Aging ex-lawman Joel McCrea is hired to protect gold shipment and asks old friend Randolph Scott to join him. Scott brings a young sidekick (Ron Starr) with him and has intentions of robbing the gold shipment, with or without McCrea's help. Last hurrah for western stars Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea. Scott's last film completely and McCrea's last worth mentioning. It's funny but I never really think of Joel McCrea as a western star. I know he did a lot of them, particularly in the later half of his career, but I always preferred his comedy and drama roles from earlier on. The westerns he did were not that impressive to me. Scott, on the other hand, was a bona fide western legend on the basis of his Boetticher films alone. Mariette Hartley is good in her film debut. Ron Starr is the film's weak link. It's not surprising he would have a limited acting career. It's been said by many to be Sam Peckinpah's best film. Is it? I'm not quite there but I do believe it's one of his least self-indulgent films. He's not one of my favorite directors but he did do some good work. This is right up there. It's not a perfect film. The first half is kind of pedestrian for a film with such a high reputation. But the second half delivers and you can see why many call this a classic.

"All I want is to Enter My House Justified"

Sam Peckinpah's second feature film is today standing up as a must see and must own for those interested in the Western genre.

The film sees ageing lawman Steve Judd land a job of escorting a gold shipment safely to a bank in Hornitos. After running into old friend, and fellow aged lawman Gil Westrun, he hires both he and his young sparky sidekick Heck Longtree to hopefully see the job through to a successful conclusion. Yet Gil has other ideas, for where Steve is upstanding and adhering to the values he has lived his life by, Gil sees this as one last chance to actually get a big payday. The journey takes a further twist as the three men meet and then save Elsa Knudsen from a brutal marriage, it's an incident that puts them all on a collision course with the Hammond brothers.

What we have here is Sam Peckinpah's first film dealing with men who have outlived their time. We witness some emotionally poignant stuff as the two main protagonists know that they have aged beyond their world, yet as alike as they are, they have different ideals in how to deal with the advent of time. The masterstroke here is the casting of genre legends Joel McRea & Randolph Scott as Steve & Gil respectively. It's evident from the off that both men are identifying with their characters, with both men hitting top emotional form to fully realise the thematic heart of the story. Mariette Hartley makes her film debut as Elsa, and she fits in nicely with the quality on show behind and in front of the camera. Lucien Ballard's cinematography is gorgeous as the various California locations envelope the protagonists in a sort of elegiac way, and Peckinpah directs with his heart as well as his head.

Bookended by two heart-achingly super sequences, of which the finale has rightly passed into Western genre legend, this really is a strong and beautiful film, one that simultaneously shows a truly great director was at work. For here he was left alone, and the final result is a quality Western beating far more than just a cowboy heart. The supporting cast is strong, notably Edgar Buchanan, L.Q. Jones & John Anderson, while the undervalued George Bassman provides a narratively fitting tonal music score. If there is a criticism? it's that Peckinpah doesn't let the younger characters breath, but given the film's core focus on aged men in an aged passing era, well it's easily forgiven. A precursor to The Wild Bunch for sure, but while the theme is the same for both films, this one impacts in a very different way. Highly recommended, not just for the Oater crowd, but for fans of classic cinema too. 9/10

Like John Wayne in The Shootist, Joel McCrea as Steven Judd rides into town a tired and tuckered old man. He's a former lawman who in his youth enjoyed some prestige. There's no Social Security for him, no company pension, he has to keep working and he takes it where he finds it. In this case it's being a guard for some gold from a distant mining camp.

He recruits an old friend Randolph Scott as Gil Westrum who now makes a living as a carnival sideshow act and another younger man from the carnival, Ron Starr.

The three of them set out for the mining camp and accept the hospitality of puritan farmer R.G. Armstrong who has a spirited daughter, Mariette Hartley.

Joel McCrea was probably the biggest out and out movie hero, he never appeared on screen as anything less than an honorable man. Sam Peckinpah originally wanted him for the Gil Westrum part, but McCrea insisted it had to be Judd for him so Peckinpah reversed the casting.

Good thing too because while McCrea is never less than honorable, Randolph Scott's western heroes always had an edge to them. He more easily fit into the Westrum character, the former lawman who is now cynical and contemplating going against the code he lived by.

And that's what Ride the High Country is all about, how you live your life and can you look yourself in the mirror every day and feel justified as McCrea so eloquently put it.

One of the fascinating things I find about Ride the High Country is that there are two morally upright people, McCrea and Armstrong. It's no big trick to stay morally upright as Armstrong has, shut off from the world and its temptations on his farm. McCrea however lives in the world and faces the same temptations every day. Those same temptations that Scott is thinking about giving into.

They return from the gold camp with Hartley who ran away and got married to a family of inbreds named Hammond who seem to think if one of them gets married, the bride is some kind of communal property. Of course the Hammonds chase after her and a pair of our most gallant cowboy heroes come to her rescue.

My personal opinion is that the most gallant screen death ever put on film is by Joel McCrea in this film. In a forgotten backwater of the west where few will see his sacrifice McCrea dies justified as he and Scott kill all of the Hammond brothers. Scott who was going to rob the gold tells McCrea he'll take the gold in. McCrea says he always knew that. And you believe it too because Randolph Scott says so. A cowboy hero gives his word. McCrea will enter heaven justified and you know that Scott will follow him as he said he would.

John Anderson, L.Q. Jones, Warren Oates, James Drury, and John Davis Chandler are the Hammond brothers as scurvy a lot as you'll ever find. Edgar Buchanan plays the alcoholic judge who married Drury and Hartley and Percy Helton is the bank president who hires McCrea and company to bring back the gold. They all fill their roles well.

Randolph Scott made Ride the High Country his last film and resisted all kinds of offers to come back. Joel McCrea should have gone out on this one also, but he made a mistake and came back a few times, including one dreadful film with his son Jody, Cry Blood Apache.

This film should be seen and seen again for the moral lessons it teaches and for the summation of the film lives it embodies for two of our greatest film heroes.