The team that brought you "The Ox-Bow Incident" comes back five years later with "Yellow Sky," another first-rate western with John Holmes-sized themes. A stunning opening desert sequence and an ambitious, innovative climax make "Yellow Sky" a must-see.
Writer Lamar Trotti ("Ox-Bow Incident," "Drums Along the Mohawk," "The Razor's Edge") fancies himself socially relevant, and he usually comes through. This is a variation on the greed-is-death theme perfected in Huston's "Treasure of the Sierra Madre." There are some connections to Shakespeare's "The Tempest," but this is more "Oh Brother Where Art Thou" than "The Perfect Storm." Wonderful supporting performances from Anne Baxter and Richard Widmark help carry the momentum through the slow patches that seem inevitable in these morality tales.
Trotti wrote Baxter's Oscar-winning role in "The Razor's Edge," a bizarre, wonderful film featuring one of Gene Tierney's finest performances. I've heard it said that any actor who wants to be the star should never agree to do a picture with an animal, a child, or Denholm Elliot. I think Anne Baxter should be added to that list: she is the very definition of a scene-stealer.
The script teases our expectations, setting us up for standard western plot development then always choosing another direction. Gregory Peck tries hard to act like a bad guy but you just know he's too pretty to be all evil. In the Peck chain of westerns, this one comes before "The Gunfighter" and after "Duel in the Sun." It isn't as interesting as either of those films, but the story is strong and the images are often striking.
Cinematographer Joseph MacDonald has given the world such masterpieces as "My Darling Clementine," "The Young Lions," and Nicholas Ray's "Bigger Than Life." The rock formations in the desert are as captivating as the anatomical formation of Anne Baxter in tight dungarees, which is saying something. Wellman's direction truly shines in the climactic shootout, which daringly chooses to hide the victor from view. The audience learns who has won as Baxter does, flipping over the dead bodies one by one, in search of her love.
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