Hang 'Em High (1968)

When an innocent man barely survives a lynching, he returns as a lawman determined to bring the vigilantes to justice.

Director:

Ted Post

Writers:

Leonard Freeman, Mel Goldberg

Stars:

Clint Eastwood, Inger Stevens, Ed Begley

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Clint Eastwood	...	Marshal Jed Cooper
Inger Stevens	...	Rachel Warren
Ed Begley	...	Captain Wilson
Pat Hingle	...	Judge Fenton
Ben Johnson	...	Marshal Dave Bliss
Charles McGraw	...	Sheriff Ray Calhoun
Ruth White	...	Madame 'Peaches' Sophie
Bruce Dern	...	Miller
Alan Hale Jr.	...	Matt Stone
Arlene Golonka	...	Jennifer
James Westerfield	...	Prisoner
Dennis Hopper	...	The Prophet
L.Q. Jones	...	Loomis
Michael O'Sullivan	...	Francis Elroy Duffy
Joseph Sirola	...	Reno

Storyline

A band of vigilantes catch Jed Cooper and, incorrectly believing him guilty of cattle rustling and murder, hang him and leave him for dead. But he doesn't die. He returns to his former profession of lawman to hunt down his lynchers and bring them to justice.

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Plot Keywords:

marshal | judge | justice | rustling | murder | 

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Taglines:

The hanging was the best show in town. But they made two mistakes. They hung the wrong man and they didn't finish the job.

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Genres:

Crime | Thriller | Western

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Certificate:

M

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

3 August 1968 (USA)

Also Known As:

Hirttäkää heidät

Filming Locations:

Las Cruces, New Mexico, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$1,800,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Leonard Freeman Production, Malpaso Company, The

Technical Specs

Runtime:

114 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

CASTLE THUNDER: Heard several times during the rain after Jed and Rachel's picnic.

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Goofs

When Cooper is marched to the 'paddywagon,' one mule is seen hitched behind the wagon. It then disappears, and when the wagon moves, two mules are seen.

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Quotes

[first lines]
[to a calf]
Jed Cooper: I'm gonna have to carry ya, huh?

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Connections

Referenced in The Tonight Show with Jay Leno: Episode #21.74 (2013)

User Reviews

Deserves got nothin' to do with it...

This was Clint Eastwood's American Western debut that I had never really seen all the way through until now. At first I thought it would be another ride 'em high, cowboys n' indians flick that was popular in America those days... before Sergio Leone shook the genre down to its raw and merciless possibilities.

The film was pretty good, and the moral undercurrent of justice "by a dirty rope on the plain, or a judge in a robe standing before the American flag" is rather striking. The Federal judge is by far one of the most interesting characters I have seen yet in a Western.

Indeed, the grittiest and most barbaric scene is not the lynching of an innocent man, but the public hanging on the eve of statehood... to prove that Oklahoma Territory executed the sort of justice required of a "civilized" state of the Union. It is made a public spectacle with beautiful hymns and cold beer. And just the way each of the condemned faces his execution is tongue in cheek.

Then there was the campfire scene where Captain Wilson confers with his employees regarding their options: irony, fear and desperation. They put a human face on their culpability, similiarly echoed decades later by Little Bill's "I don't deserve this, I was building house." And the few who chose not to run chose a desperate and violent option.

A dillemic "no one wins" justice spiralling into graphic violence... and ultimately an undiginified and graceless death. What was perfected into poignant brevity by Unforgiven was born in Hang Em High's exploration of two men's differing approaches to an unforgiving justice... a justice that led either to the end of a noose, or the end of a gun.

Not bad at all...