Clint Eastwood returns to the Western genre, which made him a superstar, in his second film as a director. Like his characters in Sergio Leone’s spaghetti Westerns, his character here is only known as the stranger, who rides into a small town called Lago.
Eastwood plays on Western conventions with the stranger watched suspiciously by the entire town to start off the film. Some thugs challenge him and they don’t make it to the second act. This is where the grittiness of the film kicks in with the stranger virtually raping the blonde and voluptuous Callie Travers (Marianna Hill, THE GODFATHER: PART II) in a barn. The cowardly and corrupt town quickly gathers to decide that they will give the stranger anything he wants to kill three bandits who have just been released from jail and are certainly headed back to the town for revenge. The stranger takes the work, but what the town doesn’t know is that he has an ulterior motive.
Early on he dreams of Marshal Jim Duncan (Buddy Van Horn, PALE RIDER) being bullwhipped to death in the street of Lago while the town does nothing to stop it. The mystery of the film is how the stranger is connected to this incident. The last shot alludes to an answer that is unexpected.
Part of the joy of the film is the stranger tearing apart the town and making a mockery of it, especially when he names dwarf Mordecai (Billy Curtis, EATING RAOUL) the sheriff and mayor. Eastwood directs with a subtle iconic style. Not as flashy as Leone, but the look and tone of the film certainly takes on a cool grand stature.
Eastwood’s stranger is certainly a cruel man, but once we learn more about him and his motivations most of his actions are given a reason even the rape of Travers. However, the misogynist idea that all a defiant woman needs is a good lay is the main trouble spot of the film. The stranger’s brief “courtship” of the hotel owner’s wife Sarah Belding (Verna Bloom, MEDIUM COOL) plays like a macho man’s fantasy and doesn’t work. In the end, the film’s overriding grittiness plays fine with these un-PC sexual moments. Those moments just play awkwardly; they don’t ruin the film. In whole, the production is a well-crafted, beautiful looking revenge tale that ends with a wonderful note of ambiguity.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
