High Noon

1952's HIGH NOON remains to this day a stew of controversy.  One that troubles viewers.  A (for its time) rather unconventional, mold breaking Western that largely eschews the genre's tropes in favor of using its straightforward narrative to make some bold statements about current events.  Genre pics did that.  Many sci-fi films were allegories for the "Red Scare" of the day.  Communism really gave fuel to lots of screenwriters.  You can fairly easily watch THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL or THE BLOB and make assumptions.  Many dusty oaters like this movie, too.  It is well known that HIGH NOON's screenwriter, Carl Foreman, had been a member of the Communist Party once upon a time and was eventually blacklisted from Hollywood by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).  Many viewers, quite famously including John Wayne, felt this film was metaphoric.

Marshall Will Kane (Gary Cooper) is about the turn over his badge.  He's getting married to a young Quaker girl named Amy (Grace Kelly).  Unfortunately, a really bad guy named Frank Miller (Ian MacDonald), has been released from prison and will be arriving on the noon train.  The guy who Kane sent to jail years earlier.  Miller's old gang arrives earlier and waits at the train station.  The motive is clear.

Kane and his new bride are set to leave town and start a new life.  They only get so far before the lawman just has to turn back and face his enemy.  Save the town he spent years making safe enough for women and children to walk the streets from the outlaw he put away.  It was those damned lawyers "up North" who got Miller out of prison, it seems.  Kane intends to form a posse to face the quartet.  It ain't so easy.  During a demoralizing few hours as the clocks tick down, Kane will visit just about every male in town looking to deputize them long enough to finish the task.  Be it barroom or church, he will be summarily refused.  Even his old cohorts turn their backs.

Why? Some offer opinions.  Others worry for their families.  Some are just scared.  Many feel that Kane is being stubborn and selfish.  If he just left town like he was supposed to, Miller wouldn't come a calling.  Sure.  To a fiercely dedicated man like Kane, leaving what he built to be corrupted and burned down goes against his fiber.  Shame the rest of the town (the carnal and the so-called godly alike) can't understand.  Rather quite misinterpret. Many viewers did and still do, citing that HIGH NOON has "confused" messages. It does not.  Complex....yes.

You could simplify things and analyze HIGH NOON as a study of human apathy.  A natural desire to not stir the pot, even if it means selling yourself out.  To lay down and die, and not honorably. Also of a man who finds himself alone in standing for his morals, his mission, for the greater good, no less.  I think most viewers can relate to that on some level.  Whether you're "pink in the middle" or a staunch Conservative.  This is a multilayered, multidimensional morality play that saves the expected fights and gunplay for the third act.  Most of the film is a man's crisis, his realization of so much of mankind's character.  Through long shots of Kane's weary wanderings and pained words.  Folks didn't like seeing their heroes as beaten down and conflicted.  Especially folks like John Wayne.

Too bad for them, and anyone now who would have such reservations. This is a lean, and by turns snappy and thought provoking patented classic in my book.  Cooper's passive, withdrawn performance is perfect here, and many soon to be famous actors (Lloyd Bridges, Henry Morgan, Lee Van Cleef) are just fine. Miss Kelly doesn't get much to do except look pretty and vulnerable, though her character's actions will be pivotal during the climax.

Fred Zinnemann's direction is sharp. Elmo Williams' editing is just beautiful, as is Tex Ritter's theme song "Do Not Forsake me, Oh My Darling", heard throughout the film.  HIGH NOON has moments of perfection throughout, and a conviction to match that of its protagonist.