The Ox-Bow Incident (1943)

 The Ox-Bow Incident (1943)

A couple of out-of-towners drop by looking for a female but find she’s already left town. When the news of a murder is heard, a posse begins to form and the two are hesitant not to participate as they are already being looked at suspiciously by the locals. There is additional hesitation by some of the locals, the sheriff is unavailable, and the deputy does not have a trustworthy reputation.

Despite all efforts to stop it, the posse is illegally deputized and takes off, sweeping along a few of the unwilling participants.

Catching up with a trio of suspects it becomes immediately apparent these might not be the men they are looking for, but bloodlust is already awakened in some of the men… Make that a majority of them.

Doing genealogical research, I learned that an ancestor was involved in a lynching (‘the Juan Flores uprising’) and so watching this movie even felt a bit like family history. While this film is based on a true story, I doubt my own story matches this one with regards of the possible innocence of the suspects, at least the way my story has been related.

Twelve Angry Men this is not, but the moral dilemma at the core of the two films is the same. Most Westerns feature killings at some point of the other, but for the most part they never approach anything like the grim feel of witnessing honest-to-goodness murder.

An excellent, heart-wrenching, tragic film and one of the most important Westerns in the history of American cinema.

With Henry Fonda, Dana Andrews, Mary Beth Hughes, Anthony Quinn, William Eythe, Harry Morgan and Jane Darwell.