ada the leading man is my tpye

Nonureva Really Surprised!

ShangLuda Admirable film.

Mabel Munoz Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

boblipton AT GUNPOINT is a typical Allied Artist B+ western: top lead actors (Fred MacMurray, Dorothy Malone, Walter Brennan), good direction and camerawork, ambitious if overwrought score by Carmen Dragon and a spotty script by Daniel Ullman -- great situations and scenes, some awful dialogue.When some bank robbers hit a small town, storekeeper Fred MacMurray picks up a gun and squeezes off a shot -- and by a miracle brings down a bad guy a half mile away. Hurray! But the dead man's brother wants his vengeance.... and keeps killing the wrong man, resulting in the town turning against its former hero.Westerns are among the oldest of film genres, and along the way they accumulated so much baggage that they became symbolic fiction, like science fiction and fantasy (which has largely replaced them in the cinema). This movie has a strong political message, which it delivers, ultimately, overtly. This weakens it. A better western with political commentary, like HIGH NOON, could leave its subtext in the subtext. Still, for fans of B westerns, it's a lot of fun to see some money spent on a favored form of fun.

Spikeopath The Dennis gang ride into the town of Plainview and set about robbing the bank. However, during their escape Alvin Dennis (John Pickard) is shot and killed by a one in a million lucky shot by mild mannered store keeper Jack Wright (Fred MacMurray). Further compounding the gang's misery is that Alvin was carrying the money and so the town have managed to reclaim what was briefly taken from them. Jack, in spite of his protestations, is hailed a hero by all and sundry, even picking up a substantial reward. But led by a hate filled Bob Dennis (Skip Homeier), the Dennis gang are plotting revenge and have Jack firmly in their sights. Jack is about to find out just who his friends are in the fickle town of Plainview.Yeah yeah yeah, At Gunpoint (AKA:Gunpoint!) is for sure a variation on the High Noon theme, and yes it proudly stands in its pulpit sermonising a moralistic viewpoint. Its central theme one that has been used a number of times in Westerns both prior and post this Allied Artists Pictures release. But so what? If a story, and the potent universal messages at its core, is worth telling, then tell it. As long as it's told well and not bogged down by poor technical aspects, then that surely is enough for the discerning genre fan? At Gunpoint is directed by Alfred L. Werker and is written by prolific Western story teller Daniel B. Ullman. It's a Technicolor/CinemaScope production with Ellsworth Fredericks on photography duties, and the wonderfully named Carmen Dragon provides a bracing score. Supporting MacMurray and Homeier are Dorothy Malone as Jack's increasingly fretful wife, Walter Brennan as a loyal Doctor friend who likes a tipple, while Whit Bissell is a welcome secondary character addition.So many good things to recommend here, it may be a simple fable, but it's lit up by high quality acting and thrives on the moody atmosphere constructed by Werker. MacMurray was always hit and miss, particularly in the Western genre, but when he got it right, or perhaps when he had an understanding director? He was real value for money. Such is the case here. His Jack Wright is an honest man reluctantly put up on a pedestal, thus he quickly becomes a scared man. Naturally fearful for his wife and child, he doesn't hide that he himself is no hero, and has no wish to become one. MacMurray perfectly plays it restrained, thus it is heartfelt and believable. Homeier was always best when playing a snarly villain and here he delivers just that, a villain hell bent on revenge, an avenging brother whose actions speak louder than words. Werker was an old pro, a jobber director, and here he was coming to the end of a career that would span 32 years. He offers up some nice tonal delights here. Witness the dusty storm that descends upon Plainview, it coincides with the town residents having a change of attitude. Then there's his framing of the Dennis gang as they come for revenge, it's impossible not to think of them as the four horsemen of the apocalypse. While the final shoot out, and the twist in the horse tail, is awash with tension and crowned by a remarkable bit of stunt work. This a fine film that belies its "B" movie roots. One that will hopefully find more fans as the years roll by. 8/10

Robert J. Maxwell Fred MacMurray is a peaceful shopkeeper who kills one of the Dennis gang with a lucky shot. The rest escape. MacMurray becomes a hero throughout the state of Texas. The remaining five members of the gang determine to kill him. The other town residents know it and begin to avoid MacMurray. They offer to stake him to a new store in far away Amarillo. Should MacMurray hide his tail between his legs, pack up his loving wife and adorable kid, and skip town? Are you kidding? This is a routine 1950s Western. There must have been hundreds of them ground out, intrigues and drama in a studio-built town with one dusty main street, flanked by a dozen building fronts made of wooden planks. Here, the core issues of Heartland America were on display -- bravery, cowardice, love, treachery, and the question of what you do with a neighbor in your tidy suburb who refuses to mow his lawn as often as everyone else. The 1960s were a transitional period, turbulent and full of excess and challenge. By the 1970s, the issues had changed to corruption and street crime and the milieu in which these dramas were played out was changed to the city streets.But this is from the 1950s. And was released five years after the wildly successful "High Noon" with Gary Cooper as the upholder of reticent righteousness.In "High Noon," a couple of gunmen are returning to town to kill Cooper because he "sent up" the viperous Frank Miller. In "At Gunpoint," the same number of gunmen are coming back to town to kill Cooper, I mean MacMurray, because he accidentally shot a gang member who was the brother of another.The rest of the story is familiar. The gang sneaks in at night and murders the town marshall. Everyone knows they will come back and take care of MacMurray too. As in "High Noon" the town gradually marginalizes the well-meaning shopkeeper and his family, but he refuses to leave town because a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do. His wife, Dorothy Malone, plays Grace Kelly and disparages his attempts to maintain his self esteem but, unlike Kelly, she's quickly won over. We see the gang riding into town for the final show down. We see the scared MacMurray behind a couple of barrels on the street corner, taking a few shots at them that miss their marks by seven hundred yards. The gang trot on towards MacMurray, grim and determined.Now, this is not the kind of movie that has any tricks up its sleeve. That's the whole point -- it should be comforting in its predictability. For instance, one of the character we meet at the beginning is the harmless, smiling, younger brother of Malone. There's no particular reason for his being there. He's always in the background being pleasant, but this story concerns MacMurray and Malone -- not MacMurray and Malone and Malone's BROTHER. Discerning viewers, those with the aficion for old movies, will recognize immediately that this character is DEAD MEAT. And so he is.Well, for the gang to continue its trot up the powdery street, right on up to the helpless Fred MacMurray, whom they then shoot full of holes, is unacceptable. Not because it wouldn't happen in real life but because it would surprise and challenge the audience. The only alternatives are (1) MacMurray to have four MORE lucky shots left in his Colt, or (2) the townsmen relent and capture or kill the gang. There are no other possibilities that don't involve supernatural intervention. No power on earth could force me to reveal which alternative the movie chooses.Oh -- those viewers with the aficion for old movies will recognize a lot of faces in the supporting case: Walter Brennan, Whit Bissell, the miscreant Jack Lambert, Harry Shannon (cf., "Citizen Kane"), John Qualen, and Frank Ferguson.Social psychologists will note the illustration of one of the more surprising findings of cognitive balance theory. Take a person who holds attitude A and opposes attitude B. Tell him that you'll pay him to act AS IF he holds attitude B. After he argues for attitude B long enough, he'll lose his belief in A and genuinely switch to B. In "At Gunpoint," the townspeople are friendly to storekeeper MacMurray. After the first shooting, they begin to avoid him out of fear for themselves and their families. Pretty soon, after they've acted as if he had the plague, they come not to like MacMurray very much and want to get rid of him. They begin with attitude A, act AS IF they held attitude B, and finally FEEL attitude B. They don't even congratulate him when his reward check comes, and they don't say thanks when he buys them a ceremonial drink at the saloon. Have you non-psychologists grasped the point? Good. That will be ten cents.

sims2j About 30 years ago, I was on vacation in Florida with my family. One rainy night in our motel we settled down to watch this movie, and it stuck with me forever. Even today, I can watch a movie, and a month later, I can't remember it - usually because it had terrible acting, an awful (or non-existent) plot, or both. But I will never forget, "At Gunpoint." I suppose another reason I remember this movie is because I was so young, and the movie had adult themes. But I understood the themes. I liked how MacMurray, the common man, became an unlikely hero. To me, this was a movie about heroism being thrust upon a person, and how MacMurray's character awkwardly dealt with the responsibilities that came with that heroism. In kind of a backwards way, the heroism came first, then the courage, but only after a long, drawn-out, sweaty palms, interim battle with his own fears. I also liked the way the movie juxtaposed accidental heroism with the real, earned heroism in the same character--it defined heroism. This was also a movie about how a hero sometimes has to stand alone amidst a community of cowards, even if it means certain death, and that, sometimes, honor is more important than life itself. The suspense in this movie was gripping. When watching it, I felt MacMurray's nearly incapacitating fear as he waited for the dead bandit's friends to return and get their vengeance. Everyone should be able to easily relate to the universal themes in "At Gunpoint." I didn't comment on the details of the scenes of this movie for fear of getting them wrong - it has been over 30 years since I saw it.