The Gunfighter
Encyclopedia
The Gunfighter is a 1950 western film starring Gregory Peck
, Helen Westcott
, Millard Mitchell
and Karl Malden
(who came back after a three year hiatus). This film was directed by Henry King
. It was written by screenwriter
s William Bowers
and William Sellers, with an uncredited rewrite by writer and producer
Nunnally Johnson
, from a story by Bowers and screenwriter and director
Andre de Toth
.
) tries to avoid the trouble that goes with a reputation as the fastest draw in the west. However, when a cocksure young man named Eddie (Richard Jaeckel
) draws on him, Ringo has no choice but to kill him. Ringo is warned to leave the area because the deceased has three brothers who will be sure to seek revenge. Sure enough, they pursue him, but he takes them by surprise, disarming them and driving off their horses.
Ringo then stops to wait in the nearby town of Cayenne where he occupies a corner of the largely empty saloon for most of the remaining film. It is only revealed later that he is hoping for a chance to see his wife and young son whom he has not seen in eight years. The local barkeeper, Mac (Karl Malden
), remembers him from the past in another town and alerts Sheriff Mark Strett (Millard Mitchell
), but Strett turns out to be an old friend of Ringo's. Strett also knows Ringo's wife Peggy (Helen Westcott
), and tells Ringo she is now a schoolteacher and has changed her surname to Walsh to hide their past life together. Urging Ringo to leave town as quickly as possible, Strett nevertheless agrees to go and ask Peggy to come and see him. She declines, still fearing the notorious and hotheaded nature of Ringo's younger days that drove them apart.
While waiting, Ringo also has to deal with Hunt Bromley (Skip Homeier
), the young local would-be gunslinger, and Jerry Marlowe (an uncredited Cliff Clark), a semi-retired man who mistakenly believes Ringo killed his son some years before. Ringo also meets another friend from the past, a bargirl named Molly (Jean Parker
), who eventually persuades Peggy to come and talk to her husband. Meeting at last, Ringo tells his wife that he has changed, that he wants to settle down somewhere where people do not know him, possibly out in California, and asks her to leave with him. She refuses, but agrees to reconsider in a year's time if he will remain true to his word. Ringo also gets acquainted with his son at last, although he does not tell him of their relationship.
By now however, Ringo has spent too long in town. The three brothers are still trailing him and arrive, but are captured before they can ambush Ringo. Then Bromley seizes his chance; while Ringo has his back turned making preparations to leave, Bromley shoots him down. As Ringo lies dying he tells the sheriff to say that he, rather than Bromley, drew first. When Bromley starts to say that he didn't want Ringo's help, Ringo rejects Bromley's words, informing his killer that he will soon know how it feels to have every hotshot and two-bit gunfighter out to get him in turn. An angry Strett immediately tells Bromley to leave town, and punctuates his order with a severe beating which he tells him is "just the beginning" of what he's got coming to him for killing Ringo.
The film then closes with Peggy Walsh attending Jimmy Ringo's funeral, making her way through the crowd around the church door to reveal, quietly but with pride, what the townsfolk have never known - that "I am Mrs Ringo". Thus, despite his death, the gunfighter finally achieves what he sought in coming to the town - his wife's forgiveness and reconciliation.
John Wayne
wanted to play Ringo. The story was purchased by Harry Cohn
of Columbia Pictures
for Wayne. But Wayne refused to work for Cohn, who had mistreated him nearly twenty years earlier when Wayne was beginning his career. Cohn therefore sold the project to Twentieth Century Fox.
noted in his June 24, 1950 review:
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
referenced scenes from The Gunfighter several times in his song Brownsville Girl
, co-written by the playwright Sam Shepard
. It appears on Dylan's 1986 release Knocked Out Loaded
and begins:
A mixture of desert-related travels, dreams and desires, the song returns to the Gunfighter-related theme several verses later:
Peck paid tribute to Dylan's words when Dylan received the Kennedy Center Honors in 1997
Gregory Peck
Eldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
, Helen Westcott
Helen Westcott
Helen Westcott was an American stage and screen actor and former child actor....
, Millard Mitchell
Millard Mitchell
Millard Mitchell was an American character actor whose credits include roughly thirty feature films and two television appearances....
and Karl Malden
Karl Malden
Karl Malden was an American actor. In a career that spanned more than seven decades, he performed in such classic films as A Streetcar Named Desire, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, On the Waterfront and One-Eyed Jacks...
(who came back after a three year hiatus). This film was directed by Henry King
Henry King (director)
Henry King was an American film director.Before coming to film, King worked as an actor in various repertoire theatres, and first started to take small film roles in 1912. He directed for the first time in 1915, and grew to become one of the most commercially successful Hollywood directors of the...
. It was written by screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
s William Bowers
William Bowers
William Bowers was a reporter in Long Beach, California before becoming a screenwriter and specializing in writing comedy westerns and also turned out several thrillers. His first credited screenplay was My Favorite Spy in 1942.During World War II Bowers served in the United States Army Air Forces...
and William Sellers, with an uncredited rewrite by writer and producer
Film producer
A film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
Nunnally Johnson
Nunnally Johnson
Nunnally Hunter Johnson was an American filmmaker who wrote, produced, and directed motion pictures.Johnson was born in Columbus, Georgia. He began his career as a journalist, writing for the Columbus Enquirer Sun, the Savannah Press, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, and the New York Herald Tribune...
, from a story by Bowers and screenwriter and director
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
Andre de Toth
André De Toth
André de Toth was a Hungarian-American filmmaker, born and raised in Makó, Csongrád, Kingdom of Hungary Austro-Hungarian Empire. He directed the 3-D film House of Wax, despite being unable to see in 3-D himself, having lost an eye at an early age. He is known for his gritty B movies in the western...
.
Plot
Notorious but aging gunfighter Jimmy Ringo (Gregory PeckGregory Peck
Eldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
) tries to avoid the trouble that goes with a reputation as the fastest draw in the west. However, when a cocksure young man named Eddie (Richard Jaeckel
Richard Jaeckel
Richard Hanley Jaeckel was an American actor of film and television.-Life and career:Jaeckel was born in Long Beach, New York. A short, but tough guy, he played a variety of characters during his fifty years in movies & television and became one of Hollywood's best known character actors...
) draws on him, Ringo has no choice but to kill him. Ringo is warned to leave the area because the deceased has three brothers who will be sure to seek revenge. Sure enough, they pursue him, but he takes them by surprise, disarming them and driving off their horses.
Ringo then stops to wait in the nearby town of Cayenne where he occupies a corner of the largely empty saloon for most of the remaining film. It is only revealed later that he is hoping for a chance to see his wife and young son whom he has not seen in eight years. The local barkeeper, Mac (Karl Malden
Karl Malden
Karl Malden was an American actor. In a career that spanned more than seven decades, he performed in such classic films as A Streetcar Named Desire, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, On the Waterfront and One-Eyed Jacks...
), remembers him from the past in another town and alerts Sheriff Mark Strett (Millard Mitchell
Millard Mitchell
Millard Mitchell was an American character actor whose credits include roughly thirty feature films and two television appearances....
), but Strett turns out to be an old friend of Ringo's. Strett also knows Ringo's wife Peggy (Helen Westcott
Helen Westcott
Helen Westcott was an American stage and screen actor and former child actor....
), and tells Ringo she is now a schoolteacher and has changed her surname to Walsh to hide their past life together. Urging Ringo to leave town as quickly as possible, Strett nevertheless agrees to go and ask Peggy to come and see him. She declines, still fearing the notorious and hotheaded nature of Ringo's younger days that drove them apart.
While waiting, Ringo also has to deal with Hunt Bromley (Skip Homeier
Skip Homeier
-Career:Homeier began acting as Skippy Homeier at the age of six, on the radio show Portia Faces Life. From 1943 until 1944 he played the role of Emil in the Broadway play, Tomorrow the World. Cast as a child indoctrinated into Nazism, who is brought to the United States from Germany following the...
), the young local would-be gunslinger, and Jerry Marlowe (an uncredited Cliff Clark), a semi-retired man who mistakenly believes Ringo killed his son some years before. Ringo also meets another friend from the past, a bargirl named Molly (Jean Parker
Jean Parker
-Career:Born as Lois Mae Green in Deer Lodge, Montana, she appeared in 70 movies from 1932 through 1966. She was discovered by Ida Koverman, secretary to MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer, after she saw a poster featuring Parker portraying Father Time. She attended Pasadena schools and graduated from John...
), who eventually persuades Peggy to come and talk to her husband. Meeting at last, Ringo tells his wife that he has changed, that he wants to settle down somewhere where people do not know him, possibly out in California, and asks her to leave with him. She refuses, but agrees to reconsider in a year's time if he will remain true to his word. Ringo also gets acquainted with his son at last, although he does not tell him of their relationship.
By now however, Ringo has spent too long in town. The three brothers are still trailing him and arrive, but are captured before they can ambush Ringo. Then Bromley seizes his chance; while Ringo has his back turned making preparations to leave, Bromley shoots him down. As Ringo lies dying he tells the sheriff to say that he, rather than Bromley, drew first. When Bromley starts to say that he didn't want Ringo's help, Ringo rejects Bromley's words, informing his killer that he will soon know how it feels to have every hotshot and two-bit gunfighter out to get him in turn. An angry Strett immediately tells Bromley to leave town, and punctuates his order with a severe beating which he tells him is "just the beginning" of what he's got coming to him for killing Ringo.
The film then closes with Peggy Walsh attending Jimmy Ringo's funeral, making her way through the crowd around the church door to reveal, quietly but with pride, what the townsfolk have never known - that "I am Mrs Ringo". Thus, despite his death, the gunfighter finally achieves what he sought in coming to the town - his wife's forgiveness and reconciliation.
Cast
- Gregory PeckGregory PeckEldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
as Jimmy Ringo. - Helen WestcottHelen WestcottHelen Westcott was an American stage and screen actor and former child actor....
as Peggy Walsh - Millard MitchellMillard MitchellMillard Mitchell was an American character actor whose credits include roughly thirty feature films and two television appearances....
as Marshal Mark Strett - Jean ParkerJean Parker-Career:Born as Lois Mae Green in Deer Lodge, Montana, she appeared in 70 movies from 1932 through 1966. She was discovered by Ida Koverman, secretary to MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer, after she saw a poster featuring Parker portraying Father Time. She attended Pasadena schools and graduated from John...
as Molly - Karl MaldenKarl MaldenKarl Malden was an American actor. In a career that spanned more than seven decades, he performed in such classic films as A Streetcar Named Desire, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, On the Waterfront and One-Eyed Jacks...
as Mac - Richard JaeckelRichard JaeckelRichard Hanley Jaeckel was an American actor of film and television.-Life and career:Jaeckel was born in Long Beach, New York. A short, but tough guy, he played a variety of characters during his fifty years in movies & television and became one of Hollywood's best known character actors...
as Eddie - Skip HomeierSkip Homeier-Career:Homeier began acting as Skippy Homeier at the age of six, on the radio show Portia Faces Life. From 1943 until 1944 he played the role of Emil in the Broadway play, Tomorrow the World. Cast as a child indoctrinated into Nazism, who is brought to the United States from Germany following the...
as Hunt Bromley - Kim SpaldingKim SpaldingKim Spalding was an American actor who appeared on television and in film between 1950 and 1961.Spalding's first role was as an uncredited clerk in the 1950 film The Gunfighter, starring Gregory Peck as Jimmy Ringo. From 1950-1953, Spalding appeared in different roles in the western television...
as a clerk (his first role) - Anthony RossAnthony RossAnthony Ross was a Broadway stage, television and film actor.Born in New York City, he may be best remembered for being the first to play the character of "the Gentleman Caller" in the original 1944 production of Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie.Ross appeared in 20th Century Fox films...
as Deputy Charlie Norris - Verna FeltonVerna FeltonVerna Felton was an American character actress who was best-known for providing many female voices in numerous Disney animated films, as well as voicing Fred Flintstone's mother-in-law Pearl Slaghoople for Hanna-Barbera...
as Mrs. August Pennyfeather - Ellen CorbyEllen CorbyEllen Corby was an American actress. She is most widely remembered for the role of "Grandma Esther Walton" on the CBS television series The Waltons, for which she won three Emmy Awards...
as Mrs. Devlin - David ClarkeDavid Clarke (actor)David Clarke was an American Broadway and motion picture actor.A native of Chicago and graduate of Butler University, Clarke was most well known for his film noir roles as a character actor....
as Second Brother - Alan Hale Jr. as Brother
John Wayne
John Wayne
Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...
wanted to play Ringo. The story was purchased by Harry Cohn
Harry Cohn
Harry Cohn was the American president and production director of Columbia Pictures.-Career:Cohn was born to a working-class German-Jewish family in New York City. In later years, he appears to have disparaged his heritage...
of Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
for Wayne. But Wayne refused to work for Cohn, who had mistreated him nearly twenty years earlier when Wayne was beginning his career. Cohn therefore sold the project to Twentieth Century Fox.
Reaction
The film was nominated for a WGA Award for Best Written American Western. Writing for the New York Times, Bosley CrowtherBosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
noted in his June 24, 1950 review:
"The addicts of Western fiction may find themselves rubbing their eyes and sitting up fast to take notice before five minutes have gone by in Twentieth Century Fox's The Gunfighter, which came to the Roxy yesterday. For suddenly they will discover that they are not keeping company with the usual sort of hero of the commonplace Western at all. Suddenly, indeed, they will discover that they are in the exciting presence of one of the most fascinating Western heroes as ever looked down a six-shooter's barrel."
Bob DylanBob DylanBob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
Brownsville Girl
Bob DylanBob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
referenced scenes from The Gunfighter several times in his song Brownsville Girl
Brownsville Girl
"Brownsville Girl" is a song from Bob Dylan's 1986 album, Knocked Out Loaded. It is notable for its eleven-minute and 5 second length and for being co-written by playwright Sam Shepard...
, co-written by the playwright Sam Shepard
Sam Shepard
Sam Shepard is an American playwright, actor, and television and film director. He is the author of several books of short stories, essays, and memoirs, and received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979 for his play Buried Child...
. It appears on Dylan's 1986 release Knocked Out Loaded
Knocked Out Loaded
Knocked Out Loaded is singer-songwriter Bob Dylan's 24th studio album, released by Columbia Records in July 1986.The album was received poorly upon release, and is still considered by some critics to be one of Dylan's least-engaging efforts...
and begins:
- "Well, there was this movie I seen one time,
- About a man riding 'cross the desert and it starred Gregory Peck.
- He was shot down by a hungry kid trying to make a name for himself.
- The townspeople wanted to crush that kid down and string him up by the neck."
- "Well, the marshal, now he beat that kid to a bloody pulp
- As the dying gunfighter lay in the sun and gasped for his last breath.
- Turn him loose, let him go, let him say he outdrew me fair and square,
- I want him to feel what it's like to every moment face his death..."
A mixture of desert-related travels, dreams and desires, the song returns to the Gunfighter-related theme several verses later:
- "Strange how people who suffer together have stronger connections than people who are most content.
- I don’t have any regrets, they can talk about me plenty when I’m gone.
- You always said people don’t do what they believe in, they just do what’s most convenient, then they repent.
- And I always said, 'Hang on to me, baby, and let’s hope that the roof stays on.'"
- "There was a movie I seen one time, I think I sat through it twice.
- I don’t remember who I was or where I was bound.
- All I remember about it was it starred Gregory Peck, he wore a gun and he was shot in the back.
- Seems like a long time ago, long before the stars were torn down."
- "Brownsville girl with your Brownsville curls,
- Teeth like pearls shining like the moon above
- Brownsville girl, show me all around the world,
- Brownsville girl, you’re my honey love."
- Copyright © 1986 by Special Rider Music
Peck paid tribute to Dylan's words when Dylan received the Kennedy Center Honors in 1997