On the day of his wedding to beautiful blonde Quaker Amy Fowler (Grace Kelly), Marshall Will Kane (Gary Cooper) learns that formerly incarcerated killer Frank Miller (Ian MacDonald) is on his way to town to exact revenge. With his selfish deputy Harvey Pell (Lloyd Bridges) turning in his badge when his attempts at blackmail fail, and with the entire town turning their backs on him, the Marshall refuses to leave and instead slowly counts down the hours until Miller and his gang arrive and the confrontation can begin.

CRITIQUE

What is there to say about director Fred Zinnemann’s 1952 Western classic High Noon that hasn’t already been said? Not much, probably, but that doesn’t mean I still don’t have to try all the same. The simple fact is that this is one motion picture that is every bit as good as the hype, and as far as landmark entertainments go this one’s place in cinematic history isn’t even remotely up for debate.

For my part, the interesting thing here is that, as a kid, I actually didn’t quite understand all the acclaim. Watching it with my dad on PBS I thought it was perfectly okay and all, but what he and my grandfather were so energized and enthusiastic about I just couldn’t see.

As I got older and I wandered into my teens I decided to give High Noon another chance. Part of the reason was that this was Zinnemann’s only Western, and after going through a large portion of his filmography (including The Day of Jackal, Oklahoma!, The Men and A Man for All Seasons) it only seemed right that give this one a go, too.

I was shocked by just how much my feelings for the film had changed in just a scant few years. At 13, I was able to see the brilliance in the director’s staging, how subtle his camerawork was, how the whole picture looked like it just sprang forth right out of one of those black and white Civil War photo books I was studying for my AP American History class. I was flabbergasted by the simplicity of the pacing and the beauty of the performances, finally able to comprehend and understand just how ahead of its time the picture was in its handling of its female and minority characters.

Most of all, though, I was absolutely in awe of Cooper. Suddenly it made perfect sense to me why he won the Oscar for his work here, Marshall Kane one of the most remarkably complex characters to ever grace a Western. The man runs the gamut here, and while his scenes trying to get help are all well-played and remarkably dynamic, it is the moments when he is alone that blew me away. The fear in his face, the almost haphazard shuffle to his gate and the quickly fidgety sideways glances this way and that, are truly astonishing. In these moments, it is almost as if Cooper has stripped Kane down to his very soul leaving him as bare and as naked as the day he was born.

I could talk about so much more here but I think it’s best to just leave it at that. This is a movie that should be require viewing for anyone who even slightly calls themselves a cinephile, and as far as the genre is concerned this one’s right up there with The Searchers, Unforgiven, The Man from Laramie, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon as one of the greatest of all time.

THE VIDEO

I don’t know how many times High Noon has seen a DVD release (I just know there has been a lot of them); all I do know is that the film has probably never looked better than it does now. Lionsgate has done an exemplary job restoring it, the original 4x3 Full Screen image so crisp and clear one almost has to wonder if they’d cleaned the film up too much. Either way, the picture looks terrific, and that’s all I’ve got to say about it.

THE AUDIO

The only available audio track is the Enhanced Original Restored Dolby Digital Audio and it comes with optional English and Spanish subtitles.

THE EXTRAS

This two-disc ultimate collector’s edition is loaded with extras. All are good, some are extraordinary, the only problem being a lot of them cover the same material over and over again. There is a huge problem with repetition here, and as great as the featurettes and documentaries are you can only listen to someone talk about the saga of Carl Foreman or the relationship between Zinnemann and producer Stanley Kramer so many times before your head starts to spin.

For those in dire need of a recap, however, the extras here include:

• Audio Commentary with Maria Cooper-Janis, Jonathan Forman, Tim Zinnemann and John Ritter – It’s odd listening to Ritter (this commentary was recorded for a previous release), I must admit, but you get used to his voice relatively quickly. Overall this is a nice commentary, the children of most of the principals having a great time getting together to reminisce about their respective father’s achievements.
• Inside High Noon - A relatively recent documentary on the making of the film. Good, solid stuff, the only problem being after you watch it there isn’t going to be a reason to view any of the other featurettes because all the material is pretty much covered in full here.
• Tex Ritter: A Visit to Carthage, Texas – A pleasing if unremarkable portrait of the Tex Ritter museum
• Full-Length Tex Ritter Performance of Oscar-Winning Original Song “Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin’” from the Jimmy Dean TV Show – Great song used to magnificent, metronomic effect in the film. This performance didn’t really do anything for me, though, I somewhat loathe to admit.
• The Making of High Noon – A brief featurette on the film covering exactly the same material as the longer doc, just doing it faster and without any sort of depth.
• Behind High Noon – And one more featurette that covers the exact same material, only this time there are some pretty neat interviews with both Zinnemann and Kramer just a short while before their respective deaths.
• Radio Broadcast with Tex Ritter – The radio broadcast of the film. If you liked the ones found on some of the Warner releases like The Maltese Falcon then this is the extra for you.

FINAL THOUGHTS

High Noon is a great film, even if I embarrassingly didn’t quite notice it the first time around. Like the ticking of a clock, however, this one trudges on with the grace and magnificence of a true classic. If you haven’t seen it, what the heck are you waiting for? If you have, do yourself a favor and pick this new two-disc collector’s edition DVD set today. Trust me, you won’t be disappointed.