Lambie Reviews The Big Country

Year: 1958
Accolades: Best Supporting Actor Win for Burl Ives
Review on Letterboxd: 'The Big Country' review by Avalanche

When you think of Westerns, you don't usually think of Gregory Peck, and yet he is the main man in this film. That actually, oddly enough, works to the films advantage, since Peck's character (McKay) is meant to be a fish out of water of sorts. He's also meant to be an ex-sailor, but that was perhaps a little bit of a step too far in the believability department.

Upon reflection, not all that much actually happens in the film. It's very much character and dialogue driven, with many threats of confrontations but very few delivered on screen. This too, works in its favour, since it helps to build up tension until someone snaps and the inevitable occurs. However, at the same time there are parts of the film that feel they could have perhaps been a little bit shorter. The first and second acts take quite a while to make their points, and just when you think a character has finally made the right decision on something, they or someone else will go and blunder into another ridiculous mistake that could have been avoided.

At times it's hard to know who to get behind and sympathise with. McKay seems to reject his pacifist stance a couple for times for no apparent reason other than to prove a point. And yet, when he does so, it seems to justify (in terms of the film) the stance of the people he is railing against,which doesn't help matters any. He's not the only one, either.

When you think that finally everyone else has seen sense in the final climactic showdown, they all eventually prove you wrong in what oddly seems to be built up as a triumphant change of heart, if the score, editing, and framing of the shots at that point is anything to go by. The action and fight sequences seem, at times, a little over the top and exaggerated, but that seems to be par for the course for some films made during this time.

All in all it's a well made film. There's some genuine humour, a great score, and some spectacular shots of the landscape. It's just that sometimes the exploration of what McKay wants to prove to others and himself, and the morality and actions of himself and others, doesn't always seem to work (for me, anyway).