Review of High Plains Drifter (1973) by Blackity B — 28 Mar 2010

Eastwood did better better jobs with Pale Rider and Unforgiven, but his first western as director has its moments, even if it comes off as cheep looking and sad to say, amateurish. Some scenes just don't work, such as the rape scene when you consider what Eastwood's character is supposed to be.

Basically, this is a revenge story. The bizarro version of High Noon. Eastwood is a stranger who arrives in a small mining town where no one mines days before three outlaws are due to return after being released from prison.

The outlaws apparently whipped the town's marshall to death and the movie implies that Eastwood is the marshall's ghost or an angel of death sent to punish the town for allowing the marshall to be killed.

I guess that would explain the rape scene, but it still seems out of place. The movie doesn't have the same supernatural quality that Pale Rider had as it left us guessing if the character really was a preacher, a ghost or an angel of death.

Call it an exploitation western. Like I said, Pale Rider and Unforgiven were far better westerns, probably because Eastwood had a bigger budget.