Review of Great Day in the Morning

This is a Western with a difference. If the viewer is looking for John Wayne and Randolph Scott type Westerns forget it. Action when it comes is brutal and to the point and beyond the standard subject of North versus South it is quite simply an unusually beautiful love story. The three in this love story is a man, a woman and a boy. The film is full of ambiguities surrounding this trio but what comes over loud and clearly by the end of the film is that love is unconditional, and if it is not then it is not love. There are two main scenes on this subject of love: the first between Ruth Roman and Virginia Mayo, and the second between Robert Stack and Alex Nicoll. I also have to underline how superb the underrated Ruth Roman is in a career defining role, and also the quiet performance of Alex Nicoll, who should by the sheer virtue of his acting had lead and major roles. He took over from Ben Gazzara in ' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof ' on Broadway, and that says it all for me. But the most praise is for the loner Robert Stark whose bleak and tender beauty has never been more outstanding than in this film. He is a lost lover in the hard world of the Western, and no other actor but him could have played Owen Pentecost, one of the most emotionally intriguing characters in what is usually considered a man's genre of film making. There is always something unspoken in his acting; a blending of both masculine and feminine in the highest sense of that way of being. My slight criticism is that the perfect Virginia Mayo is not given enough and that her too obvious sexuality is not relevant to this scenario. The coy nudity of her bathroom scene was strictly for the dumb male ( which applies to a lot of Westerns ) and she did not need to have that scene. Ruth Roman in contrast portrays both sexuality and love in a focused and perhaps her best role. There are quite a few masterpieces ( yes, an overused word ) in the world of cinema, but thanks to Tourneur's directing. an exceptional script and a handful of pitch perfect performances this is one of them.