150 Word Review: '3:10 To Yuma' (1957)
Choo-choo buckaroos
Glenn Ford is a silver-tongued outlaw in director Delmer Daves' 3:10 to Yuma from 1957, a tense, subversive cowboy thriller about doing the right thing in the lawless Arizona Territory. This isn't a romantic Wild West, it's a desolate wasteland: aChoo merciless drought is choking everyone except those with gold and guns.
Van Heflin is a wide-eyed, desperate rancher who agrees to escort mankiller Ben Wade to a train bound for justice before his gang shows up and starts shooting. Henry Jones's town drunk is human, and Leora Dana's frontier wife is heroic.
Based on an Elmore Leonard short story, 3:10 to Yuma is more wordplay than gunplay. There are gorgeous wide shots of the Southwest, but the real action happens in hot, airless rooms. Ford is a smirking rattlesnake who tries to sweet-talk his way out of chains. Is he a bad guy, or are these just bad times?
Going to have to watch that again soon! Maybe today. https://open.spotify.com/track/0u4d5gdNeF0bKlVqUFSkjz