of his films, again he chooses not to impose those beliefs on the viewer but instead allows the viewer to draw their own conclusions. Where there is an emphasis is with repeated shots of a statue of the Madonna and child, as well as key shots of women caring for a young child. The mother and child motif also carries over in connecting Peck with Van Cleef and Silva.

Working again with cinematographer Leon Shamroy, the look of The Bravados is naturalist, Henry King is comfortable with CinemaScope to play with some of the possibilities of perspective, forcing the viewer to actively watch the film. Examples include a shot near the beginning of the film that includes a deputy seen in the foreground looking at Peck riding in thedistance. Stephen Boyd peers out of the jail window, almost proportionate to the movie screen which serves as a frame within the camera frame, vertically broken by the jail cell bars. There are also extreme close-ups of Peck, Collins and the others, something that filmmakers shied away from when CinemaScope was first introduced. Interestingly, in one of his interviews, Henry King had thought that the then new wide screen process would eliminate the need for close-ups of the actors. Henry King may have been an old hand at making movies, but he proved himself open to what could be done with the new technology.

September 26, 2010

Coffee Break

September 23, 2010

Captain from Castile

Henry King - 1947
20th Century-Fox Region 1 DVD

Those lips. Those hips. Those eyes. Those thighs. I've seen Jean