They'd never forget the day he drifted into town.
A gunfighting stranger comes to the small settlement of Lago. After gunning down three gunmen who tried to kill him, the townsfolk decide to hire the Stranger to hold off three outlaws who are on their way.
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Character
Bleak, grave, open-ended and meticulous.
- warmbleak
- gravecomic
- resolvedopen-ended
- rawmeticulous
- contemporarynostalgic
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“Is this Clint Eastwood's best work?”
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“Is it the best western film of its decade?”
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“Is High Plains Drifter too bleak?”
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Reviews on TMDB
Written by TMDB members; each links to the original. Not part of Tastebuds's numbers.
- CinemaSerfon TMDB · Jan 20267/10
Now we are used to Clint Eastwood playing the poncho-clad man of few words in westerns, but this one has an altogether spookier thread to it. When he arrives into a dead end town he is immediately challenged by three ne’er do wells whom he effortlessly despatches. The townsfolk are not so much terrified as they are impressed and so they ask him to stick around and help protect them from three more thugs who have threatened to burn down their town. Now you’d have thought that had these townspeople just placed themselves on their rooftops with rifles, then they could easily have picked off three men on horseback, but this town really ought to have been on the “yellow” brick road, so they need outside help. He agrees, after a fashion, but exerts his own unique price on this citizenry whilst all the while we see flashbacks of a man being brutally bullwhipped by three men in the street. This isn’t so much a film about a man with no-name as a film about someone or something distinctly devilish. A man with no soul? He isn’t a nice man, a decent or kindly soul, indeed he is probably every much a brute as those about to descend on the town and so engenders little affection from his employer
Read the whole review on TMDB - Wuchakon TMDB · Mar 20247/10
**_Clint paints the Western town red, like Gehenna_** A mysterious Stranger (Eastwood) trots into a remote town in west-central California, a dozen miles from the Nevada border. The townspeople desperately need his help to prepare for the release of three vengeful men from the territorial prison. "High Plains Drifter" (1973) was Clint’s third directorial effort (although he also did some uncredited work on “Dirty Harry”). It parallels his “Pale Rider” from a dozen years later with the difference that Preacher from “Pale Rider” is essentially righteous and therefore protects worthy people whereas Stranger in this flick is vengeful, focusing on dishing out retribution to those who are bad. The fact that there are few ‘good’ people in Lago makes you root for the Stranger, to a degree, but it also prevents the viewer from having compassion for the townsfolk. There’s also an emptiness and tediousness to the proceedings that works against the movie. Still, this is an iconic Eastwood Western and holds up in its unique, nigh satirical way. The beautiful Marianna Hill plays the blonde, Callie. She was 30 years-old during shooting. You might remember her from the Star Trek episode “Dagger of
Read the whole review on TMDB - drystyxon TMDB · Apr 20232/10
Another Hollywood (spaghetti) formula Western where homicidal maniacs abound. Here, Clint plays a homicidal maniac who obviously comes back from the dead after being killed by three bad guys and betrayed by an entire town of people. So, the first thing he does is murder the only three men who weren't part of that. Makes sense? Not if you're looking for credible motivation. But credible motivation isn't a part of most of Eastwood's Westerns. Certainly not the spaghetti ones. So, the rest of the movie is just sound and fury, signifying nothing, and don't try to make sense out of any of it. It's just another movie about homicidal maniacs being everywhere. If the West or East or anywhere was anything like this, there wouldn't be anyone left in one piece to keep a town going. They'd all either be dead or crippled. But Eastwood loved to be in that sort of thing. A hundred years from now, he'll be remembered for many good Westerns like Hang Em High and Joe Kidd, and his Rawhid series, and Dirty Harry, because he played credible characters in those. He doesn't do that here.
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Cast
- Clint EastwoodThe Stranger
- Verna BloomSarah Belding
- Marianna HillCallie Travers
- Mitchell RyanDave Drake
- Jack GingMorgan Allen
- Stefan GieraschMayor Jason Hobart
- Ted HartleyLewis Belding
- Billy CurtisMordecai
- Geoffrey LewisStacey Bridges
- Scott WalkerBill Borders
Crew
- Clint EastwoodDirector
- Ernest TidymanWriter
- Bruce SurteesDirector of Photography
- Dee BartonOriginal Music Composer
- Ferris WebsterEditor
- Robert DaleyProducer
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