High Noon

DVD Features:

Audio:

• Dolby Digital 5.1 - English
• Subtitles - English, Spansih

• Audio Commentary
• Documentaries - 1. INSIDE HIGH NOON
                          2. TEX RITTER: A VISIT TO CARTHAGE TEXAS
                          3. BEHIND HIGH NOON
• Featurettes - 1. The Making of HIGH NOON - Hosted by Leaonard Maltin
                     2. Full-length Tex Ritter Performance of Oscar-Winning Song
                     3. Radio Broadcast with Tex Ritter (Audio)

Major Awards:

Academy Awards - Best Film Editing (1952)

Academy Awards - Best Actor (1952)

Academy Awards - Best Film Editing (1952)

Academy Awards - Best Original Score (1952)

Academy Awards - Best Original Song (1952)

Academy Awards - Best Original Song (1952)

Product Description:

Gary Cooper is Hollywood's perfect hero, the very embodiment of integrity and grace in this greatest of Westerns. As a newly married town marshal, he must balance an innate sense of justice and duty with loyalty to his beautiful new--and pacifist--bride when he is left by an ungrateful town to face a gang of deadly outlaws alone. As we watch spellbound, film time is real time as the showdown grows ever closer. HIGH NOON is a masterpiece that is frequently interpreted as a parable about artists left to "stand alone" and face persecution during the HUAC Hollywood blacklisting. However, Howard Hawks allegedly devised RIO BRAVO as an answer to the film's "wimpiness," and John Wayne once declared HIGH NOON as un-American--he was apparently offended by the ending of the film, which shows Sheriff Kane removing his badge and tossing it in the dirt.

Plot Synopsis:

As Sheriff Will Kane prepares to retire from his law-making, gun-fighting duties and marry his pacifist girlfriend, he receives word that a man he sent to prison has been pardoned. Kane initially escapes, but returns to protect the town from this killer and his band of outlaws only to find hostility and resentment among the uncooperative townsfolk.

Plot Keywords:

Character Study | Classic | Essential Cinema | Heroes | Recommended | Self-Discovery | Theatrical Release | Western

Production Notes:

• HIGH NOON was an original selection to the Library of Congress National Film Registry in 1989.
• The New York Film Critics chose HIGH NOON as Best Film of 1952 and named Fred Zinnemann Best Director of 1952.
• Jack Elam, who would make a career out of being an often drunk minor character in Westerns, is the man in the drunk tank in HIGH NOON.
• A made-for-TV sequel was aired in 1980. "High Noon Part II: Return of Will Kane" starred Lee Majors in the Gary Cooper role, joined by David Carradine, J. A. Preston, Pernell Roberts, and M. Emmet Walsh.
• Academy Award Nominations: 7, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay.

Cast and Crew: