Anthony Mann’s terrific final western is a potent examination of one man’s battle against his own darker impulses. Gary Cooper stars as Link Jones, who manages to cover several seemingly contradictory western archetypes.
At first glance, he’s a hayseed yokel, a rube from the sticks daunted by the smoke-billowing steam engine on his first train ride. He struggles to bend his limbs into the carriage seat and confides to a friendly huckster that he’s on his way to hire a school teacher and, yes, he does happen to be carrying a full year’s wages.
Your heart sinks. Surely this is a man who is about to get chewed up and spat out by tougher, smarter souls who survive in the Wild West by living on their wits and other people’s money; but Link has a secret past, one that becomes clear after he, the conman and a show girl are left behind when the train is robbed by bandits.
The bandits, led by the monstrous Dock Tobin, are Link’s relatives. He ran with the gang for most of his early life. And more from desperation than any lingering affection, Link seeks them out and asks for shelter.
Mann combines the drama of the west’s broad vistas with a claustrophobic parlour piece that rakes up simmering grudges and sexual tension in a shack full of murderers. Link may have left his outlaw persona behind long ago, but it’s the only thing likely to keep him alive. Anthony Mann, 12, 100min
Available on Blu-ray from March 23