Wonderful Westerns: ‘Gunfight at the O.K. Corral’ (1957)
Period/historical pieces have always been popular when it comes to movies. Whether it be a motivational story about a football coach who pushes his team to the best of their abilities or a movie about a very brutal and dark moment that hopefully mankind will never see again. As you probably guessed, that’s what today’s subject involves.
Real tales and figures of the wild west have been used as a source of inspiration since practically the beginning of filmmaking itself. Many American West legends have been brought to the silver screen, two of the most popular being Wyatt Earp and John “Doc” Holliday. Both of these figures have been the subject of a whole slew of movies and TV shows. In this column, we’ll be talking about my favorite of all the Earp/Holliday related films: Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957), directed by John Sturges and starring Burt Lancaster as Earp and Kirk Douglas as Doc.
Let me just get this out of the way: Yes. This film is an extremely romanticized version of the gunfight and has many historical inaccuracies. Hell, this movie doesn’t even give the Earps their famous mustaches. If I were a teacher, I’d probably give its authenticity a D- at best. But despite all that, it’s still a great film with excellent acting, storytelling, action, and music. This film may make people look up the actual events and get interested in history. That’s got to be worth something.
The real selling point of the film is the chemistry between Earp and Doc. In other film versions, they usually start off as just acquaintances at best, but in this film, while they’re aware of each other, they don’t care for one another at all. This actually works for the story, because a big focus of the movie is the budding respect and friendship of the two men who are essentially on the opposite of the law and both get involved with the politics and law enforcement of Tombstone for different reasons. Wyatt does it because of a sense of duty and to help his brothers — Virgil (John Hudson), James (Martin Milner), and Morgan (DeForest “I’m a Doctor!” Kelley) — while Doc does it out of a sense of pride.
Both of these guys also have an adversary that embodies everything that rubs them the wrong way. For Wyatt, it’s Ike Clanton (Lyle Bettger), a man who looks out for his family but lacks any of the moral and professional code that Wyatt has. He’s quick-tempered, he’ll pull out his gun if he feels like he’s been even remotely insulted, and he threatens the Earps at nearly every confrontation.. Not too far from the real Ike Clanton, actually. Wyatt, while disliking the Clanton brothers immensely, avoids confrontation and even tries to convince the youngest of the brothers, Billy (played by a very young Dennis Hopper), to avoid his brother’s lifestyle.
For Doc, his adversary comes in the form of another notorious gunfighter — Johnny Ringo (John Ireland). Ringo is a very worthy foe for Doc. He constantly pushes the right buttons to test his masculinity and honor, which — given Doc’s Southern heritage — is a very big deal. Especially when it’s in front of his woman, Kate Fisher (Jo Van Fleet).
Speaking of women, both of them have their special lady friends. Doc’s is the previously mentioned Kate, who’s more or less a traveling companion, and that’s about it. Both fight and bicker with each other but know that neither can leave because they don’t want to be alone. As for Wyatt and his lady, Laura Denbow (Rhonda Fleming), while she’s an interesting character at first, being a lady gambler who tests Wyatt’s integrity, she’s one of the weaker aspects of the film. She’s not terrible, she just doesn’t do that much, and she leaves almost halfway through the film. It’s sad because there’s a fairly interesting story involving Wyatt, his common-law wife Mattie Blaylock, and actress/eventual common-law wife Josephine. But that’s an entirely different discussion.
One of the other really smart aspects of this film is the build-up to the titular gunfight. This movie holds off on any massive gun play until the final battle when the tension and confrontations between the Earps and the Clantons get more aggressive. It finally comes to a head when a member of the Earp clan is gunned down, and Wyatt can take no more as he, his brothers, and Doc march down the street to end this. The exposition for the battle starts right at the beginning with Frankie Laine singing the film’s theme song, which was composed by Ned Washington and Dimitri Tiomkin. Listen to his haunting voice as he sings the line, “Boot Hill, Boot Hill. So cold, so still.”
The gunfight itself is simply amazing. It’s probably one of my favorite Western gunfights ever put on the silver screen. I won’t go into that much detail as I want you to experience it yourself but I will say one thing about it: the movie earned its best sound nomination at the Oscars.
If you can look pass historical inaccuracies, then I highly recommend this awesome film which features a great example of John Sturges excellent directing and storytelling, and some great performances from an awesome ensemble cast. There was a remake/sequel that Sturges made called Hour of the Gun (1967), but I’ll hold off on talking about that for another article. In the meantime, give this film a watch. You won’t regret it.
