High Noon (1952)

 “You risk your skin catching killers and the juries turn them loose so they can come back and shoot at you again. If you're honest you're poor your whole life and in the end you wind up dying all alone on some dirty street. For what? For nothing. For a tin star.”

            Until I watched High Noon I had yet to find a western that felt intense. To me there just never seems to be any tension because they all seem the same. There is a small Midwestern town in the middle of nowhere where the sheriff has to save the day from some outlaws and bandits. That is pretty much what goes on in High Noon but told differently, artistically, and brilliantly.

            Will Kane (Gary Cooper) has just married Amy Fowler (Grace Kelly). He is the town’s sheriff but he had planned to leave the position to become a storekeeper. From the train station the stationmaster runs into town to warn Will that Ben and Frank Miller have been released from jail and along with two other outlaws Jack Colby and Jim Pierce are set to come into town on the noon train.

            Upon hearing the news Will immediately leaves with Amy. When they are a little ways out of town Will stops the wagon and tells Amy that him running is exactly what Frank Miller wants him to do and if he were to run it might not be good for the townspeople and they would also try to hunt him down wherever he goes. Will turns the wagon around and heads back to town. As the time ticks down Will struggles with what to do. He goes to the local saloon to try to gather up special deputies to help fight the outlaws. No one there wants to help because most of them are friends with the Millers and others have changed their minds about him as a sheriff. Will then interrupts church services to gather people. Several of the church members do not want to help him either mostly because he was unable to keep the brothers behind bars and now they may come and hurt their children and destroy their town.

            In the meantime Amy has given Will an ultimatum. He either leaves with her or she leaves on her own on the noon train. Will decides to stay and finish what needs to be finished.

            The time and train come into town. Everyone is indoors waiting and protecting themselves for whatever may come. Amy was on the train when she hears gunfire erupt. She rushes off the train and to the Marshall’s office.  Will has the outlaws chase him to the edge of town to barn. They have him trapped for a moment as they try to burn down the barn Will is hiding in. Will manages to kill one of the outlaws from his perch until he is forced down from the fire.

            Hiding in the Marshall’s office Amy sees one of the outlaws. She finds a gun and shoots the man dead. The last outlaw left alive is Frank Miller. He finds her and drags her out of the office. Frank tells Will to come out or he will kill Amy. As soon as Will shows himself he throws Amy to the ground and begins to shoot. Amy attacks Frank and Will is able to shoot the outlaw dead.

            Immediately following the end of the battle the townspeople come out of their homes and businesses. Will throws his badge on the ground and he and Amy finally leave the town for a new life.

            What I liked about the story with High Noon is that you know the outlaws are coming to kill Will but it is the build up and anticipation of the coming fight that creates this great tension. We see Will all tense with anticipation and helplessness. I also really liked how Will is shown to be a good man but from what everyone else says to him about him and them not wanting to help you see that maybe Will Kane is not a very good man. Like, he has tried to do his best but he either was not up to the task as much as the people would have liked or he just did a lousy job protecting the town. Adding to the tension was the direction. Several of the shots were from below or just level with the actors in the scenes where their anxiety is building. The direction I felt was artistic and different for a Western. I like artistic-ness when it comes to certain films. I never would have thought that combined with a Western that style or effect would have worked so well. I liked how there was very little action and it was more of a story of a man with conflicting morals and emotions than all action.

            High Noon is a very good classic Western that is worth watching. 

They Won't Forget (1937)

They Won’t Forget is a film with a story that unfortunately is still relevant today. Fortunately though, society is not as primitive as it was back in the 1930s, I say “not as primitive” because let’s face it with certain things we still are. We are supposed to be more understanding and willing to see the truth and sometimes more than not we do not want to see the truth we are blind to it. We get one idea in our head and it is hard to get it out.

            Robert Hale is a teacher for a secretarial school for girls in a small southern town. Robert is from the north and not too many people trust him. The head of the school comes in to let his class go because it is memorial day for the Confederate dead. The students laugh at him after he gets reamed out by the head of the school. One of the students Mary Clay (Lana Turner) gets upset at her classmates for laughing at him because she likes him.

            After they are let out Mary and her friend go to a drug store and get milkshakes. Mary realizes she forgot her vanity case in the class room and goes back to get it. She passes a professor outside the building and the janitor hears her walk up the stairs. That night Mary’s date cannot find her so he goes to the school where her friend said she had gone.

            At the school the janitor comes out along with Robert when he left for the day. The janitor goes back into the building. Robert goes home and tells his wife he went to the barber when she mentions he smells like perfume. He also tells her that he stayed at the school to grade papers. Robert wants to go back home up north he feels there is a barrier between them and the people of the town. He wife convinces him to stay. When she goes to kiss him she sees a spot on his collar. He tells her the barber must have cut him.

            That night the janitor calls the police about a murder. He repeats hysterically over and over that he did not do it. The police find Mary’s body. Mary’s boyfriend tells the new sheriff Andy Griffin (Claude Rains) that Robert was in the school when he went to look for Mary. Her friend tells a reporter that Mary was crazy about Robert. Two detectives are sent to question Robert. One of them reads a note Robert had in his hand and another comes out with his stained suit. The detectives take Robert, the letter, and the suit downtown.

            The reporters practically invade Robert’s apartment. They tell his wife that her husband is being held in jail. The reporters publish that Robert was looking to go away. The whole town thinks he is guilty and that Andy should have prosecute him.

            Soon the entire nation is made aware of the case. The northern papers want to sell the prejudice angle. A famous New York detective comes down to do his own investigation into the murder. The investigator is eventually beaten up and run out of town. 

            The owner of the school where Mary was killed hires a lawyer for the janitor because he thinks the New York investigator will try to pin the murder on the janitor since he is a black man to get Robert out of jail. A powerful northern lawyer named Gleason (Otto Kruger) comes down to defend Robert. Robert is of course found guilty of the murder. The entire trial was unfair. Even the governor knows the trial was unfair and only gives Robert a life sentence instead of another trial.

            Mary’s brothers organize a mob to kill Robert. Andy felt terrible for having not been able to protect Robert from being killed. He sent a check to Robert’s widow. She comes to his office and tells him and the reporter there that they are the ones who had Robert killed. When Robert’s widow leaves Andy looks out the window and says to the reporter he wonders if Robert was really guilty.

            The cast was alright. This was Lana Turner’s first speaking role and she was completely adorable. A month before this she had been found in a drug store and her screen test had been for this film. Turner was the only good actor in this entire film. Alright, maybe except Otto Kruger but he was barely in the film. Claude Rains was laughable which is a total shame. He was ridiculous in the courtroom scene he was so awful. Rains over acted like hell.

            They Won’t Forget was really powerful. I like how it was ambiguous how we do not know if Robert was truly guilty or not. Prejudice was really strong and blinded the people of the small southern town where they could not look at evidence or see clearly to question if this northern man was truly guilty or innocent. Their blind hate and rage for an outsider clouded their judgment. That kind of injustice drives me insane. I think it drives me insane because I am thinking of the story with a modern mind. We have all this technology and criminology and such that I think how all those things could have truly proven Robert’s guilt or innocence. They Won’t Forget was a bit boring after a while especially with the acting since it was so poor. Besides the acting the story is very powerful and suggest seeing the film once for it. You will be amazed how not too much has changed in America since that time. 

Ever in My Heart (1933)

There are so many films about World War II it is rare today to see a film about the First World War. I know Downton Abbey is, at the time of this writing, currently taking place during WWI (or so I have heard I do not watch the show) but it is not a film. One of the many reasons why I like films from the 1920s and 1930s is because when they talk about “The War” they are talking about the one from 1914-1918. Most of the war films from the 1930s were about men fighting in Europe and while their wives and families were home waiting for them. Warner Bros. 1933 film Ever in My Heart is different. Instead of telling the story of the hardships on the Front it tells of the hardships faced on the home front of a man who was a peaceful American citizen, and was cruelly treated because he happened to come from Germany.

            Mary (Barbara Stanwyck) and her family are waiting for the return of her counsin Jeff (Ralph Bellamy) and his friend from Germany. Jeff has been away a long time. Everyone keeps asking if Mary and Jeff will become engaged. Jeff returns home with his German friend Hugo (Otto Kruger). Mary is taken with Hugo immediately. For the next few days and weeks Mary and Hugo has been with each other. The help starts to talk about Mary being with Hugo. They all want Mary to be with Jeff. Her grandmother and other cousin are upset when Mary becomes engaged to Hugo. Mary sits down and talks with Jeff. He agrees the two of them drifted apart and is happy to see his friends together.

            As the years go on Hugo becomes a professor at a college. He and Mary have a son named Teddy and he eventually becomes an American citizen. The day after Hugo became a citizen World War I begins. Mary’s brother Sam lost a friend on the Lusitania. He does not even want to stay in their house in a German atmosphere. Mary was supposed to be giving a tea party that day but all the ladies call and cancel. Hugo noticed that everyone backed out of playing tennis with him that day as well. Soon Hugo is let from his job at the college. He flips out on Mary when she suggests they go to stay with her family because they have never accepted him. More grief strikes the family when Teddy becomes ill and dies.

            No one in town likes Hugo even though he is an American citizen. Even the kids in town hate him and they hurt his dachshund because it is also German. The poor god was do badly hurt by the kids Hugo shoots him. He cannot understand why Mary stays with him. He tells her to go to her family until he can get things straightened out. She does not want to but does so because she loves Hugo. Jeff and the grandmother come to take Hugo and Mary back home. The grandmother says that Hugo can work in the mill but if he does he has to change his last name. Hugo refuses it was his father’s name. He yells at them for not coming to pick up Teddy in the summer to get him away from the horrible heat. Mary collapses from exhaustion and hunger. Hugo tells Jeff and the grandmother to take her away he will come for her within a week. This is the first time they have been separated since they met.

            A few weeks later Mary receives a letter from Hugo. He writes that he was allowed to be a citizen but he was not allowed to be an American. He has left America to fight for his people. Mary gets a divorce and soon after leaves to work for the war effort in Europe. Jeff is also sent to Europe. He confesses to Mary that she was the only girl for him and she says he should have been the only one for her. In a small café she has been working at Mary sees Hugo. She is so happy to see him but he just looks away. Jeff lets Mary know there is a spy in the division he knows all the divisions movements for the next forty-eight hours.

            Mary goes back to her room. Hugo is there waiting for her. He is hiding because he is the spy. They still love each other and spend the night together. Mary had taken poison from one of the newest female workers. She does not want Hugo to be killed and she does not want to betray him. Mary puts the poison in both their glasses with telling Hugo. Mary holds Hugo in her arms.

            This was an early role for Barbara Stanwyck and you can already see she would be one of the best leading ladies of the screen. She was amazing. I love and adore Stanwyck in this film. She was a tough cookie as usual but she was strong tough not snarky tough like in her other Pre-Codes. Stanwyck did get a little overdramatic in one part but that can be easily overlooked she was so perfect. The ending could have gone totally wrong had there been any other actress but Stanwyck in the role. Mary had the courage and the sadness to do something so drastic as she did in the end and no other actress could have pulled it off so beautifully because they would have over played the scene. Otto Kruger keeps surprising me every time I see him in a film. I first saw him as the bad guy in Hitchcock’s Sabotage so he will always be a bad to me yet in his other films he has been nice. Kruger was a very good actor who I feel does not get enough credit. Ralph Bellamy was Ralph Bellamy the lovable guy who does not wind up with the girl. I love him even more because he never gets the girl.

            Ever in My Heart was fantastic. It was fantastic because it was different. There is no denying that there are moments when it is melodramatic but come on this an early talking film and a film from 1930s and if you know your film history you will understand. It was so sad what happened to Hugo how he was discriminated against because he was German. The same thing is happening now and has for throughout history. Hugo was a good man and loved America because he loved an American woman. It was tragic that he no longer felt wanted in his new homeland and left his wife to fight against it. That is what made Ever in My Heart interesting to watch and what made the story so touching and good. Ever in My Heart is unfortunately not available to view on Youtube nor is it on DVD. I caught the film on TCM some time ago and if the channel ever airs it again definitely watch it.