• The Big Country is a fitting name for Wyler’s audacious, expensive, open-air western.
  • It is closer to Stevens’ Giant (1956) in terms of expanse (beyond actually)- especially in comparison with Boetticher’s work or Anthony Mann during the same strech. This is an epic, Wyler is working on a massive canvas, 166-minutes, almost all exterior landscapes, 25-50 immaculate long shots with man almost swallowed up by the size of the country

Wyler is working on a massive canvas

  • Even the performances are big- the dueling (albeit in a pretty stiff casing) baritones of Gregory Peck (Peck’s 1946 Duel in the Sun is another western with similar ambition) and Charlton Heston (they’re serviceable this is a great performance from neither). I think it is fair to wonder if this is an even better film with Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas in 1958
  • Jerome Morris’ score should have been mentioned sooner— majestic
  • There are battling patriarchies (the screen presence of Charles Bickford and Burl Ives is key- very good casting) – part gang-warfare (with political undertones) like Johnny Guitar, part Earps vs. Clatons, and part-Shakespearian- it has a heft to it- Kurosawa would admire this film I believe with his feudal japan adaptations that look close to this
  • East coast civilization (Peck) vs. western violence and ruggedness (just about everyone else)- could be a good double-billing with The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
  • there’s a anonymity to Wyler’s work that will always keep him from touching the all-time greats- but this is yet another feather in the cap in his long, storied career
  • A gorgeous shot sequence at 20-minutes— Peck is on the second story porch with cattle in the distance- a beautiful landscape painting. Heston has a shot just after that, sizing up Peck (he’s a rival for the beautiful spoiled brat played by Carroll Baker) in another stunner under an awning

a magnificent silent sequence of shots 20-minutes into the film

Heston sizing Peck up after Peck sizes up the open country

Shot in Technirama, 35mm 2.35 : 1 ratio

  • A nice choice of dissolves for many of the edits
  • Burl Ives won the best supporting Oscar in 1958—he won for this (and he’s good here)- but he also had Cat on a Hot Tin Roof to help. He isn’t in the film at all until 1 hour in—and he makes a big speech- a great entrance and character
  • Many vistas of open country and cattle, characters in the foreground—this is Wyler after all- one of the godfathers of deep of field work. One with Jean Simmons of her land with the stream
  • Reoccurring long shots—a formal/visual tie. The fist fight between Heston and Peck at night (with no music- a great touch)- long overhead shots of the climactic battle in white sand. This is Kurosawa’s Ran.

Reoccurring long shots—a formal/visual tie. The fist fight between Heston and Peck at night (with no music- a great touch)

long distance shots of the climactic battle in white sand. This is Kurosawa’s Ran

  • A Must-See film