Pat Brennan (the rugged Randolph Scott) appears on the horizon, riding into a small station to refuel from his trek through the wilderness. After the station owner's initial suspicion, he recognizes Brennan and the owner's son begins cheerfully pestering the visitor. The boy plays around the station's well and gets Brennan to bring back some candy with him from the nearest town.
When Brennan eventually returns to the station, the candy is taken by robbers, the owner and his son are at the bottom of the well, and "The Tall T" begins to take off. Before this point, the picture has been a cheerful classical western with Scott exhibiting an "aw shucks" attitude not dissimilar from Ronald Reagan's. Brennan has some laughs in town, loses his horse in a contest, and leaves town on foot, looking like a lovable loser. This lighthearted tone is cut short when Brennan and the group that gives him a lift (a newly married couple) encounter bandits who have looted the station and killed its inhabitants.
After Brennan and the couple (Willard and Doretta Mims) are taken captive, further darkness emerges from behind the cheerful veneer that we encountered earlier in the film. Brennan is no longer the happy-go-lucky cowboy but a cornered and frightened hostage who has dropped the Hollywood niceties. Doretta (Maureen O'Sullivan) also ends the charade and admits that her marriage was a sham that she accepted out of a sense of loneliness. They desperately plot a way out of this hopeless situation, but they seem to be together based on their self-preservation instincts rather than the obvious love interest angle. The character shift is accompanied by a dread that hangs over the latter half of the movie. Brennan's group knows that there is no escape from this captivity and as the hostage situation drags on, the suspense builds and we question whether Brennan will make a move. While most Westerns usually feature the protagonist fighting greater numbers, none I have seen recently have left me with as much of a feeling of hopelessness as "The Tall T."
Additionally, there is a strange camaraderie shared between Brennan and Usher (Richard Boone), the lead robber. Usher appears to have a grudging respect for Brennan's straight-shooting nature and willingness to accept the dire straits he is in. Brennan, for his part, attempts to reason with Usher and doesn't directly antagonize him as he does the others.
The brutal rejection of morality seen in the second half is made all the more effective by its juxtaposition with the cheery Western tropes seen in the first part (In fact, I almost didn't believe that the bandits had murdered the boy and his pa). Violating the usual laws of Hollywood Westerns, writer Burt Kennedy and director Budd Boetticher create a dark tale under the bright desert sun.
Side Notes
After doing some cursory research on Randolph Scott, I have determined that 1. He was potentially a lover of Cary Grant's and 2. He is part of a "Blazing Saddles" joke that I didn't get until now. Thank you, Mel Brooks.
Crew & Cast
Directed by Budd Boetticher (Seven Men From Now, Ride Lonesome, The Man From the Alamo)
Written by Burt Kennedy (The Train Robbers, Support Your Local Sheriff!, Hannie Caulder and episodes of TV Series "Lawman" and "Combat")
Cast
Randolph Scott - Pat Brennan
Richard Boone - Frank Usher
Maureen O'Sullivan - Doretta Mims
Arthur Hunnicutt - Ed Rintoon
Skip Homeier - Billy Jack