I wanted to but couldn't!

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

When I started watching this one, the beginning seemed very much like the typical Western of the 19050's. It was in a bar and some young punk decided he wanted to take on Ringo, the man reputed to have the fastest gun. He takes him on, and he loses. Then Ringo has to take it on the run as 3 brothers wanted to avenge the death of their youngest, even though he had created his own demise. That is where this movie changes. Ringo (Gregory Peck) has a place to go and a purpose to go there. He sets the 3 brothers after him on foot and heads for that place. It is a town, where his wife and son live, only he does not know where in town they are, or their names. Peck is absolutely brilliant as Ringo, and his character raises this way above the usual Western. Ringo is a character who wants to escape his reputation, but he can't. It seems he has a lot of help with a top notch support cast. Millard Mitchell is great as his friend, the Sheriff of the town Ringo's wife live in. He does everything he can do to protect Ringo but urgently try to get him to leave his town.Karl Malden is brilliant as the saloon keeper who gives him shelter and food and tries to help him leave too. Henry King who directs this had recently finished 12 O'Clock High which was also great with Peck. This next movie may not be as famous as the former, but it is every bit as good. Helen Westcott is Ringo's wife, though her role becomes more profound in the later part of this one. For anyone who likes Peck, this is above the average western, way above. The ending is a bit predictable, yet it is done so well and with a couple of extra twists, that the viewer is totally pulled into the story long before it ends.

THE GUNFIGHTER is a mature and reflective western that manages to subvert genre expectations within the action context and trappings of its own genre. It stars the inimitable Gregory Peck as Jimmy Ringo, a world-weary gunslinger whose biggest enemy is not one of the many villains after him but rather his own reputation. As such this is a film which explores the dark side of heroism and it feels very real and very gritty as a result.The film itself is quite low budget, shot in black and white and with a great deal of the running time taking place within a single bar-room location. Nonetheless suspense is inherent in the premise and in some ways I was reminded of DOG DAY AFTERNOON as the situation becomes a kind of insane circus. Peck is excellent, it does go without saying really, and well supported by the likes of Karl Malden. Those looking for crowd-pleasing action sequences should look elsewhere as this is all about consequence and real-life, not gung-ho fantasy. The ending is unexpected, but very good.

This is a tight black and white adult western about a famous gunfighter, Jimmy Ringo (Gregory Peck). Ringo is getting tired and wants to find a way to outlive his past and start over again with his estranged wife, Peggy Walsh (Helen Westcott), and his 8-year-old son. Is it possible to change and outlive killing 12 men as a fast draw celebrity and go somewhere where no one knows you? Ringo comes to the little town where they live to make a try at it. One of his friends from the old days, Mark Strett (Millard Mitchell), has managed to make this transition from one side of the law to the other by becoming the town Marshal. Strett is both encouraging and skeptical that Ringo cannot do what HE did because, Strett didn't make the name for himself that Ringo had: Ringo is always being compared to some of the most famous gunfighters of the West, and that name is hard to outrun. Added to Ringo's problems is the fact that he had just killed a young man trying to make a name for HIMSELF (in a fair gun fight). The three brothers of that man are out to get Ringo. During the chase, Ringo ambushes them far outside of town, takes away their guns, and releases their horses so that they can't follow him. When Ringo enters the town, his fame precedes him and the young boys in town run to the saloon to try to get a look at him. Further, the saloon keeper, Mac (Karl Malden), is also one of his adoring fans who keeps fanning the fire of his fame. Ringo meets with Strett in the saloon to try to arrange a meeting with his wife and boy (who had started over under a new name). But, can this meeting take place, and what will become of it? One of my favorite supporting actresses of the day, Verna Felton, is great in a brief scene in the saloon in which she represents the women of the town, as Mrs. August Pennyfeather, demanding that the Marshal run Ringo out of town (not knowing that Ringo is right there to help the Marshal with ideas of how to accomplish this goal).

This film is best known for it being at the beginning of the revisionist western. That is, where the world of clear-cut good guys and bad guys had reached its end. Here, we have a gunfighter whose skills with a gun became too good for his own good.Wherever Gregory Peck's gunfighter goes, trouble goes, right from the beginning, where he's taken on by a young'un who wants to take on the west's top gun. That young man's brothers track the gunfighter down to a town where Peck goes to visit the family he left behind.As you can imagine, trouble follows. The movie takes on a "High Noon" construct, as the clock ticks down as the brothers close in. Adding to that is yet another young gun who wants to take on the gunfighter.The drama continues as you would expect. But, the closing section contains some excellent moments, and a finale that has a lot of gritty punch, especially for a movie from 1950.Thus began the era of the gritty western, where the easy lines of good and evil were erased for good.******** (8 Out of 10 Stars)