High Noon (1952)

28 October 2019

I last watched High Noon (1952) on 3/21/2015, though I didn't give a review of it at the time. I saw it was available on Prime Video and chose to gave it another watch. A few interesting things about the film: it came out during Hollywood blacklisting, and they went through several big name actors before landing on Gary Cooper, including John Wayne and Gregory Peck. But the screenplay of a blacklisted writer turned some actors away from playing the part.

It won 4 academy awards, most notably Best Actor for Gary Cooper. Outside of Cooper the other acting is all over the place: Grace Kelly acting is timid, Katy Jurado's is oddly forced, and Lee Van Cleef never has a line of dialog. But it's a good film, and although not a "real time" film as some think it is (the movie is 85 minutes but covers a 100 minute timeframe) it's really close, and that really helps to run the tension up. High Noon is a classic, with scenes reused or parodied in countless other films (especially westerns). 9/10. 9/10

21 March 2015

Last night I watched a couple films: The Secret of NIMH (1982), finally - by recommendation - watched High Noon (1952), and rewatched Becket (1964), Also caught a random movie called The Secret of Moonacre (2008).

It was good to see NIMH again - It had been probably close to 20 years and I barely remembered it. High Noon was a very good film, but would be a tough film for repeated watches, as the movie had a slow build up to it.