Country: US
Technical: col/scope 121m
Director: Edward Dmytryk
Cast: Henry Fonda, Richard Widmark, Anthony Quinn, Dorothy Malone
Synopsis:
A complex chain of tensions and antagonisms is set in motion when a frontier town calls in troubleshooters to defend it from a lawless rancher family and its band of gunmen, one of whom goes straight and wants to 'do things legal'.
Review:
Thoughtful Western from Fox, shot near Dead Horse Point, Utah. It may or may not have allegorical significance (Dmytryk had been blacklisted); in any case the screenplay bears the weight of pretension. The film interrogates the ancient Roman argument as to when a dictator outstays his welcome, in as much as the fictional town of Warlock hires an infamous gunman to do its dirty work, but what happens when a penitent badman turns deputy? Added to which, there is a townswoman who wants to domesticate Fonda, a prostitute who wants to be made an honest woman of, and Quinn who is homo-erotically possessive of Fonda. Historically the film occupies middle ground between My Darling Clementine and High Plains Drifter, and Fonda gets to try out his costume for Once upon a Time in the West!
Country: US
Technical: col/scope 121m
Director: Edward Dmytryk
Cast: Henry Fonda, Richard Widmark, Anthony Quinn, Dorothy Malone
Synopsis:
A complex chain of tensions and antagonisms is set in motion when a frontier town calls in troubleshooters to defend it from a lawless rancher family and its band of gunmen, one of whom goes straight and wants to 'do things legal'.
Review:
Thoughtful Western from Fox, shot near Dead Horse Point, Utah. It may or may not have allegorical significance (Dmytryk had been blacklisted); in any case the screenplay bears the weight of pretension. The film interrogates the ancient Roman argument as to when a dictator outstays his welcome, in as much as the fictional town of Warlock hires an infamous gunman to do its dirty work, but what happens when a penitent badman turns deputy? Added to which, there is a townswoman who wants to domesticate Fonda, a prostitute who wants to be made an honest woman of, and Quinn who is homo-erotically possessive of Fonda. Historically the film occupies middle ground between My Darling Clementine and High Plains Drifter, and Fonda gets to try out his costume for Once upon a Time in the West!
