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| High Noon (1952). See notes below. |
A Smokin' Yarn from the New Old West.
An American pastime of elocution.
There was a time he figured he was a real hotshot,
A bigshot taking potshots at targets at too close range.
But he learned he had to bite the bullet, after the smoking gun
Proved that he had shot himself in the foot.
Shoot, he had a hair trigger, mind blowing for sure
But when Kitty shot him down, he wanted to blow his brains out.
He had taken a scatter shot approach, a crap shoot, he confessed. He had rifled through her drawers half cocked. She wanted to put a gun to his head.
If there was a silver bullet, it was that he only got winged. He had faced a firing squad and maybe, just maybe, they had been shooting blanks.
He headed over to Max Patio for a couple of tequila shooters, the hard stuff,
Bullet proof. Savvy? By then, he was locked and loaded.
He was sure-shootin trigger happy again, but Max, being a straight shooter,
Told him he had a double-barreled problem. “Go shoot some hoops with Pistol Pete, Unload,” he advised. “No need to take up arms. Squeeze the trigger gently
Aim high… Shoot for the stars.”
Still he was confused, imagined himself in the middle of a cross-fire. His mind was blazing: Popping, whistling bullets, drop-dead strategies. All manner of 2nd amendment excuses.
He took note of a big-wave gun hanging on the wall behind the bar, said to himself: “I could surf that stick at Mavericks through a couple of barrels an’ explode out of the tube like a cannon ball.”
The photogs could shoot some frames and run em in a magazine. Shoot first, talk later, so to speak.
But that was a cowboy fantasy, a shoot ‘em up kind of deal, take no prisoners.
He remembered how that coward Mr. Howard had plugged Billy in the back.
Then from the juke box across the room he heard the soft lament, perhaps a snapshot
of his future: “Take this gun away from me. I can’t use it anymore.”
This was no small-bore recrimination or blast of buckshot, but a bullet point on his resume. He looked that barkeep straight into his blood-shot eye.
His lips trembling with resolve, he fired away: “Set me up one last shooter, friend,” he said. “I’m not driving the Bronco tonight, I’m riding shotgun."
Fade to dusty road leading into town and a few dead bodies sprawled in front of the saloon. The moody Western twang of Tex Ritter breaks the silence... "Do not forsake me, oh my darlin'/Do not forsake me, oh my dar-lin/ /Although you're grievin/Don't think of leavin/Now that I need you by by side."
Wait along/ wait a-long, wait a-long.
Notes: I wrote this piece several years ago as a spoof, attempting to show, and discover for myself, how gun references have influenced our language. Looking for an image to go with it today, I landed on the picture of Gary Cooper, from a poster advertising the 1952 film High Noon, which created a controversy during the McCarthy Era of blacklisting communist sympathizers, many from the Hollywood film industry. The film is eerily relevant today.
There is very little violence in the movie, which is based on tension and suspense as the clock ticks. The movie unfolds in real time as small-town Marshall Will Kane (Gary Cooper) attempts to round up support to defend the town from released prisoner Frank Miller and his gang. Miller has vowed to kill Kane. Kane has just wed his beautiful wife, played by Grace Kelly. Miller is due to arrive in town on the train at high noon.
The townfolk act cowardly unwilling to help the Marshall. Actor John Wayne reportedly turned down the lead role because it seemed weak and unmanly, even un-American. Screenwriter Carl Foreman was unable to find work following HUAC hearings led by Sen. Joseph McCarthy. The film explores themes of duty and courage and standing up for justice rather than succumbing to safety and convenience. We see the same behavior in today's Republican Party with members voting for their own self-preservation rather than the good of their greater communities.
The political critics viewed the film as socialistic, emphasizing strength in community rather than the iconic individual Western hero. Produced by Stanley Kramer, known for socially conscious films like Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, High Noon won seven Oscars, including Best Actor, Best Screenplay, Best Director and Best Original Score: Do Not Forsake Me, written by Dimitri Tiomkin, sung by Tex Ritter, a favorite song of mine since I was very young.
"When [Marshall Kane] dies," says one character in the film, "the town dies too."
