Warlock offers us a mean-spirited, mercenary Henry Fonda and an honest, peaceloving Richard Widmark. A Wyatt Earp-like frontier marshal, Fonda agrees to protect the small town of Warlock from an outlaw gang, but only if he's permitted to plunder the town's cash reserve. Widmark, the town deputy, is a reformed outlaw whose willingness to fend off the invading criminals is motivated by his fondness for his new neighbors. Looming large in the proceedings is Anthony Quinn as the glory-grabbing Fonda's sidekick. Adapted by ...
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Warlock offers us a mean-spirited, mercenary Henry Fonda and an honest, peaceloving Richard Widmark. A Wyatt Earp-like frontier marshal, Fonda agrees to protect the small town of Warlock from an outlaw gang, but only if he's permitted to plunder the town's cash reserve. Widmark, the town deputy, is a reformed outlaw whose willingness to fend off the invading criminals is motivated by his fondness for his new neighbors. Looming large in the proceedings is Anthony Quinn as the glory-grabbing Fonda's sidekick. Adapted by Robert Alan Aurthur from a novel by Oakley Hall, Warlock is a good example of the "thinking man's westerns" prevalent in the late 1950s-early 1960s. Hal Erickson, Rovi
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Add this copy of Warlock [Dvd] to cart. $5.49, good condition, Sold by Goodwill Southern California rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Los Angeles, CA, UNITED STATES, published 2005.
Add this copy of Warlock to cart. $20.48, good condition, Sold by Bookmans rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Tucson, AZ, UNITED STATES, published 2013 by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corpo.
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Dolores Michaels, Dorothy Malone, Anthony Quinn, Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda. Good. 1959 Run time: 121. Buy with confidence-Satisfaction Guaranteed! Satisfaction 100% guaranteed.
Add this copy of Warlock to cart. $24.95, new condition, Sold by Importcds rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Sunrise, FL, UNITED STATES, published 2013.
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Richard Widmark; Henry Fonda; Anthony Quinn; Dorothy Malone; Dolores Michaels. New. Run time: 122 mins. Language: English. New in new packaging. USA Orders only! Brand New product! please allow delivery times of 3-7 business days within the USA. US orders only please.
Add this copy of Warlock to cart. $28.27, new condition, Sold by newtownvideo rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from huntingdon valley, PA, UNITED STATES, published 2013 by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corpo.
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Dolores Michaels, Dorothy Malone, Anthony Quinn, Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda. New. Run time: 121. Buy with confidence-Satisfaction Guaranteed! Delivery Confirmation included for all orders in the US.
Add this copy of Warlock to cart. $29.51, new condition, Sold by newtownvideo rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from huntingdon valley, PA, UNITED STATES, published 2013 by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corpo.
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Seller's Description:
Dolores Michaels, Dorothy Malone, Anthony Quinn, Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda. New. Run time: 121. Buy with confidence-Satisfaction Guaranteed! Delivery Confirmation included for all orders in the US.
Add this copy of Warlock to cart. $34.58, good condition, Sold by Prime Goods Outlet rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Troy, OH, UNITED STATES, published 1959.
The Library of America recently published an outstanding anthology, "The Western: Four Classic Novels of the 1940s and 50s" which includes "The Ox-Bow Incident", "Shane", "The Searchers", and Oakley Hall's large 1958 novel "Warlock." Each of these novels has been made into a film, including "Warlock" filmed in 1959 and directed by Edward Dmytryk. The movie is a lengthy, (just short of two hours), high-budget and beautifully filmed production with a large cast of famous actors. It is a complex, thoughtful film which does justice to an even more complex and thoughtful novel.
The film is set in the fictitious town of Warlock in the Arizona territory. The small town is plagued by outlaws and seeks to develop to become a peaceful, thriving community. It hires a vigilante gunslinger, Clay Blaisedell (Henry Fonda) to bring order to the town as the acting marshall. Blaisedell is accompanied by his friend, the gambler and gunslinger Tom Morgan (Anthony Quinn) who suffers from a club foot. Blaisedell's immediate task is to subdue a gang of cattle rustlers who live on the outskirts of Warlock. He receives assistance from an unexpected source, Johnny Gannon (Richard Widmark), formerly a part of the rustlers whose younger brother remains with them outside of the law. Widmark receives top billing and his character is probably the most complex in the movie. The film also includes two strong women characters, Lily Dollar (Dorothy Malone) as a prostitute who becomes involved with Gannon and the idealistic young Jessie Marlow (Dolores Michaels) who becomes a love interest of Blaisedell's.
The film involves the shifting relationships of the many protagonists among themselves and with the townspeople. The movie is violent with many scenes of gunfights on main street, shoot-ups in saloons, mob action, stagecoach robberies, and killings. With all the violence, the film focuses even more on character. The individuals and the town are complex and resist easy categorization or unequivocal moral judgment. Alliances and friendships change dramatically over the course of the film. The movie emphasizes the difficulty of the settlement of the West and the moral ambiguity it entailed.
With its complexity, the film can seem long and plodding in places, even with a familiarity with Hall's novel. I watched the film for the first time immediately after reading the novel and found that it dragged. I recently watched it again after reading Geoffrey O'Brien's September 22, 2020. essay "Law and Disorder in Edward Dmytryk's Warlock" published in the Library of America's online "The Moviegoer" column. O'Brien concludes that Warlock" constituted "a culminating glory of the 50's Western." Seeing the film again with a little distance from the book helped me appreciate it much more.
"Warlock" is an excellent film in its own right and a worthy companion to Hall's complex novel. "Warlock" shows the subtleties of which the Western genre is capable, in both film and novel. I was glad to see and to think about this film with its beautiful cinematography, inspired acting (particularly from Anthony Quinn and Henry Fonda) and thoughtful portrayal of the settlement of the American West.
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