Warlock - A Great Western Town Movie

by Simon Gelten (Scherpschutter)
(Turnhout, Belgium)

It's All For The Law ..!

After the relatively optimistic western films of the previous decades, that had celebrated the taming of the frontier, the westerns of the fifties were more critical of the history of the Far West and showed more discomfort with society. Like High Noon and Rio Bravo, Edward Dmytryk's Warlock deals with the problems of upholding law and order in a western town.


If the Winchester tamed the frontier, it was the Colt that tamed the frontier town. In absence of the cavalry, it all came down to the courage and the abilities of the individual. In High Noon Gary Cooper begs for help and gets none, in Rio Bravo John Wayne does not beg for help and gets some. Both towns would've been equally lost without their stubborn lawman. In Warlock things are different: so far very lawman has been frightened off by the San Pablo gang, a group of hooligans hired by a rancher who doesn't want the town to grow because this might harm his ranching interests. In despair, the town's people decide to hire a legendry gunfighter named Clyde Blaisdell (Henry Fonda) as Marshal, even though the local judge opposes that Blaisdell would have no legal status.


Blaisdell immediately points out that he will do things his way and that the people will hate him in the end. He imposes his authority quickly, but then a woman named Lily Dollar (Dorothy Malone) comes to town. Blaisdell has shot her lover some time ago, but we soon find out that Blaisdell's friend Morgan (Anthony Quinn) arranged the shooting, like he has arranged most steps in Blaisdell's life. Lily starts a romance with Johnny Ganno (Richard Widmark), a former gang member who has accepted the ungrateful job of deputy in order to redeem himself. When Blaisdell tells Morgan he's about to marry a local beauty, the two men fall out and things are settled in a series of unusual, and very dramatic shootouts.


With themes like resentment, jealousy, redemption and the legitimacy of law and order, not to mention suppressed homosexuality - Warlock is one of the most complex films of its kind. It's also one of the most ambiguous. High Noon may still be open to alternative readings, but we never doubt who is good or bad. In Warlock the gang members sometimes seem less menacing than those who are supposed to serve or uphold the law. This idea is nicely illustrated when one of the gang members says that he has as much right to be in town as the town's people with their hired killer.


Although Widmark is top-billed, the relationship between Fonda and Quin is the heart and soul of the movie. It seems less important whether this relationship is a homosexual one or not. More important is the depiction of Quinn's frustrated cripple as a kind of spin-doctor who uses his more charismatic friend to deploy his cravings for power (and lust). Both actors give an impeccable performance. Quinn has never been better, still the movie belongs to Fonda. His character Blaisdell is an ice-cold professional but not an ice-cold killer: he even pleads with one of the gang members not to draw his gun. And in the end we feel sorry for him: he has lost both his friend and his professional pride. The famous scene, with Fonda throwing away his guns and handing over the town to his legal successor, clearly symbolises the transition of the frontier town from a semi-anarchic state to a respectable community, but it also feels like a symbolic castration, indicating that in the process of civilisation, some of those old ideas of law and order must be sacrificed. Like Ethan Edwards in The Searchers, Clay Blaisdell is no longer needed in the New West. He has become a man who must forever wander between the winds.


Some critics have interpreted the film as an allegorical reading of McCarthyism, referring to Dmytryk's decision (after some time in prison) to testify before Congress against colleagues with communist sympathies. Others have read it as a deconstruction of the story of Wyatt Earp. Fonda's Blaisdell is a menacing, violent, but still caring character with very personal ideas about right and wrong, and yes, it's quite possible that he's closer to the historic Wyatt Earp than the character Fonda played in My Darling Clementine.


Warlock is a typical town western. Relatively few scenes are set outside the town limits, and they're not very convincing. The landscape is strictly used as background, never really integrated in the movie, like in a Ford or Leone western. In those days film makers took the time to tell a story and flesh out their characters, so it may also look a bit slow-moving to contemporary viewers. But this is the real thing, this is what made Hollywood movies great. Don't miss it.