Wordiezett
So much average
VividSimon
Simply Perfect
CommentsXp
Best movie ever!
RanchoTuVu
A cattle drive from Texas arrives at its destination in a town in Kansas. This sets off a wave of price gouging to take as much advantage as possible of the new business. Virginia Mayo runs a restaurant and Robert Middleton is set to open a new saloon. Marshall Robert Ryan comes face to face with the past in both Middleton and the cowboy son of a gunslinger (Jeffrey Hunter) who believes that Ryan gunned down his father in cold blood in the previous town he was a marshal in. The film is pretty good at showing the avariciousness of the merchants, who are willing to let law and order slide in order to profit from the business. Do they want law and order or wild and uncivilized profiteering led by the crooked Middleton and his gunslingers? It's a good question and the film could have been a whole lot better with a script that made more sense, especially for the beautiful Mayo, who's character is trapped in a stereotype.
classicsoncall
I was surprised at how strong this film played out for one I'd never heard of before. I guess that puts me with the majority of reviewers on this board in support of "The Proud Ones". What puts the film at odds with a lot of early Westerns is the apparent age of it's star, Robert Ryan, who looks even older than his actual age of forty seven at the time of the picture's release. It isn't unusual to find Western films where the hero feels past his prime at thirty five, as in Gregory Peck's "The Gunfighter", one of my all time favorites by the way. After watching this one, I like to compare and contrast Ryan's forceful performance with the one he did in 1971's "Lawman", where he portrayed a town sheriff who knew the difference between right and wrong, but was willing to compromise in favor of the local town boss. He didn't have the lead in that picture, but he had some memorable scenes with it's star, Burt Lancaster.Here, Ryan carries the picture all the way, with help from young Jeffrey Hunter's Thad Anderson, who see saws his way through the picture attempting to establish credibility regarding Marshal Cass Silver's (Ryan) role in the death of his father. Silver never sugar coats it for Thad, he shot the elder Anderson in a 'him or me' situation, and had no problem alluding to his victim as scum, one of the hired hands of 'Honest' John Barrett (Robert Middleton), villain of the piece. Thad hires on as a jailer, then as a deputy to help the marshal clean up Flat Rock before the final curtain comes down.For fans of Westerns, there's no escaping the similarities to 1952's "High Noon", though without the tension of a pre-determined showdown. Cass Silver is about ready to hang up his badge, while his main squeeze Sally (Virginia Mayo) tries desperately to convince her man that it's time to leave town and start a new life elsewhere. The main theme holding the story together is the lawman's need to see the present job through, even if it means an uncertain, possibly fatal end. It's what gives the film's title it's meaning, and what drives the honorable man to an honorable conclusion.Aside from the story, I was intrigued by a number of elements the picture had to offer, like it's apparent fixation on gunshot wounds to the head. Badman Pike (Ken Clark) got it in the head during the stable shootout, as well as jailer Jake. Which is even more unusual, considering that Walter Brennan by this time should have earned the right not to go out in such a bloody manner. Even Ryan's character took an early graze to the temple, which set up his problem with blurred vision and possible blindness. That's something I've seen only one other time, in the 1965 spaghetti Western "Minnesota Clay", where Cameron Mitchell's character begins to rely on the direction of sound when he starts to lose his sight.One other thing, how unusual is it to see Jeffrey Hunter limping around from a leg wound instead of Walter Brennan? It's something you notice right away, if you can get beyond Brennan's oversize handlebar mustache - you think that was real?
alexandre michel liberman (tmwest)
"The Proud Ones" can be considered one of the best westerns of the fifties. It is a forgotten film which also was not very noticed when it was originally released. Adapted from a book by Verne Athanas, it stars Robert Ryan who has to choose between being proud and face Robert Middleton, the saloon owner and his gang on an suicidal task or listen to the advice of the woman he loves, Virginia Mayo and the town people (who are motivated by greed) and run away. This is aggravated because he is losing his eyesight. There is also Thad (Jeffrey Hunter) whose father was killed by Ryan, when according to witnesses he was unarmed. How Ryan is going to face his task with the help of Hunter is what the film manages to tell us in a very convincing way and there resides its greatest merit. It is not easy to explain Ryan's and Hunter's motivation but the good story, combined with the competent performances and good direction makes all the difference. Lucien Ballard who was Budd Boetticher's favorite cinematographer adds a lot to the film which was made in Cinemascope, and therefore is a pleasure to see nowadays on a wide screen television. Remarkable also is the soundtrack with a great melody that seems to be whistled.
billpollock49
The quintessential thinking western. The man wronged (Ryan), the dependable woman in his life (Mayo), the young man searching for the truth(?) (Hunter).
A good western with the normal hallmarks of this genre. Good storyline, actors who can actually act (Jeff Hunter's best acting display since "The Searchers") and importantly in any move or TV programme , great, haunting soundtrack. The whistling of this gives this western depth and feeling. The other actors, including the head villain, all play their parts with a modicum of effort, enhancing this film.The various shootouts are well handled, with Ryan's worsening disability becoming more obvious, as an example the shootout in the barn. Hunter's young man changes as the movie progresses in now not wanting to kill a semi blind man and also realising that perhaps the sherrif is right but his search for the truth of his father will out.The final confrontation in the saloon followed by the the haunting soundtrack makes for a memorable western.
