High Noon (1952)

I don't particularly want to say a whole lot about High Noon – I think the whole world has probably had some sort of comment on it, and the historical context. Gary Cooper plays a newly married (to his pacifist quaker wife, Grace Kelly) town marshal. Just after his wedding he discovers that a man he'd previously had sentenced to death has been pardoned and is returning to town. In his first role, Lee Van Cleef does some effective standing at the station looking threatening. The townspeople all refuse to help, either out of fear, dislike of the newly tamed frontier (and thus sympathy with the villains), or a belief that this is someone else's problem. This section was—I believe—intended as an analogy for blacklisting and people's failure to stand against it.

The film is clearly a classic, and excellently made. The ratcheting up of tension as it gets closer to the arrival of the noon train is particularly effective. I felt that the story as a whole is perhaps a bit too "forced" – it is clearly focused on making a point and it's hard to ignore that. Gary Cooper is excellent throughout, which is good since the vast majority of the film is just about him. Grace Kelly is a bit weaker – she doesn't seem to have terribly much to do (this may be a problem with scripting rather than acting) and you get no real sense of her personal conflict. Unlike some people though, I don't have a huge problem with her intervention in the ending. The Tex Ritter theme song used throughout is also a highlight.