SHOOTOUT IN A ONE DOG TOWN

US, 1973, 74 minutes, Colour.
Richard Crenna, Jack Elam, Richard Egan, Dub Taylor, Gene Evans, Stephanie Powers, Michael Ansara.
Directed by Burt Kennedy.

Shootout In A One Dog Town is a very good western telemovie. The story is by Larry Cohen, later to become a director of such horror films as It's Alive, and its sequel It Lives Again, God Told Me To and The Private Files of J. Edgar Hoover. The film was directed by Burt Kennedy, a veteran writer-director of many excellent brief westerns, including the humorous Support Your Local Sheriff. The film is a simple story of a man protecting gold in a very small town called Opportunity in Arizona. He is played well by Richard Crenna. The bandits after the gold are led by Richard Egan in a guest appearance. There is an excellent supporting cast, particularly Jack Elam, who has appeared in so many westerns especially those of Burt Kennedy. He has a chance to develop a role very well in this film. The screenplay borrows in some ways from the classic High Noon situation and ends happily. However, it is typical of the western themes but shows how they can still be done well, even if the material is not original.

1. The significance of the title and its tone? The use of Squint the dog -humorously throughout the film? Audience expectations of a western, a western with such a title? How well were expectations fulfilled?

2. The impact of the telemovie: Home audience, brevity, sustaining interest, development of character and themes within a short space? A reliance on the western conventions and their familiarity? The success of this telemovie?

3. The strength of the cast? Their characters and suggestions of character within a brief space? The screenplay's use of conventional western situations e.g. that of High Noon?

4. The western and the American heritage? The opening up of the west, the small towns, banks? Ordinary people? The maintaining of law and order? The vulnerability to violence? Opportunity?

5. The quick setting up of the situation: the overland gold, the posse being killed, the group of bandits? Reynolds and his being wounded, arriving in town, making all the arrangements, being prepared to die in principle for the gold and for justice? The quick delineation of the character of Reynolds? His influence on the others? On the banker?

6. The old men and their chatter at the beginning of the day, their being used as a kind of chorus throughout the film? Their comment on people and situations, their observation of people and the audience seeing others through them?

7. Handy as a character? The upholder of the law - and his saying he was not too bright? His success at keeping bar? The reformed drunk? His friendship with the banker, his being too ready to give out information to Billy Boy? His being sorry and explaining this to the banker? His willingness to help? The character sketch in his talk about himself? His being hit for the banker? His surviving, pressing the banker to continue protecting the gold? His relationship with Squint - Squint running away and finally staying with him? His pride at the end of the film? A good character role for Jack Elam?

8. The banker and his wife? The bank in the middle of nowhere, a man of integrity, his deciding to take a stand on law and order and not surrender the gold, the pressure from Letty? His fear? Handy and himself taking the stand and the shooting of Billy? Letty and her explanation of her father's death (and the use of the music to suggest the scene)? The dynamite? Warding off the group with the dynamite? The gun tied to the back door? The e final siege and the banker protecting himself in his vault? The stand of a western hero and its acknowledgement?

9. Petry and his band, cruelty, murder, Billy Boy and his bragging? The banker reading the 'wanted' lists and explaining their background and their killing? The old man and his saying he had respect for Petry? His realising that the others had been killed off in the raid? His being shot in the back? Petry and his relentlessness, trying to bargain with the banker, seeing the dynamite before he was killed?

10. The atmosphere of the small town, the little boy. the funerals? The talk about what was happening in the small town? The film's capturing its way of life?

11. The entertainment value of the western? Themes of law and justice, the hero alone, heroism in the face of violence, western principles and the American heritage?