I was right to wait for the Criterion release before watching this. It looks great on blu-ray and the commentary with Jimmy Stewart interviewed by film historian Paul Lindenschmidt in 1989 is a treasure to hear (Stewart died in 97). Winchester '73 is Mann's second western, the first being The Furies in 1950. He had done mostly light comedies and noir in the 40s. Winchester '73 is a taut 92-minute story of revenge and pursuit, with a secret shared between the protagonist and chief antagonist that isn't revealed until the end: [spoiler alert] Lin McAdam (Stewart) and Dutch Henry Brown (Stephen McNally) are brothers.

The plot is this: Stewart rides into Dodge City with his buddy Frankie Wilson (Millard Mitchell) to find McNally. They meet with Wyatt Earp who seizes their guns per local ordinance. The town's Centennial shooting contest for a Winchester '73 prize rifle sets the stage. Stewart and McNally are crackshots with rifles, achieving perfect groupings on targets, and both are able to shoot a coin tossed in the air. The way this was shot from below and across the shoulder of each actor is interesting. Stewart says in the commentary that they had an actual gunman and sharpshooter off camera hitting the coins; real bullets struck the coins. Next they try shooting at a small ring-shaped disc from a nearby Indian's necklace; the idea is for the bullet to hit the outer ring and not go through the middle hole. McNally misses and so does Stewart. As they reach stalemate, Stewart proposes a final challenge by grabbing a nearby citizen's letter in his pocket, removing the stamp and placing it over the ring hole. He then shoots straight through it and wins the rifle. Going back to his room to pack, Stewart is attacked by McNally and the rifle stolen. They flee town with Stewart in pursuit.

Next is a scene in Riker's bar where an Indian trader played marvelously by Far Country's John McIntire plays cards with the McNally gang. McIntire is hypnotized by the Winchester rifle, as are many characters in the movie. It passes from person to person like a bad luck charm and everyone who gazes upon it must caress it and ogle it like it's Tolkien's One Ring. Quite unusual and entertaining concept for a western in 1950. This is a Borden Chase story incidentally. McNally and his gang are without guns, having fled Dodge City right after stealing the Winchester, so he plays for winnings to buy guns but ends up selling the Winchester when luck turns against him. He's kicked out after trying to grab someone else's gun to pull on McIntire. Later we see McIntire approach nearby Indians and their leader Young Bull (Rock Hudson) to buy weapons. There's a spectacular shot of Young Bull against the setting sun and silhouette of an Indian on horseback. In the commentary Stewart notes how hard it is to get that focus and depth of field against the sun. Young Bull invariably eyes the Winchester and demands it. Here the scene cuts and we learn what happens later when McNally spots McIntire sitting at a campfire from afar and in a macabre twist is in fact dead.

Meanwhile, a saloon girl and her fiance whom we saw earlier leaving Dodge City are attacked by Indians out in the frontier. The husband flees on horseback in a panic, leaving her behind on a wagon. When he spots a cavalry camp nearby he rides back and has her bring the wagon with him. They find out the cavalry have been surrounded by Indians for days. Soon Stewart and Mitchell who notice Indians tailing them ride into the camp as well. We get some nice dialogue here and character moments, including hints that Shelly Winters and Stewart are drawn to each other. The next morning the Indians attack and are fended off. Young Bull is killed and the prize Winchester drops to the ground. Stewart and Mitchell leave, oblivious to this fact. A young soldier played by Tony Curtis spies the Winchester on the ground and it's given to Winters' fiance. Both travel to a house which is set to become theirs. The fiance has planned to meet with an outlaw named Waco Johnny Dean played superbly by Dan Duryea. He is all sleaze and villainous charm, riding into town with his gang and immediately occupying the house and shooting back at lawmen outside. Duryea too eyeballs the rifle and is overcome with envy. He ends up shooting the fiance and abducts Winters, taking her with him as his gang is killed and the house burned.

They reach a hideout where McNally is planning a bank robbery in Tascosa. In a subsequent scene, Stewart and Mitchell ride into town and there's a shootout with Duryea who is killed. Stewart chases McNally on the heels of the bank heist and they have a dueling shootout in rocky terrain on the outskirts of town. It's an interesting duel because each has a rifle and they're using the ricochet of the bullets between rocky crevices to subdue the other. It's a cat and mouse game with two skilled shooters, yet Stewart prevails by carefully waiting while McNally reloads. Mann employs striking deep focus photography here and in other scenes. The Winchester is reclaimed and the movie ends.

I love this quote by Shelley Winters who did not understand the film: "Here you've got all these men running around to get their hands on this goddamn rifle instead of going after a beautiful blonde like me. What does that tell you about the values of that picture? If I hadn't been in it, would anybody have noticed?" Ha, when she puts it that way... I find it refreshing that the western trope of a love interest takes a back seat to something more elemental and allegorical: a coveted object. It's like the Maltese Falcon in the west. Mann shoots many closeups and perfectly framed shots of the rifle with its inscription plate on the rifle butt. Contemporary audiences might see similarities in how Peter Jackson constantly intercut close ups of the ring.

This is about as perfect as a classic western can get, although I prefer Bend of the River for entertainment value. Still, this is definitively the best Mann & Stewart western. While watching it I noticed such virtuosity in the filmmaking: superb black & white photography, lighting, and the way Mann does his shots with very little camera movement. Everything is set up in a scene to aid the composition and whoever appears in the frame stays still while a flurry of activity might be going on in the background. When the camera does move there's energy and excitement. The shots of Stewart and Mitchell riding in the wilderness on a hill against a gleaming bright sky look like stylized pen-and-ink or woodcut illustrations. It defies realism and yet doesn't look fake. A simple moment like this had me reflecting on what it is about older movies in b&w that I love so much: they best approximate illustrations in books. I had this same feeling watching Treasure of Sierra Madre or Night of the Hunter.

I get a sense with these films that what I'm seeing is like illustrations come alive, as if a fable is being told and the b&w film on these 35mm cameras capture the dreamlike essence of a picture book. Nowadays everything has to look photorealistic yet sterile and soulless; the banality of modern life color desaturated or muted. Put aside all the problems with digital color grading, the cyan urine filters and teal blues that look so obnoxious. We've lost something about the magic of film to transport us to a storybook world. Quoting Bogdanovich quoting Jean Renoir: "When we achieve perfect realism we will have achieved perfect decadence."