HANG 'EM HIGH

US, 1968, 114 minutes, Colour.
Clint Eastwood, Inger Stevens, Pat Hingle, Dennis Hopper, Ed Begley, Charles Mc Graw, Ben Johnson, Bruce Dern, Ruth White, L.Q. Jones.
Directed by Ted Post.

Hang 'Em High is a typical Clint Eastwood western of the late sixties. Eastwood had starred in Rawhide on American television and then had gone to Italy to appear in three films for director Sergio Leone. These were A Fistful of Dollars, A Few Dollars More, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. They quickly became box-office successes and are considered something of classics of the individual man of the West with the vengeance theme. After Eastwood returned to America to begin a very successful career, he made this film which is very reminiscent of the style of Sergio Leone. It is a grim western with a vengeance theme, rather well worked out. It has a very strong supporting cast and was directed by Ted Post who had made a number of thrillers for cinema and television.

1. The impact of the film as a Clint Eastwood Western, of the late sixties, of the revenge genre ? The influence of the Italian Western, an American version of the Italian Western? How successful?

2. The importance of the opening and its dramatic impact: the sense of injustice, the horror of lynching, the hero himself involved and experiencing it, the breeding of revenge?

3. The portrayal of the people involved in the lynching, a law unto themselves, the strengths and the weaknesses, being led by Captain Wilson, the others just followers? Did they deserve the revenge wreaked on them?

4. The importance of the rescue, the vengeance in Cooper's mind, his motivations?

5. What kind of person was Cooper? Was his character well-explored? His growing motivations? His experience of the jailer, the transporting of the criminals? His encounter with Judge Hinton? His involvement in administering law and order? His voluntary obedience? His running the risk of administering justice himself? His place in the town, his relationship with Rachael, with Madam Sophie and her girls?

6. The portrayal of the judge and the exercise of his power? The portrayal of authority and justice in the West? How just a man was he, how obsessed with his work, a hanging judge? His attitudes towards hanging? The importance of the execution.scene and its length, involvement of the audience in the men dying, the preacher. etc.? (and the irony of Cooper's lack of presence at the hanging?)

7. Rachael as a person also seeking revenge? Her role in the town, her visiting the prison, her rescuing Cooper after his being shot, tending for him, influencing his motivation, love? The credible Western heroine?

8. Wilson as a leader? His attitude towards law and order and the administration of justice? A bully, his fear of Cooper, shooting at him? His evolving the plot for Cooper's death?

9. The impact of so much of the film going into Cooper's administering justice, rounding of criminals, the deaths of the group? The dramatic impact of these and their visualisation? The very attitudes of the men involved?

10. The final confrontation of Wilson? Wilson unable to cope, his fear of the siege and the men with Cooper, the irony of his hanging himself?

11. Comment on the special Western effects: the lynching scene set in the tranquility of the opening pastoral sequencet the wagon train in criminals, the hanging sequence and the way that it is filmed, the impact of the hanging, the men, especially the Irishman, the sermon of the preacher, the attitude of the judge?

12. The final confrontation between Cooper and the judge? The manipulation of Cooper by the judge?

13. How much insight and awareness of themes of law, order, justice, violence in the West? The picture of the West and the American heritage from this?