Rating: NR
Genre: Western
Release Date: 12/04/2007
SubTitles: English/Espanol/French
Dubbed: English/French/Espanol
Sound: DD1/DD2
Run Time: 168 Minutes
Flags: Western Violence
Distributor/Studio: 20th Century Fox

One of the greatest movie Westerns, John Ford's My Darling Clementine is hardly the most accurate film version of the Wyatt Earp legend, but it is still one of the most entertaining. Henry Fonda stars as former lawman Wyatt Earp, who, after cleaning up Dodge City, arrives in the outskirts of Tombstone with his brothers Morgan (Ward Bond), Virgil (Tim Holt), and James (Don Garner), planning to sell their cattle and settle down as gentlemen farmers. Yet Wyatt, disgusted by crime and cattle rustling, eventually agrees to take the marshalling job until he can gather enough evidence to bring to justice the scurrilous Clanton clan, headed by smooth-talking but shifty-eyed Old Man Clanton (Walter Brennan). Almost immediately, Wyatt runs afoul of consumptive, self-hating gambling boss Doc Holliday (Victor Mature, in perhaps his best performance). When Doc's erstwhile sweetheart, Clementine (Cathy Downs) comes to town, Earp is immediately smitten. However, Doc himself is now involved with saloon gal Chihauhua (Linda Darnell). The tensions among Wyatt, Doc, Clementine, and Chihauhua wax and wane throughout most of the film, leading to the legendary gunfight at the OK Corral, with Wyatt and Doc fighting side-by-side against the despicable Clantons. Its powerful storyline and full-blooded characterizations aside, My Darling Clementine is most entertaining during those little "humanizing" moments common to Ford's films, notably Wyatt's impromptu "balancing act" while seated on the porch of the Tombstone hotel, and Wyatt's and Clementine's dance on the occasion of the town's church-raising. Based on Stuart N. Lake's novel Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshall (previously filmed twice by Fox), the screenplay is full of wonderful dialogue, the best of which is the brief, philosophical exchange about women between Earp and Mac the bartender (J. Farrell MacDonald). The movie also features crisp, evocative black-and-white photography by Joseph MacDonald. Producer (Daryl F. Zanuck) was displeased with Ford's original cut and the film went through several re-shoots and re-edits before its general release in November of 1946.

~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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Cast:
Henry Fonda - Wyatt Earp
Linda Darnell - Chihuahua
Victor Mature - Doc John Holliday
Jane Darwell - Kate Nelson
Walter Brennan - Old Man Clanton
Cathy Downs - Clementine Carter
Ward Bond - Morgan Earp
Francis Ford - Dad
Don Garner - James Earp
Ben Hall - Barber
Tim Holt - Virgil Earp
John Ireland - Billy Clanton
Fred Libby - Phin Clanton
John Farrell MacDonald - Mac, the Bartender
Louis Mercier - Francois
Alan Mowbray - Granville Thorndyke
Roy Roberts - Mayor
Mickey Simpson - Sam Clanton
Russell Simpson - John Simpson
Arthur Walsh - Hotel Clerk
Grant Withers - Ike Clanton

Production:
John Ford - Director
Samuel G. Engel - Producer
David Buttolph Cyril Mockridge - Composer
Dorothy Spencer - Editor
Samuel G. Engel Sam Hellman Winston Miller - Screen Writer
Thomas K. Little Fred J. Rode - Set Designer
James Basevi - Art Director
Lyle Wheeler - Art Director
Joe MacDonald - Cinematographer
Rene Hubert - Costume Designer
William Eckhardt - First Assistant Director
Ben Nye, Sr. - Makeup
Alfred Newman - Musical Direction/Supervision
Sam Hellman - Screen Story
Eugene Grossman - Sound/Sound Designer
Roger Heman - Sound/Sound Designer
Fred Sersen - Special Effects
Stuart N. Lake - Book Author

Wyatt Earp [Blu-ray]
    Kevin Costner / PG13 / 1994
Forty Guns
    Barbara Stanwyck / NR / 1957
Hour of the Gun
    James Garner / NR / 1967
High Noon [Collector's Edition]
    Gary Cooper / NR / 1952
Tombstone
    Kurt Russell / R / 1993

1990 Library of Congress

1946 National Board of Review