TCM Greatest Classic Films Collection: Westerns (The Stalking Moon / Ride the High Country / Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid / Chisum)

Sam Peckinpah's RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY is one of the finest western adventures in cinematic history. Everything---the superb acting from old time veterans Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea, the crisp and pointed dialogue, the camera work (and film editing), and the never-overdone elegiac underlay of farewell and warning, not just about the "old west" of the motion pictures (of the 1930-1960 period), but about the reality of the American frontier and the American spirit--adds up to excellence.

If two actors truly symbolized the Old West of public imagination, certainly those actors were Randy Scott and Joel McCrea. How fitting that RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY should be their "so long, pardner" to the genre! In 1962 the classic Western was dying, the genre changing, just as America was changing. The spirit of American innocence and optimism was subtly being transformed--while we longed for the return of Randy Scott, Gene Autry, Hopalong Cassidy, and moral certainties, Vietnam would soon make us a nation of cynics and skeptics. Thus, RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY is more than just a salute to two great Western actors and their farewell to that enduring American film creation the classic Western; RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY tells us, through two of the most admired cowboy actors of all time, about ouselves, about changing American society, and presents us with a classic morality tale. Steve (McCrea)Judd's remarkable words to Gil (Scott) Westrum, when Westrum gently suggests they might skip out with the gold they are charged with transporting, says it all: "All I want to do is enter my house justifed." It was the classic, optimistic American dream that motivated the pioneers of the old West just as it did the pioneers of Virginia or Massachusetts, the foundation of our society "to enter our house justified," to make a just and fair life for ourselves in a new land. RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY reminds us, this one last time, of our original national purpose, and shows us the pitfalls along the way--not just temptation but the "times" that threaten us.

In the end Westrum (Scott) returns (repents of his deviation from the moral course) to Judd's rescue...and Judd's response is: "I knew you would [return] all the time." Perhaps it is indeed too late, for Judd dies, alone, in one of the most amazing scenes in all cinema. Does his fervent dream of a "house justified" die with him? Does the older America of undbounded optimism and a moral code disappear with his departure and the end of the western frontier---and the end of "old time" Westerns? Peckinpah does not answer, and we are left to ponder. But one thing IS certain...we are never the same after watcbing this marvelous film.