Year: 1957
Director: Delmer Daves
Country: US
Language: English
From The Great Train Robbery (1903) to Django Unchained (2012), everybody has a favourite Western. Early Westerns inspired international filmmakers like Akira Kurosawa to make films like Yojimbo (1961) which would inspire a whole new sub-genre known as the Spaghetti Western, which eventually intrigued more generations of filmmakers, like Quentin Tarantino, to get in the mix. 3:10 to Yuma premiered in 1957 and has become a staple in the genre.
After outlaw leader Ben Wade (Glenn Ford) is captured in a small town, his gang continue to threaten. Small-time rancher Dan Evans (Van Heflin) has never stood up against evil all his life, always playing the role of a bystander, however now he is persuaded to take Wade in secret to the nearest town with a railway station to await the 3:10 train to Yuma. Once the two are holed up in the hotel to wait it becomes apparent the secret is out, and a battle of wills starts.
Just to warn, this version of 3:10 to Yuma is only alike to the remake in plot only. The 2007 film starring Russell Crowe is complete garbage and will likely make you fall asleep. Daves' vision is a psychological Western; though it has a decent amount of action scenes, the real suspense is in the dialogue and the verbal confrontations between Wade and Evans. The acting by both men is superb, I have never seen better acting by the charismatic Glenn Ford. The editing is fantastic and the score sets the tone, but the really impressive feat is the cinematography. At times it is claustrophobic, revealing doubt and panic in our heroes' mind, and at other times it can show the great isolation of the West.
The themes of 3:10 to Yuma are quite apparent and intriguing. The film is about morality and temptation, it's a tale that could have come straight from the bible. Dan Evans is a regular Joe who has come on hard times and desperately needs some money. Ben Wade has money, a lot of it, and he will give it to Dan if the man goes against his morals. This proves to be a tremendous temptation, it will take all of Dan's mental energy to refuse. However, throughout the film we see that Wade is a smooth talker and often lies to get his way, so perhaps he has no money after-all. A great quality to this film is that it is very open-ended, doom and doubt are around every corner, it's hard to guess how this film will end.
In conclusion, 3:10 to Yuma is perhaps the most entertaining Western ever made. It certainly packs a great punch and will have you mulling over what you've seen for weeks to come. My only critique is that I think perhaps the ending is a bit out of the blue, however the more I think about it, the more I like it. Buy the wonderful Criterion Collection Edition. Praise it! 4,5/5
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