the Government's announcement of new land grants. As he prepares for the approaching land rush he make the acquaintance of Westerner Jim Henderson and his wild daughter, Tex. Tex is a true daughter of the frontier unhampered by conventions or skirts and while she finds herself smitten with Wagner, he however is hampered by his New England sensibilities and can't abide a woman that behaves as Tex does. It takes a truly grim turn of events before Tex can prove herself to this reserved New Englander.
A Man hunts down his father, to exact revenge for his ill-fitting name. However, his pain and anger threaten to tear apart the Universe. The Continuum sends his herald, Time, to fix this complex conundrum.
A Mexican bandit faces the firing squad - the call to fire about to be made. Suddenly, out of nowhere a lone man appears, killing the entire squad. But this act of mercy was not performed out of kindness or compassion...the stranger has one half of a map that leads to a cache of gold; the outlaw has the other.
Harding Martin and David Patrick are both desperately in love with Elsie Johnson. Each tries to gain some advantage over his rival. Pretty Elsie coquettishly enjoys their rivalry and fosters it.
Three fellows band together to help a woman find her uncle's cache of gold in this western. All they have to help them is a tattered map that her uncle, a prisoner of war, created in camp. Unfortunately two badguys have the map and try to turn the three goodguys against the niece. They do not succeed and justice prevails.
A New Yorker on his first trip out West falls in love with a beautiful woman he sees as he steps off the train. An hour later he finds himself forced at gunpoint to marry the very same woman, then is forced to fight the girl's family and friends to keep her.
Wells Fargo agents Jack Douglas (Kirby Grant) and Bosco O'Toole (Fuzzy Knight) are sent after a gang of stage robbers. Danny Burton (Bernard Thomas, brother of Laura Burton (Jane Adams, is implicated before Jack is able to prove that saloon owner Lee Fain (Danny Morton) is the man behind the outlaw gang.
Setting West was made using original printing materials from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, such as wood type, borders and stereotypes of “Cowboys and Indians”, trains and bison. These words and images were printed directly onto 35mm clear film stock at eminent letterpress studios in North America: the Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum in Two Rivers, the Center for Book and Paper Arts in Chicago, the Hatch Show Print in Nashville and the Musée de l’imprimerie du Québec & Lovell Litho in Montréal. Judith Poirier printed 1,643 feet of film to produce her abstract western and her technique of printing onto celluloid creates a unique texture on screen, as well as generating an original soundtrack. Setting West reinterprets a classic cinematic genre while exploring a formative period in the history of typography and printing.
Evil mayor Mr. Mayor and his mistress Emily want to start a war between the ranchers and peaceful Bukkake natives that live in the forest by the riverside. In order to challenge the natives, they incite the rancher Bob McAllister to attack and dishonor the daughter of the big chief Long Banana.
Texas Guinan is having her cattle rustled, so she head into town to hire a night rider. While her one employee is checking out Pat Hartigan, she overhears someone say she needs a husband to manage the ranch. So she pulls out a gun, orders the new preacher over, and marries him at gunpoint, which he doesn't object to. When Hartigan comes over, she opines she's married the wrong man, but facts are facts.