Max’s Drive-In Movie – High Noon

When I see Gary Cooper I think of one person…and that is Lou Gehrig because he did a great job portraying him in Pride of the Yankees. Gary Cooper plays Sheriff Will Kane in this western on his wedding day. Grace Kelly plays his Quaker’s new wife and she is stunning. Katy Jurado is also great in the role of Helen Ramírez, a beautiful and successful woman. 

High Noon theater

There are other excellent Westerns like The Unforgiven, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, The Eastwood Trilogy, The Searchers, and Tombstone…this is right up there with them. It’s very uncluttered and doesn’t have 20 plotlines going on at once…it’s simple but exciting. I’ve watched this movie around 5 times and I always find something I didn’t before.

The Killer Frank Miller is due on the noon train and his first order of business is to kill Kaine, a man who Kane helped send to prison five years ago and swore blood vengeance at the time. The three members of his gang are waiting at the depot. Miller escaped hanging, got a long sentence, and some idiots on the parole board turned him loose.

Cooper is a man’s man in this one…a badass but a laid-back one. He refuses to run away from a fight despite having no help from the town members who say he once saved the town. He visits the bar and The church and gets nothing. He takes them on himself.

The 40s and 50s had some great character actors. One in this movie I always have liked…Thomas Mitchell, was in some Capra films, including It’s A Wonderful Life. You have other actors that you have heard of. Harry Morgan of Dragnet and M*A*S*H. Future movie stars Lloyd Bridges and Lon Chaney Jr.

Give this one a watch…it’s only 85 minutes long and Cooper just oozes goodness in many roles including this one. He is not an anti-hero but a man who stands for what is right no matter the cost. This film explores the best and worst of mankind.

The fictional Tony Soprano : Let me tell ya something. Nowadays, everybody’s gotta go to shrinks, and counselors, and go on “Sally Jessy Raphael” and talk about their problems. What happened to Gary Cooper? The strong, silent type. That was an American. He wasn’t in touch with his feelings. He just did what he had to do.

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

26 thoughts on “Max’s Drive-In Movie – High Noon”

  1. This was my father’s favourite Western. I have to see it again since I hardly remember it. I saw ‘the Unforgiven’ very recently for the first time and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Having said all this ‘the Western’ is one of my least favourite genres. I haven’t even got one Western in my top 100 movies. Did you see the Coen Brothers ‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’. I liked that.

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    1. Oh I like that one as well…the Buster Scruggs movie… In my top 5 is The Good, Bad, and Ugly, this one, and Tombstone easily.
      This one is simple and straight ahead…that is what I like about it. Cooper does what nobody wants to do.

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    1. Yea I like that fact…that is what I like about it. I don’t like 20 subplots going on…not just westerns but some TV shows as well. It’s short and gets to the point.

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  4. “High Noon” is a true classic I watched many moons ago while growing up in Germany. There was a time when pretty much each Saturday evening they would show a Western movie on TV. I watched many of them starring John Wayne, Glenn Ford and, of course, Gary Cooper.

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    1. Thank you Randy! You surprised me on Thursday when you said you saw North Dallas Forty…not many people have I don’t think…this one…I love. I love the simplicity of it and it gets to the point. Cooper was one of the greats.

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      1. You certainly couldn’t forget ND40 those scenes with the drugs were quite startling. I know it’s controversial but my favourite Cooper film is The Fountain Head. It’s pretty much unavailable but I’d love to see it again.

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      2. I have that one movie…I’ll email ya… yea that is the way sports were played back then…from everything I’ve read…it’s right on the mark.

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  8. Great film on so many levels. Cooper was perfect so was the rest of the cast. Lee Van Cleef makes an appearance. This and Hanging Tree are two faves. Cooper w understated and truthful. Believed everything he did. The song Phil mentioned works for me also. Top pick Max

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    1. I forgot the simplicity of it until recently…I love how it gets to the point…Cooper was spot on in this one.
      I will have to look for Lee Van Cleef…I can’t believe I missed him.

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    1. I’ll have to check that out. I just saw the trailer…some of it looks like Rambo before Rambo when he is in the mountains. Thanks for that.

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      1. I’ll go all soft eyed and nostalgic for a moment. I saw this with my Dad, probably one Sunday night at the local cinderblock threadbare curtained cinema. We biked there from home and back, discussing it on the way home. Thinking on it now, I can remember cycling through the light and dark pools of the street lights.

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