An exemplary work of art that transcends the western genre entirely and felt like watching a great classic movie regardless of its western setting. It doesn't have the traditional western tropes either. There's no heroic gunfighting except for the final battle at the end, which is more a cat-and-mouse sequence than a macho showdown. For that reason it strikes me as one of the first revisionist westerns. The characters don't fall into typical archetypes. There's almost no glamorizing of the western frontier as it takes place mostly in town. Instead we're watching Gary Cooper march through empty streets looking for help of any kind to deal with an outlaw. Cooper was the sheriff who put him away, but this criminal was let off by a judge and jury and now seeks revenge. He has three confederates waiting for him at the train station in town and we see many shots of the gang lulling about until he arrives (Lee van Cleef being one of them).

The outlaw's train is expected at noon and so the whole movie is a tense buildup to this: can Cooper find enough good samaritans in town to take up the gun and help him? The constant tension around a clock striking noon is indelible. The director obsessively cuts to close-up shots of the clock face to remind us that time is running out. This idee fixe coupled with Cooper's glorious outfit--that black vest over white shirt, black pants and prominent pocket watch chain (as if time itself is a ball and chain)--it's all iconic. Cooper's wife, a young Grace Kelly, wants them to leave town and never look back. Cooper knows they'll just be hunted wherever they go. He tries appealing his case to all sorts of folks and they turn him down out of cowardice, self interest, apathy, or impotence. There's a sad, stoic pain in Cooper as he repeatedly walks up and down the streets, like Diogenes looking for an honest man. A young Lloyd Bridges plays his former deputy who abandons him as well.

Fred Zinnemann's direction is virtuosic. At 80 minutes long the film showcases some of the best editing you'll see. No minute is wasted. The final shootout is messy, unheroic even, as Cooper survives not with a quick draw, but through ambush and retreat tactics. He comes around behind the four men, takes one out and retreats to a barn, takes a sniping shot before another henchman can see it coming, and continues a rearguard action. A later revisionist western, McCabe and Mrs. Miller may have been influenced by this: there's a similarity in how Warren Beatty takes out the three bounty hunters at the end through stealth and surprise. At any rate, the conclusion is victorious, yet abrupt and sour. Almost immediately after Cooper takes out the final guy and is wounded himself, he gets up into a wagon with Grace Kelly and they ride off out of town to the credits rolling. Pure bitterness here, as if Cooper is wiping his hands and saying "Fine, I had to do it all myself" and leaves in contempt, disgusted with the town.

From the special features it's clear the film had enormous resonance for its time in connection to the Hollywood blacklisting and McCarthy era. Yet I don't think the political messaging was on the nose. How I see it is a commentary on human nature: that people aren't always going to stand up and do the right thing and help his fellow man when he needs it. It was a wise choice in the screenplay that Cooper didn't die at the end. Had he been killed, the film would merely be a somber morality play lecturing us not to abandon men in need. It touches on this theme while showing us that Cooper handled it himself in spite of the townsfolk. That's a better ribbon to tie this bow. Really, this film could have been set in 1500 Japan or 1920s Chicago or any kind of scenario where a man cannot find allies at a desperate hour. It just happens to be a western and one of the greatest ever made.