El salario de la violencia

I just saw this, for the first time, on TCM (July 2019) . It's an amazing film experience. I'm not a fan of westerns, by and large. This is one I can recommend. The storytelling engages the timeless themes of fathers and sons, and does so in a way that touches your heart directly enough that you can overlook the one or two fairly obvious scenes.

Tab Hunter was the real deal. :)

The plot seemed quite fresh (even after my second viewing), though on analysis it includes familiar themes: tension between brothers, conflict between son and father leading to tragedy. A lot of this is down to the way it portrays the steady - not to say rapid - deterioration of the elder son so that he becomes a murderer; Tab Hunter deserves a lot of credit for this; at first he seems to be just a bit of a tearaway, but at the end he looks really vicious.

I like Van Heflin. He was great as the tortured Athos in "The Three Musketeers" and the decent homesteaders in "Shane" and "3.10 to Yuma", but I'm not sure that he carries off being the tough patriarch who won the country from the Indians.

Viewing the film in the political correctness of 2007, I blinked at the verbal racial abuse inflicted on the native Americans; two days later, I'm still trying to think of another 1950s Western where it was so overt. (I'm talking of verbal abuse, rather than cowboys killing lots of Indians.) The film proceeds at a pleasing rate, except for the somewhat overlong shooting-at-bottles scene very early on.

I don't know if "I'm a Runaway" was ever a "proper" song, but it was quite catching, even when sung by Hunter, and for once I didn't object to a musical interlude in an action film.

Very good western,where one more time the villain (Tab Hunter) is much more interesting than the good (James Darren) and his bland girlfriend . The a- man -had-two-sons subject was plundered since the Bible was written ,but,unlike "East of Eden" ,in the boys rivalry for the love of their fathers,it's the one the old man likes best who turns out badly."I wish you could be like your brother" he says to dutiful Davy.The relationship between Ed and Lee Hackett is much subtler than it at first appears.Good use of cinemascope,notably in the scene when Ed Hackett catches a beautiful white mare.The ending is a bit too predictable but it is a thoroughly enjoyable western.

I give this movie a 9 out of 10 for its earnest (yet not overdone) acting, sympathetic (yet not sappy) treatment of Indians, and exuberant (yet not overwhelming) energy level throughout. The relatively unknown actors and filmmakers really tried hard here. Aside from the family conflict, there is an intriguing treatment of the theme of historical change and how the Old West relates to the New - also seen in movies such as Bus Stop, The Misfits, and Lonely are the Brave.

Gunman's Walk is not perfect - things get 'explained' a bit too neatly at the Freudian conclusion, for example - but there is scarcely a dull or uninteresting moment. Don't miss the unique details in this film, such as the instant mood swings that the characters, especially the Father, go through, and the astonishing bar scene where the Big Brother cavorts with hookers and sings "I'm a Runaway."

This is a very unusual western and it comes highly recommended.

Van Heflin played second lead in a score of pictures over 3 decades. In this excellent western he gets to play the lead, and his performance is one of the greatest of his long career. He displays a completely believable fatherly range of emotion and makes the audience identify with his 'how the west was won' mentality. Phil Karlson's deft direction keeps the pacing of this picture very crisp and poignant. The settings and western scenes are also quite excellent. All of this has been said without mentioning Tab Hunter's taught performance, which is really the defining touch that makes this movie great. Surprisingly, Hunter was a teen idol especially developed by the movie studio to be just another screen image. He defied the studios by delivering this amazing performance as a wild and reckless young man growing up in the shadow of his father's hard nosed old western legacy, determined to leave his own stamp on the developing times in the west. Gunman's Walk may be the most underrated western in screen history. It almost feels like a real metaphor for the western motif, and the changing civilization that beckons just over the horizon.