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The movie was written by John W. Cunningham (story) and Carl Foreman , based on a pulp short story, The Tin Star. It was directed by Fred ZinnemannFred Zinnemann ( April 29, 1907 March 14, 1997) was a noted movie director. He was born in Vienna, Austria, and died of a heart attack in London, England. Selected filmography From Here to Eternity High Noon A Man for All Seasons (1966) Oklahoma Zinnemann, a controversial choice, since the producers were uncertain that an AustriaAustria is a landlocked country in Central Europe, a federation of nine states. Austria is bordered by Germany and the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to then JewThe word Jew is used in a wide number of ways, but generally refers to either a follower of the Jewish faith, a child of a Jewish mother, or a member of the Jewish culture or ethnicity. This article discusses the term as describing an ethnic group; for a would be able to direct the quintessential American genre: the Western. Zinnemann himself was highly influenced by the books of Karl MayKarl Friedrich May (Hohenstein-Ernstthal, February 25, 1842 Radebeul, March 30, 1912) was the best selling German writer of all time, noted chiefly for wild west books set in the American West and similar books set in the Middle East; in addition, he also that he had read as a child. Writer Carl Foreman was also the producer of the film, but he was uncredited because he was blacklisted by Senator Joseph McCarthyThis article is about the American politician. For other people with the same name, see Joseph McCarthy (disambiguation). Joseph Raymond McCarthy ( November 15, 1908— May 2, 1957) was an American politician of the Republican Party. McCarthy served as a U. and the House Un-American Activities Committee.
High Noon is a generally praised but somewhat controversial western in which a lawman in a western town feels obliged to face down a bunch of bad men coming into town. Cooper's character is betrayed by all the "good" men in town who won't take up arms for a good cause. It is often an interpreted as an allegoryAn allegory (from Greek αλλος, allos "other", and αγορευειν, agoreuein "to speak in public") is a figurative representation conveying a meaning other than and in ad of contemporary McCarthyismMcCarthyism named after Joseph McCarthy, was a period of intense anticommunism, also known as the (second) Red Scare, which occurred in the United States from 1948 to about 1956 (or later), when the government of the United States actively persecuted the.
There was some controversy over the casting of Gary Cooper in the lead role. Although he had already won an Oscar for his performance in Sergeant York, he was considered too old for the part, and was, in fact, thirty years older than Grace Kelly, who plays his wife.
In the film she is a young woman who wants her husband to leave town and has a religious aversion to violence of any kind. Still, she stays with him when he fights — and even kills one of her husband's assailants herself.
The movie won Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Gary Cooper), Best Film Editing, Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture ( Dimitri Tiomkin), and Best Music, Song (Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington for High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin'), sung by Tex Ritter). It was nominated for Best Director, Best Picture, and Best Writing, Screenplay.
One of the interesting techniques used in filming High Noon was to have the sequence of events occur in "real time." When a clock is shown in a scene, an event the audience expects to occur at another given time will occur that number of minutes later in the movie.
The director intended to capture the atmosphere of old Civil War photographs, with an austere gray sky as a backdrop. Despite the constraints of a limited budget ($750,000) and only 28 days to film, he was able to obtain this even though most of the film was shot on a Hollywood lot by taking advantage of the smog in Los Angeles to darken the sky.
High Noon is consistently on the Internet Movie Database's list of top 250 films, was #33 on American Film Institute's 100 Years, 100 Movies, and has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry. Its haunting theme music is still popular.
A made-for-TV sequel, "High Noon Part II: The Return Of Will Kane" (produced in 1980, 28 years after the original movie was released), featured Lee Majors in the Cooper role.
The 1980 science fiction film Outland borrowed from the story of High Noon for its plot. The movie starred Sean Connery.
And finally, in 2000, "High Noon" was entirely re-worked for cable television with Tom Skerritt in the lead role.
Some speculate that High Noon provided inspiration for Akira Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai.
High Noon is the film most requested by American Presidents.
1952 films AFI 100 Movies AFI 100 Thrills US National Film Registry Western films