The Hanging Tree *** (1959, Gary Cooper, Maria Schell, Karl Malden, Ben Piazza, George C Scott, Karl Swenson, Virginia Gregg, John Dierkes, King Donovan) – Classic Movie Review 6824

Director Delmer Daves’s 1959 Western stars Gary Cooper as ‘Doc’ Frail, a Montana small town doctor who saves local small-time thief Rune (Ben Piazza) from a mob who want to hang him, but he demands the kid becomes his bond servant in return. However, ‘Doc’ Frail finds redemption with a Swedish woman called Elizabeth Mahler (Maria Schell) burnt and blinded in an Indian attack on her stagecoach.

Daves’s movie is an intriguing, intelligent, intense little Western, low on action but with first-rate acting, music score (Max Steiner and cinematography (Ted McCord) contributions. Wendell Mayes and Halstead Welles’s screenplay, based on a novel by Dorothy M Johnson, is more of a character study than a traditional Western.

George C Scott’s début in a showy small role as a crazed, alcoholic healer and preacher called George Grubb set him off on the road to stardom. Also in the cast are Karl Malden as Frenchy Plante, Karl Swenson as Tom Flaunce, Virginia Gregg as Edna Flaunce, John Dierkes as Society Red, King Donovan as Wonder and Slim Talbot.

The song ‘The Hanging Tree’ by Jerry Livingston (music) and Mack David (lyrics) was Oscar nominated for Best Original Song.

Cooper started a film production company, Baroda Productions, in 1958. In 1959 it made his movies The Hanging Tree, They Came to Cordura and The Wreck of the Mary Deare.

Cooper reflected: ‘Dad was a true Westerner, and I take after him.’ He starred 20 Westerns out of his 107 movies, three of them silents, winning the Oscar as Will Kane in High Noon (1952).

Malden directed when Daves became ill. Daves directed from 17 June to 28 July 1958, Malden directed (uncredited) from 29 July to 30 August 1958 and Vincent Sherman directed (uncredited) for one day only on 30 July 1958. It ended Daves’s run of magnificent seven Westerns that started with Broken Arrow (1950), followed by Drum Beat (1954), Jubal (1956), The Last Wagon (1956), 3:10 to Yuma (1957), Cowboy (1958) and The Hanging Tree.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6824

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