Transparent heart icon with white outline and + sign.

Life's busy, read it when you're ready!

Create a free account to save articles for later, keep track of past articles you’ve read, and receive exclusive access to all RP resources.

White magnifying glass.

Search thousands of RP articles

Articles, news, and reviews that celebrate God's truth.

Open envelope icon with @ symbol

Get Articles Delivered!

Articles, news, and reviews that celebrate God's truth. delivered direct to your Inbox!

By:

High Noon

Western / Drama
1952 / 85 min.
Rating: 9/10

In a contender for best Western of all time, Gary Cooper plays the newly married Marshal Will Kane. His old job and his new pacifist Quaker wife Amy aren’t a good fit, so the lawman plans to retire, move away, and have a new start in a new town as a shopkeeper.

But before the happy couple can get away, Kane learns that Frank Miller, a vicious criminal that Kane put in prison, has been released, and is set to arrive in town on the noon train. Miller is looking for revenge, and his gang of four outlaws is already in town waiting for his arrival. Kane’s friends urge him to get out of town quickly, and his wife pleads for him to listen.

But the replacement marshal won’t arrive until the next day, and Kane’s sense of duty won’t allow him to run. He decides to stay, and even his wife’s ultimatum – that she’s leaving on the noon train with or without him – doesn’t change his mind.

The noon train serves as a looming deadline, and the soundtrack to the film has a ticking clock cadence, counting down the seconds. This adds to the urgency as Kane tries to rally a posse from the townspeople, and gets only refusals. Even men who have helped him before turn their backs on their marshal, finding all sorts of excuses (it struck me as a bit Matt. 22:1-14-ish, though that passage’s banquet setting is quite different).

Cautions

The big caution would be the inevitable gunfight. It doesn’t revel in gore, so yes, men get shot, but blood doesn’t get splattered.

The other caution would concern Helen Ramirez, a secondary character who was, or still is, a prostitute. She had some sort of relationship with Kane (and before that with the outlaw Miller), which puts some taint on Kane’s otherwise honorable disposition. But the backstory isn’t filled in much.

Conclusion

There’s much to love here, from the pacing, which largely takes place in real-time, to the music, sparse and awesome. The theme song, Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darling, is such a perfect match and is so popular that folks born 50 years after the film came out may well feel like it is familiar.

The best part is simply a hero we can cheer for – Kane’s courage and conviction, his willingness to risk his life for the town despite having every reason not to, is the very definition of a Christ figure. Of course, he also has a past, so he’s not a saint. But he is ready to die for townsfolk who don’t deserve his loyalty.

This is a classic with broad appeal, even for those who don’t like Westerns or black-and-white films. You should give it a chance.

Enjoyed this article?

Get the best of RP delivered to your inbox every Saturday for free.



Red heart icon with + sign.
Drama, Family, Movie Reviews

The man who shot Liberty Valance

Western 1962 / 123 minutes RATING: 8/10 What does it mean to be a man? In this classic Western, Hollywood offers up two answers. Tom Doniphon (John Wayne) is a successful horse rancher living just outside the town of Shinbone who prides himself on not needing anyone and not fearing anyone. He solves his own problems, and figures that everyone else should do the same. Self-reliant - that, in his mind, is what makes a man a real man. Ransom Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart) is a lawyer, newly arrived to Shinbone who starts a school for both children and adults when he discovers that most can't read. He wants to bring law and order to town, but via the law book, and not the gun barrel, and that makes him naive. But he's also principled and caring, and that, in his mind, is what makes a man a man. To put both these models of manhood to the test, we have Liberty Valance, a bully and a killer. He and his gang do whatever they want, and none of the town folk dare stop him. Doniphon could stop him... but that would be solving other people's problems for them. Ransom wants to stop him... but he'll need more than just his law books. Cautions This is an all-time classic that everyone will enjoy...if they have the patience for it. It starts off slow, and the pacing throughout is far more relaxed than anything a modern viewer is used to. If it were made today, they would cut at least a half hour. But, if you go in understanding that, then this will be a grand film. It's the nature of Westerns to have some violence in them, but in this one a lot of it occurs offscreen, though just barely so, as when Ransom is whipped. Onscreen we see a manic Liberty striking furiously, but Ransom is just below the frame, so we don't see the blows land. A couple of people are shot, but without any real gore. The only language concerns would be one use of "damn." Conclusion If your children regularly watch TV then the pace of this film will be too slow to keep their interest. But otherwise this would be a classic worth sharing with the family including children maybe 10 years old and up. It's good fodder for a discussion about the difference between Hollywood's ideal man, and the type of man God calls us to be in passages like Ephesians 5:21-33. ...