The ghost with the dancing horse

 

HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER

I have been watching Clint Eastwood since the age of about twenty, starting with "Rawhide."  It was the era of westerns, and I never tired of horse operas.  Perhaps it was because I'd had an after school job of ushering at a movie theater and westerns were standard fare.  And Clint was among the best of them.

So I kept on following, through the spaghetti westerns to Dirty Harry and then his self-directed films, and never tired of watching Clint Eastwood playing Clint Eastwood.  That lean, laconic, stone-faced style, so oddly attractive.

This film was made ages ago, in the seventies, but somehow I missed it. And this one is different.  Well, Clint plays Clint, just as he always did, but the story has a most unusual message.  

If you want revenge, take care not to sup with the devil.

Clint, playing a nameless stranger, rides into a small mining town, the usual western outpost with clapboard houses, a stable, a church.  A few of the local men accost him and threaten his life.  Predictably he proves himself -- with a gun, naturally.  So impressive is he that the townsfolk propose a contract.  They need a gunfighter, as three men they put away for murder are coming out of prison next day. The anonymous guy with a gun accepts it, but on his own very strange terms.  He has a mission of his own.

That mission is gradually revealed as he arms the townsfolk, drills them into a faint semblance of efficiency, and literally paints the town red.  His motives come in horrifying glimpses that leave the viewer to make his or her own conclusions.  Because of this, the ending is both thoughtful and satisfying.  As a western, this film is remarkably intelligent.

But the star of the show?  Not Clint, believe it or not.  It's Clint's equally nameless horse.  The dance as the gunfighter rides into town is startlingly clever.  That horse was so good, in fact, that I was on tenterhooks throughout the rest of the film in case that lovely, graceful steed was stolen, killed or hurt.

Scan through the credits of the clip above, and at three minutes into it, turn up the music and watch that horse dance.