Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957)

This is a great and underrated genre movie that is a take on the story of the Earp brothers and 'Doc' Holliday and their fight with the Clanton gang, in Tombstone.

The movie features some classic western characters, that almost everybody knows already. It makes the movie more easy and probably also more fun and light to follow than most other genre movies. The movie features very many characters, with could had made the movie confusing to follow but you just know who all the characters are and where they stand.

The story is very fascinating and entertaining. It's a bold story about gunslingers and lawmen and getting even. The story also leaves room for subplots and layers about family and friendship, mostly of course the 'unusuasul' friendship between Wyatt Earp and 'Doc' Holliday. Unusual because their characters are some different from each other. The movie even leaves room for the love-story between Wyatt and his lady friend, though it's not as much present in the story as you would perhaps expect and it most certainly does not distract from the movie as a whole.

The storytelling is great and begins from the moment Wyatt tries to settle down after his career as a lawman and the movie ends with the well known confrontation and shootout at the O.K. Corral. Yes, the movie takes lot of liberty with the true story but its all for the good of the movie and its entertainment value. Director John Sturges surely knows how to tell a good story!

It's a very pure western with all of the classic ingredients present; of course gunfights, card games and shootouts. The ending shootout at the O.K. Corral is surprisingly well brought to the screen. It's action packed and really spectacular filmed. It makes the ending very exciting and spectacular as well to watch.

All of the characters are great and it's true that the movie is most definitely uplifted by the performances of the cast. Burt Lancaster is fairly good in the role of Wyatt Earp but the one that steals the show is Kirk Douglas as John 'Doc' Holliday. Also quite fun to see how much the 'young' Kirk Douglas looked like his son Michael. They even sound the same. The movie features an also still very young and hard to recognize Dennis Hopper as Billy Clanton.

The movie its musical score is highly unusual. I mean the theme is actually sung by Frankie Laine! But it fits the movie surprisingly well and knows to capture the mood and atmosphere of the movie. The same goes for the 'normal' musical score by Dimitri Tiomkin.

A very pleasant and greatly told movie from John Sturges, with also memorable performances from the cast.

9/10

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Fmovies: Released in 1957 and directed by John Sturges, "Gunfight at the OK Corral" stars Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas as Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday in a loose adaption of the events that led up to the famous shootout in Tombstone, Arizona, on October 26, 1881. Rhonda Fleming and Jo Van Fleet are on hand as the protagonists' respective babes. Earl Holliman is noteworthy as Earp's deputy in Dodge City while John Ireland plays Johnny Ringo. DeForest Kelley (Bones from Star Trek) has a small role as one of the Earp brothers while a young Dennis Hopper plays Billy Clanton.

This is a dialogue-driven production that reflects the era in which it was made, hokey opening cowboy song and all. If you can acclimate to its 'world' there are a lot of rewarding elements, particularly the growing friendship of Wyatt and Doc, which starts out shaky, to say the least. It's their relationship that anchors the story, which has trouble working up suspense since it takes place in three distant locations—Fort Griffen, Texas; Dodge City, Kansas; and Tombstone, Arizona. By the time the Earp brothers & Holliday relocate to Tombstone there are a mere 50 minutes left in the movie, which means there's only a small measure of time to establish the villainy of Ike Clanton (Lyle Bettger) & his 'Cowboys' outlaw gang and subsequently build-up to the climatic shootout.

Speaking of which, the real Tombstone gunfight only lasted about 30 seconds; here's it's 16-times longer at 8 minutes. Most other versions are more accurate on this count, e.g. "Hour of the Gun" (1967) (which, by the way, is Sturges' sequel to this one, albeit with a different cast and a more accurate gunfight at the OK Corral), "Doc" (1971), "Tombstone" (1993) and "Wyatt Earp" (1994). Speaking of "Tombstone," one of the reasons it was a hit is because it had well over an hour to build up to the main shootout and did so expertly; "Wyatt Earp" less so, but then "Wyatt" excels in areas that "Tombstone" doesn't, like mundane realism and exposition on the title character. Besides the anchor of Wyatt and Doc's relationship "Gunfight at the OK Corral" does try to work-up suspense through a fictitious growing rivalry between Doc and Johnny Ringo.

While this is a talky Western it's interspersed with nigh shocking violence, like a knife-to-the-chest in the opening act. Nevertheless, it IS dialogue-oriented so to get the most out of it you'll have to (1.) listen closely or (2.) use the subtitles, like I did, which helps you keep track of names and various important (mumbled) statements. I shouldn't close without mentioning Rhonda Fleming and her whoa-man beauty in a fictitious peripheral role.

The film runs 122 minutes and was shot in Old Tucson and other Arizona locations, as well as Paramount Ranch and Paramount Studios, California.

GRADE: B-

One of Hollywood's major offerings of 1957, "Gunfight" contains all the ingredients one would expect of a blockbuster - big stars, big budget and a storyline calculated to capture the public's imagination. For me, however, the film doesn't quite work. In the final analysis, the whole thing is a little too sluggish, a little too formulaic.

To be sure, it contains fine things. Burt Lancaster is stolid and unyielding as hard lawman Wyatt Earp. Sturges films him with the camera at ground level as he rides onto the screen, making him seem superhuman in his larger-than-life moral certainty. He faces down the armed drunk without the faintest twitch of fear, the embodiment of a strong, righteous enforcer of the law. The friendship between the paragon and the wastrel is cleverly done, with Earp and Holliday (Kirk Douglas) each seeing something to admire in the other, very different, man. Character is also to the fore as a plot-driver when Kate Fisher (Jo Van Fleet) is forced by the dynamics of her relationship with the Doc into ever more wretched behaviour. By comparison, the Earp-Laura love story is cold and staid. Both Lancaster and Rhonda Fleming are terrific to look at, but hard to warm to. Though the film takes an eternity to get to the shoot-out which is its raison d'etre, when the climax finally comes the suspense is built superbly. In a nice symmetry, we see the women of both sides dreading the fatal clash as Ma Clanton and Virgil's wife separately mourn the departure of their respective menfolk. Douglas made a career out of playing generous-spirited bad guys, and one of the best things in this film is Doc Holliday's heroic effort of will, rising from his sickbed to stand beside his friend in the face of mortal danger. Shot in a rich Technicolor palette, the film's images are strong and clean, and at times even beautiful, for example the barn fire, or the approach of the Earp faction, with Cotton standing facing them, his body framed by the corral building.

Other elements are not so well done. Wyatt is too unrelenting a hard man to win the audience's unqualified sympathy, as in the scene when he tells the all-too-human Cotton, "If you can't handle it any more, turn in your badge." The Frankie Laine ballad, almost de rigeur in 1950's westerns, is simply not up to scratch ("Boot Hill, Boot Hill, so cold, so still ...") There is an ugly shadow eclipsing Ike Clanton's face throughout his most important scene. Billy (a very young Dennis Hopper) is 'converted' by Wyatt far too easily.

There exists a wide spectrum of opinion on the question of how loyal a work of fiction should remain to the historical event which inspired it. One camp would argue that the artist has total freedom to rework a popular legend such as The Gunfight, while the other extremity would insist on documentary accuracy. This film is interesting, in that it takes a well-known incident for which contemporaneous records abound, and virtually disregards the historical truth.

In the film, the decent, clean-shaven Earp boys are merely 'doing what a man has to do'. We know that the Clanton-McLaury gang is mean and duplicitous, and that there will have to be a showdown between Right and Wrong. The shoot-out, when it comes, happens over several minutes of time on a clear, bright day. There is an athletic battle of movement, with the Earps in particular manoeuvring for position, and finally trapping the Clantons in and

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral fmovies. This trigger-taut Western drama deals with a lawman and a badman , the strangest friendship this side of heaven and hell . They fought shoulder to shoulder in the wildest stand-up gunfight in the history of the West . They are the strangest alliance between the West's most famous sheriff Wyatt Earp (Burt Lancaster) , trying to overcome outlaws and its deadliest gambling killer , Doc Holliday (Kirk Douglas). It's incomparably performed by the greatest team who ever went into action , Lancaster portrays the large-than-life lawman , living by the old rules , driven by revenge , dueling to the death and Douglas is most impressive as a gunslinger , the hellfire gambler , his only friends were his guns and his only refuge was a woman's heart . Two towering Box office actors in a huge exciting production . The film correctly builds up its suspense until a tense battle in streets of Tombstone.

The flick is formed by three parts and divided by three songs played by Frankie Lane and musical score by Dimitri Tiomkin . The first is located in Fort Griffin where Earp finds Holliday and helps him against Ed Bailey (Lee Van Cleef). The second part concerns on Holliday and his mate Kate (Jo Van Fleet) and appears a gambling-woman , the red-haired named Laura (Rhonda Fleming) . Here Doc helps Earp against another historic characters , such as Shangai Pierce (Ted De Corsia) and Johnny Ringo (John Ireland), furthermore is the sheriff Ben Masterson (Kenneth Tobey) . The third part focuses Tombstone , 1881 , with stimulating scenes about OK Corral gunfight between Morgan (DeForest Kelley) , Virgil (John Howard), Wyatt Earp , Doc against the nefarious Ike (Lyle Bettgler), Billy Clanton (Dennis Hooper) , Johnny Ringo, and Tom McLowery(Jack Elam). The main character is a historical figure , in this case the sheriff Wyatt Earp who participated the most famous duel occurred in the western town of Tombstone in 1881 that has been brought to the big screen many times as in the classic "My Darling Clementine" in 1946 directed by John Ford with Henry Fonda and Victor Mature , in this "Gunfight at O.K. Corral" (1957) by specialist John Sturges who would resume the same story in "The Hour of the Gun" (1967) ; the demystifying "Doc" (Frank Perry, 1971) with Harris Yulin and Stacy Keach or the more modern "Tombstone: The Legend of Wyatt Earp" (George P. Cosmatos, 1993) with Kurt Russell and Val Kilmer and ¨Wyatt Earp¨ (Lawrence Kasdan, 1994) with Kevin Costner and Dennis Quaid . The motion picture was stunningly directed by John Sturges

This is a story enormous in scope ,unusual in concept with a mile-a-minute action on a climatic and thrill-a-minute gunfight. Packs a magnificent cinematography-Vistavision and Technicolor with overblown chromatic by Charles B Lang and outdoors shot in Fort Griffith , Tucson, Phoenix and Tombstone . This thrilling film contains a spectacular and lyric musical score by the great Dimitri Tiomkin . John Sturges's masterpiece of the West in one of the top films of the 1957 year . Followed by a sequel ¨Hour of the gun (1967)¨ also directed by specialist Sturges with James Garner and Jason Robards .

The DVD copy I saw is excellent. The Frankie Laine ballad blends very well with the scenes. Burt Lancaster gives a quite cold performance as Wyatt Earp, and the Earp family is not shown as well as it should. Same thing goes for the Clantons, with the exception of Dennis Hopper, and John Ireland as Johnny Ringo. Kirk Douglas and Jo Van Fleet as Doc and his woman are really the ones that make this film pick up speed. They involve you in their drama. The gunfight is very well staged, you don't see good action scenes like that in westerns nowadays.

No, this is not the way it really happened at the Ok Corral in Tucson but since when has Hollywood ever been totally accurate and true to history? The chemistry between Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster works extremely well. This movie works because of great stars and a solid cast of great actors. The score is outstanding featuring Frankie Lane singing the title song. The photography is very realistic compared to most westerns of that era. The gunfight at the Ok Corral is worth waiting for. If you like westerns, you will especially like The Gunfight At Ok Corral.