59. High Noon (1952)

High Noon is a 1952 American Western film produced by Stanley Kramer from a screenplay by Carl Foreman, directed by Fred Zinnemann, and starring Gary Cooper. The plot, depicted in real time, centers on a town marshal who is torn between his sense of duty and his love for his new bride and who must face a gang of killers alone.

Though mired in controversy with political overtones at the time of its release, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won four (Actor, Editing, Music-Score, and Music-Song)[3] as well as four Golden Globe Awards (Actor, Supporting Actress, Score, and Cinematography-Black and White).[4] The award-winning score was written by Russian-born composer Dimitri Tiomkin.

High Noon was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" in 1989, the NFR's first year of existence. An iconic film whose story has been partly or completely repeated in later film productions, the ending scenes especially inspired a next-to-endless number of later films, including but not just limited to westerns. (Wikipedia)

PODCAST NOTES:

Senate HUAC parody intro (00:01), Tex Ritter's performance of Dmitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington's 'The Ballad of High Noon' (2:00), Westerns as often 'weird' arty and surreal films and why that is (4:00), 'High Noon' and its popularity with US Presidents (5:30), Glenn Frankel's book on 'High Noon' (6:00), Stanley Kramer's proto-independant film studio (7:00), Why Hollywood was drawn to the Communist party in the 20's and 30's (8:00), HUAC and its processes and procedures (10:30), Studio collaboration with HUAC and the economics of legal defense (13:00), Carl Foreman, screenwriter of 'High Noon' (14:00), John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart, and Gary Cooper as cooperative witnesses for HUAC (16:00), The moment when you realize when a movie is "great" and the realities of watching a movie so regarded as "a classic" (18:30), 'Joker' as a politically fraught movie and similar takedown of the entertainment establishment (20:30), Drinking in Westerns; why shot glasses?? (22:00), Clip from 'High Noon' with Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly (23:00), Please tell us what movie Chris' Final Line comes from (29:00), Fred Zinnemann's career and 'Day Of The Jackal' and 'A Man For All Seasons' and 'Julia' (36:30), Katy Jurado's great performance in 'High Noon' (42:00), Clip of Katy Jurado and Lloyd Bridges in 'High Noon' and the feminist messaging of same (43:00), Katy Jurado and Gary Cooper scene from 'High Noon' (48:00) in which she says "One year without seeing you" in Spanish, to which Gary Cooper replies, "Yes, I know." Columbo Cinematic Universe (56:30), John Wayne's complicated legacy and interesting relationships with many of the makers of 'High Noon; (58:00), John Wayne's Oscar acceptance speech on behalf of Gary Cooper (59:00), 'Rio Bravo' / 'High Noon' and Chris' brilliantly unexpected 'Sweet Home Alabama' / 'Southern Man' analogy (1:01:20), Alternative Casting (1:03:00), Flying Purple People Eater (1:06:30), The Wilhelm Scream and presence (1:07:10), Headlines (1:09:30), Bomb Squad segment and 'Motherless Brooklyn' recap and 'Last Christmas' starring Emilia Clarke and Henry Golding and Jason stunned by the actual plot twist (1:11:00), Final Lines (01:19:00)

Read Glenn Frankel's fantastic book about the making of 'High Noon' here.

'High Noon' wiki page.

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