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45 out of 45 people found the following review useful:
Unmatched Version!, 1 February 2011

Author: jpdoherty from Ireland

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

One of the finest and most memorable westerns of the fifties is GUNFIGHT AT THE OK CORRAL! A splendid Vista Vision Technicolor presentation based around the famous shootout that took place in Tombstone Arizona on the 26th October 1881. Produced by Hal Wallis for Paramount Pictures in 1957 it was masterfully directed by John Sturges and mightily cast with Burt Lancaster as the great frontier lawman Wyatt Earp and Kirk Douglas as Doc Holliday. The combination of these two heavyweight stars playing the leads plus the movie's catchy fire cracker title assured the picture's box office success. From an excellent screenplay by Leon Uris it was stylishly complimented by the brilliant and glowing cinematography of Charles B. Lang together with Dimitri Tiomkin's rollicking score including the clever vocal sung by Frankie Laine which operatically guided us through the narrative.

The story we all know and love recounts the arrival in Tombstone of Marshal Wyatt Earp. From his developing relationship with the dubious Doc Holliday to his many run ins with rancher Ike Clanton and his law breaking gang of cowboys which would inevitably lead to the event that would become known as the most famous and notorious shootout in American western history.........THE GUNFIGHT AT THE OK CORRAL.

The incident itself has been well documented by Hollywood. Most famously by John Ford in 1946 when it featured in his classic "My Darling Clementine" for 20th Century Fox with Henry Fonda as Wyatt Earp and Victor Mature as the consumptive Doc Holliday. Then in a later version in 1993 "Tombstone" with Kurt Russell as Earp and Val Kilmer who just chewed up every shred of scenery as a swashbuckling Holliday. This was followed the next year by Kevin Kostner's over long and bloated "Wyatt Earp" (1994) with Kostner making for a stiff Earp but Dennis Quaid delivering a blistering and definitive performance as a really ill looking Holliday. It is interesting to ponder that the actual event that occurred on that fateful October afternoon in 1881, when the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday confronted the Clantons and the McLaurys at the OK Corral, was but the briefest of encounters. It was all over inside of thirty seconds! With thirty shots fired at point blank range it resulted in the deaths of Tom and Frank McLaury and young Billy Clanton. Morgan and Virgil Earp along with Doc Holliday were wounded but survived. Wyatt was unhurt. For an incident that - in reality - was so short it is quite amazing how elaborate and embellished Hollywood has depicted the event in every movie. Sturges' film probably contains the longest and most colourful version of the incident which took up to about twenty minutes of screen time. Of course we must accept this to be artistic licence and enjoy it as it is - regardless of the liberties taken by the film makers concerning the facts of what actually occurred that day. Also It is curious that situated next to the OK Corral was the photographic studio of Camillus Fly (Fly was famous for his many photos of early Arizona including those taken at the negotiations between the Apache warrior Geronimo and General Crook). Unfortunately Fly - reputed to be under threat from the Earps - took no photographs of the unfolding events that day in the adjacent OK Corral. A missed opportunity most certainly, a shamefully lost scoop that history can never forgive. Fly's studio is nowhere to be seen in either Sturges' or Ford's pictures. And yet it was quite prominent in 1993's "Tombstone".

However, actual occurrences and events not withstanding Sturges' movie is still an immensely entertaining picture. Performances are top notch! Lancaster makes a fine upstanding square jawed Wyatt Earp against Douglas' tempestuous and aggressive Doc Holliday. Good too are those in smaller roles like Jo Van Fleet as Doc's abused girl friend "Big Nose" Kate, Lyle Bettger as Ike Clanton, John Ireland as Ringo and Dennis Hopper as Billy Clanton.

All in all another great one from the fifties, the decade of the classic Hollywood western.

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37 out of 49 people found the following review useful:
Lancaster and Douglas --- Earp and Holiday, 9 August 2005

Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

In one of her books Hedda Hopper devoted a chapter to both of the stars of Gunfight at the OK Corral, calling them the Terrible Twins. As a columnist Hopper was a firm defender of the old studio system and both Burt and Kirk were seen by her as betraying old Hollywood.

Now personally I think their careers show that both of these guys knew exactly what they were doing in guiding their own destinies. This film is a great example of it. It was deservedly a critical hit and a moneymaker.

No film has ever been made that completely told accurately the story of the famous gunfight, least of all this one. But it sure captures the spirit.

I think both of these guys could have played each other's part and the film still would have been a winner. The problem with playing Wyatt Earp is that he's usually such a straight arrow on screen or on television that the main job of the actor is to keep from making him sound like Dudley Doo-Right. Burt Lancaster is capable enough and did it, but Wyatt Earp maybe one of the least complex roles he ever essayed.

Kirk Douglas though is the best Doc Holiday I've ever seen portrayed. Doc Holiday is a brooding, consumptive alcoholic who's also a woman batterer. He treats Jo Van Fleet like garbage and her responses to him is responsible for several of the plot twists. As I've said before Douglas can flip into rage better than any other actor ever. Just watch him with Van Fleet after the youngest Earp brother has been killed.

Today we would call Jo Van Fleet a battered spouse even though she and Douglas are living common-law. Her's is the next best portrayal in the film besides Kirk Douglas.

Rhonda Fleming has little to do except look coquettish and beautiful as the lady gambler who Lancaster falls for. But that was usually enough for her public. It's ironic that she's playing a liberated woman for 19th century and Fleming's politics are quite right wing and Lancaster her very traditional 19th century man was a noted political liberal.

And of course the unbilled co-star is Frankie Laine singing that wonderful title song by Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington. Tiomkin was one of the best of movie composers, his music gave that extra oomph into a lot of good movies, making them great.

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33 out of 49 people found the following review useful:
A pure Western with a great score..., 10 January 2000

Author: ironside (robertfrangie@hotmail.com) from Mexico

"Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" derives from one of the most celebrated shoot-outs in Western history in Tombstone, Arizona, on October 26, 1881... The semi-legendary confrontation had made of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, men of exceptional quality...

"Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" has some of the Sturges virtues, but not all… It doesn't however disappoint when it comes to the crunch—the gunfight itself… This is magnificently staged… It probably equals anything that law and order movies have produced in set-piece battles…

The film also focuses on the friendship between Earp and Holliday and the good will of two different kinds of men... Earp, is an honest lawman with authority, and Holliday, a gambler with a 'real big hate for the law.'

The two characters are powerful, strong, and at the same time compassionate, with respect and dignity... Holliday's character as the black sheep, is much more interesting than the straight marshal who is at the same time the lawman, the judge and the jury.' The main assets of the motion picture are Lancaster and Douglas, two great stars conscious of their potentialities with excellent ability...

Douglas is impressing and brilliant as the troubled sick Doc Holliday and Lancaster is confident, solid and likable as Wyatt Earp... The mirror scene, in the beginning of the film, is great: Douglas, cool and steady, is ready for action observing carefully in the mirror the sharp feature and narrow steely eyes of Lee Van Cleef who is so anxious to kill him with a small gun hidden in his left boot...

Fine performances by a first-class cast heighten the interest: Rhonda Fleming is ravishing as the redhead lady gambler; Jo Van Fleet is very effective as the jealous lady, torn between Ringo and Holliday; Earl Holliman is good as the naive deputy who 'picks up the hardware as soon as the cowboys hit town;' John Ireland is unforgettable with his slight stoop and menacing walk; Lyle Bettger is strong as Ike Clanton, the organizer of the toughest bunch of gunslingers; Dennis Hopper is difficult and rebellious as the young Clanton who can't take the advice of the marshal; and Jack Elam is threatening as the tall and lean man with an evil leer...

Dimitri Tiomkin's great score back up the "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral," a pure Western, magnificently photographed by Charles Lang in VistaVision and Technicolor...

John Ireland has been twice on the losing side of the Corral incident... The first time as Billy Clanton in John Ford's "My Darling Clementine."

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25 out of 39 people found the following review useful:
Burt and Kirk Take on the Clantons!, 16 August 2003
Author: Ben Burgraff (cariart) from Las Vegas, Nevada

'Gunfight at O.K. Corral' is one of the many films that have told the tale of the famous showdown between the Earps and the Clantons, but setting this version apart is the ideal casting of Burt Lancaster as the straight-shooting Marshal Wyatt Earp, and Kirk Douglas as the sardonic, dying gambler, Doc Holliday. As in all their pairings, there is a chemistry between them that makes even mundane scripts seem magical!

Lancaster, continuing his rule of alternating between heavy drama and action films, researched the historic Earp extensively, speaking to many who knew him, and his performance is restrained and assured. Douglas, on the other hand, fresh from playing Vincent Van Gogh in 'Lust for Life', knew he needed a splashy hit film, and played Doc Holliday as larger than life, swaggering, diseased, and charismatic. His portrayal is far closer in spirit to the interpretations of Holliday by Val Kilmer, in 'Tombstone', and Dennis Quaid, in 'Wyatt Earp', than Victor Mature, in John Ford's 'My Darling Clementine'.

The film, co-written by Leon Uris, author of 'Exodus', is a historically fanciful but very entertaining exploration of the friendship between Earp and Holliday, as the lawman moves from Dodge City to Tombstone, followed by the gambler, covering a 'blood debt', after Earp saves his life. The climax is, naturally, the infamous gun battle between the Earps (with Holliday) versus the Clanton family and their allies. While purists will quickly note that the shoot-'em-up presented is totally fabricated (watch 'Wyatt Earp' or 'Tombstone' if you want accuracy), it certainly is rousing!

Other aspects of the film to enjoy...Dimitri Tiompkin's magnificent musical score, highlighted by Frankie Laine's unforgettable performance of the title tune, throughout the film...Excellent supporting players, including Jo Van Fleet as Holliday's mistress, John Ireland as evil Johnny Ringo, a young Dennis Hopper as Billy Clanton, and Rhonda Fleming as the gambler girlfriend of Wyatt (based on Earp's actual wife, Josie)...Cameos by Kenneth Tobey as Bat Masterson, DeForest Kelley as Morgan Earp, Martin Milner as James Earp, and Frank Faylen as the corrupt sheriff.

The director, John Sturges, revisited the Earp saga some years later in 'Hour of the Gun', with James Garner as Earp, and Jason Robards as Holliday, but while the later film may be more correct, historically, 'Gunfight at the O.K. Corral' is a far more enjoyable film.

I strongly recommend it to any western fan!

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10 out of 12 people found the following review useful:
It's OK at the Corral, 16 September 2007

Author: Bucs1960 from West Virginia

Who really cares if this film is historically accurate? This is the re-telling, no matter how grandiose and overblown, of a gunfight that has gained in reputation over the years and has become legendary, deserved or un-deserved. The result is one jim-dandy of a western with a little bit of love, a little bit of drama and a whole lot of violence as the Earps and the Clantons go head to head.

And who better to be the bigger than life heroes than those two bigger than life stars, Lancaster and Douglas. Talk about perfect casting...... Lancaster as Wyatt Earp moves through this film like a ballet dancer and Douglas as Doc Holliday squares that famous chin and gets tough while hacking up his lungs to tuberculosis. Who can forget Lancaster running and diving across the corral with a shotgun. His former career as an acrobat and trapeze artist is on display here.

The supporting cast is about as good as it gets. From Lyle Bettger to John Ireland as the bad guys......to Jo VanFleet as Doc's woman.....to Dennis Hopper as the confused youngest Clanton. Rhonda Fleming is beautiful and is only part of the sub-plot used to flesh out the running time but I'm not complaining.

You don't have to be a fan of westerns to get involved in this epic tale......and I haven't even mentioned Frankie Lane's title song. It's a heroic tale of family honor and violent consequences when honor is challenged. Accuracy be damned......it's a great film.

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20 out of 32 people found the following review useful:
"A Law Bigger'n Any In The Book - Family Pride", 4 December 2000
Author: Michael Coy (michael.coy@virgin.net) from London, England

One of Hollywood's major offerings of 1957, "Gunfight" contains all the ingredients one would expect of a blockbuster - big stars, big budget and a storyline calculated to capture the public's imagination. For me, however, the film doesn't quite work. In the final analysis, the whole thing is a little too sluggish, a little too formulaic.

To be sure, it contains fine things. Burt Lancaster is stolid and unyielding as hard lawman Wyatt Earp. Sturges films him with the camera at ground level as he rides onto the screen, making him seem superhuman in his larger-than-life moral certainty. He faces down the armed drunk without the faintest twitch of fear, the embodiment of a strong, righteous enforcer of the law. The friendship between the paragon and the wastrel is cleverly done, with Earp and Holliday (Kirk Douglas) each seeing something to admire in the other, very different, man. Character is also to the fore as a plot-driver when Kate Fisher (Jo Van Fleet) is forced by the dynamics of her relationship with the Doc into ever more wretched behaviour. By comparison, the Earp-Laura love story is cold and staid. Both Lancaster and Rhonda Fleming are terrific to look at, but hard to warm to. Though the film takes an eternity to get to the shoot-out which is its raison d'etre, when the climax finally comes the suspense is built superbly. In a nice symmetry, we see the women of both sides dreading the fatal clash as Ma Clanton and Virgil's wife separately mourn the departure of their respective menfolk. Douglas made a career out of playing generous-spirited bad guys, and one of the best things in this film is Doc Holliday's heroic effort of will, rising from his sickbed to stand beside his friend in the face of mortal danger. Shot in a rich Technicolor palette, the film's images are strong and clean, and at times even beautiful, for example the barn fire, or the approach of the Earp faction, with Cotton standing facing them, his body framed by the corral building.

Other elements are not so well done. Wyatt is too unrelenting a hard man to win the audience's unqualified sympathy, as in the scene when he tells the all-too-human Cotton, "If you can't handle it any more, turn in your badge." The Frankie Laine ballad, almost de rigeur in 1950's westerns, is simply not up to scratch ("Boot Hill, Boot Hill, so cold, so still ...") There is an ugly shadow eclipsing Ike Clanton's face throughout his most important scene. Billy (a very young Dennis Hopper) is 'converted' by Wyatt far too easily.

There exists a wide spectrum of opinion on the question of how loyal a work of fiction should remain to the historical event which inspired it. One camp would argue that the artist has total freedom to rework a popular legend such as The Gunfight, while the other extremity would insist on documentary accuracy. This film is interesting, in that it takes a well-known incident for which contemporaneous records abound, and virtually disregards the historical truth.

In the film, the decent, clean-shaven Earp boys are merely 'doing what a man has to do'. We know that the Clanton-McLaury gang is mean and duplicitous, and that there will have to be a showdown between Right and Wrong. The shoot-out, when it comes, happens over several minutes of time on a clear, bright day. There is an athletic battle of movement, with the Earps in particular manoeuvring for position, and finally trapping the Clantons in and around a burning wagon. The strategic intentions of the good guys are clear and easy to follow.

The reality of October 26, 1881 was quite different. Two gangs of walrus-mustachioed men confronted each other, standing face-to-face in a built-up street. The shooting lasted a maximum of 30 seconds, and when the smoke cleared, three of the so-called "cowboy faction" lay dead or mortally wounded, whereas the Earp faction sustained only minor wounds. Wyatt was totally unharmed. Ike Clanton and Billy Claiborne, two of the cowboy leaders, had in fact run away when the guns opened fire.

This was no tussle between Good and Evil. Wyatt Earp was not a US Marshall, as the film tries to insist. He was Virgil's assistant with purely local authority, little more than his brother's pinch-hitter. Doc Holliday held no office of any kind. This was a clash between two Americas - the Earps representing the urban, northern, republican culture which had won the Civil War, while the Clantons stood for the freebooting, democratic, open-range mentality whose sympathies lay with the vanquished South.

A motion picture has a span of something like 90 minutes in which to set out its stall. Perhaps such a narrow intellectual space imposes so many constrictions that the true flavour of a historic event can never be properly represented. Or maybe the limitations of the medium set the film-maker free to create a better, more poetic "reality". I don't know the answer. There probably isn't one.

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10 out of 14 people found the following review useful:
Excellent Archetypal Western, 5 December 2004

Author: Nicholas Rhodes from Ile-de-France / Paris Region, France

This film has everything going for it : magnificent music score introduced at regular intervals throughout, superb sets and lighting, deep blue skies, parched yellow fields, cactus, mountainous backdrop, gunfights, romance, tension, saloon bars ..... what more could a western lover want ?

In spite of it two hours' duration, this is a magnificent archetypal western, if I wanted to criticise negatively something in it, I would say that the female presence, and consequently romance could have been a little stronger with more romantic and passionate scenes to offset the shooting and violence !

I notice that some jerks on IMDb are criticizing "historical inaccuracies" the film ! This mad me laugh to death. Who really cares a TINKER'S CUSS whether the film is historically accurate ? This is not a documentary about the Wild West, it is CINEMA !! And good cinema it certainly is ! The final shoot-out at OK Corral is magnificent ( better that that of OPEN RANGE ! ). The combination of Frankie Lane's theme tune plus those deep blue skies and yellow parched fields will always remain foremost in my memory as regards this film.

Kirk Douglas plays an interesting character, not always easy to fathom out as compared with the straight and righteous character of Burt Lancaster, who looks magnificent in this film. Unfortunately we do not know whether he meets up with his loved one at the end but we suppose he will ( Cf Doc Holliday "She'll Be Waiting For You ....... ).

So far only available from the USA on DVD with English subtitles, it cannnot be found in Europe unfortunately, though I have seen it a couple of times on both English and French TV. No doubt Paramount will probably bring it out on DVD over here too in the coming months .....

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11 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
In this film it is Doc that counts., 19 October 2003

Author: tmwest from S. Paulo, Brazil

The DVD copy I saw is excellent. The Frankie Laine ballad blends very well with the scenes. Burt Lancaster gives a quite cold performance as Wyatt Earp, and the Earp family is not shown as well as it should. Same thing goes for the Clantons, with the exception of Dennis Hopper, and John Ireland as Johnny Ringo. Kirk Douglas and Jo Van Fleet as Doc and his woman are really the ones that make this film pick up speed. They involve you in their drama. The gunfight is very well staged, you don't see good action scenes like that in westerns nowadays.

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12 out of 19 people found the following review useful:
A Great Cast Is Reason Enough To See This Film, 13 May 2000
Author: gitrich (sfwr@earthlink.net) from Brea, Ca. USA

No, this is not the way it really happened at the Ok Corral in Tucson but since when has Hollywood ever been totally accurate and true to history? The chemistry between Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster works extremely well. This movie works because of great stars and a solid cast of great actors. The score is outstanding featuring Frankie Lane singing the title song. The photography is very realistic compared to most westerns of that era. The gunfight at the Ok Corral is worth waiting for. If you like westerns, you will especially like The Gunfight At Ok Corral.

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18 out of 31 people found the following review useful:
Nice Colors, Two Big Stars Best Features Of This Version, 28 September 2006

Author: ccthemovieman-1 from United States

The stories and films about Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday and the Clantons are always interesting, at least to me. They've been put on film a half dozen times over the years. I think the best feature of this particular version was the beautiful, muted colors. Now that it's out on DVD, I would like to see this on a nice widescreen transfer. My only looks (two of them) were on VHS. Story-wise, most of the others Earp films were more interesting than this one.

What makes the story worth seeing are two big stars playing main roles: Burt Lancaster as "Wyatt Earp" and Kirk Douglas as "Doc Holliday." What's different about the story is that, unlike all other versions, Earp and Holliday are not good friends throughout this movie, although they wind up as allies in the final shootout. Also, the arguments between Holliday and his girlfriend "Kate" (Jo Van Fleet) grow tiresome after awhile.

Overall, this doesn't have enough action to satisfy today's viewers, except for the shootout scene at the end, which goes on for at least 10 minutes.

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