Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		5.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.5

The Hanging Tree Blu-ray Movie Review

The Doctor Is In

Reviewed by Michael Reuben January 29, 2018

The Hanging Tree was one of the final films to star Gary Cooper, a beloved icon of the old studio system, whose popularity was inextricably bound with the image of tough, laconic rectitude he projected in classics like High Noon and Sergeant York (for both of which he won Oscars). Cooper died just two years after release of The Hanging Tree—of cancer, at the relatively young age of 60—and looking back now, it seems eerily timely that his last major project was a role quietly subverting the stalwart "white hat" image the actor had cultivated for much of his career. Based on a novella by Dorothy M. Johnson, a prolific writer of Western fiction (she also created The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance) and directed by Western veteran Delmer Daves, The Hanging Tree is an early milestone on the path that would take Westerns from formulaic oaters to moody morality plays. The frontier anti-heroes who would later populate the cinema of Peckinpah, Leone and Eastwood are among the latter-day descendants of Cooper's Dr. Joseph Frail in The Hanging Tree.

The Hanging Tree wasn't widely seen for many years, primarily due to rights issues. For a long time, the only available video version was a full-frame transfer from a less-than-pristine print that occasionally played on Turner Classic Movies. But in 2012, with all rights issues resolved, the Warner Archive Collection released the film on DVD in its original aspect ratio, and the response was so favorable that WAC began to investigate the feasibility of a Blu-ray release. While a hi-def version initially seemed unlikely due to the nature of the elements in Warner's vault, patience, further investigation and the technical finesse of Warner's Motion Picture Imaging facility have now brought The Hanging Tree to Blu-ray in a stunning presentation.

The year is 1873, and there's a gold rush in Montana. Makeshift towns spring up overnight, and they may disappear just as quickly. They have the essentials—a hotel and bar, bank, general store, assayer's office and a brothel—but no organized government. Law and order is a matter of mutual consent, and it's a thin veneer. Accused offenders are judged by the mob, and those found guilty are hanged from the titular tree.

Skull Creek is such a town, and one day it acquires a new resident in the person of Joseph Frail (Cooper), who calls himself a doctor and opens a medical practice, which quickly garners an ample clientele. For a man of medicine, Doc Frail is an unlikely character. He drinks regularly, gambles nightly, is handy with a six-shooter and carries himself with the tough-guy demeanor of a gunslinger. "Frail" is an ironic moniker for a healer, and it isn't his real name. Like so many on the frontier, he has come to a new town to reinvent himself and escape his past.

The Hanging Tree follows Frail's adventures as he navigates the sometimes calm, sometimes turbulent waters of Skull Creek. He quickly acquires a kind of indentured servant in a young man named Rune (Ben Piazza), whom the doctor rescues from being captured and hanged for filching a nugget from a prospector's claim. He also acquires an implacable enemy in the person of a drunken faith healer, Grubb (George C. Scott, in his first feature film), who sees Frail as unholy competition. Vacillating between friend and potential enemy is a prospector named Frenchy (Karl Malden), who's certain that he recognizes the town's new doctor from somewhere and whose rough manner and insinuating grin mark him as a man not to be trusted.

Just as Doc Frail appears to have settled in, Skull Creek is roiled by another new arrival. A traveler from Switzerland, Elizabeth Mahler (Maria Schell) is the sole survivor of a stagecoach holdup, and she is found nearly dead from exposure after three scorching days and freezing nights in the wilderness. Nicknamed "the Lost Lady" (and, later, "the Lucky Lady"), she is nursed back to health by Doc Frail, who installs her in the cabin next to his and has Rune attend to her every need. Soon enough, the town is whispering that there's more than medical care happening between the doctor and his patient. But as Elizabeth recovers, she does something even more shocking by declaring her intention to remain in Skull Creek and join the ranks of panhandlers seeking their fortune. It's a decision fraught with danger, especially when Frenchy hastens to offer the newcomer a partnership. The way he looks at Elizabeth—he all but licks his chops—leaves no doubt that his interest in her extends beyond mining for gold.

Delmer Daves and his crew shot The Hanging Tree in the rugged Oak Creek Wildlife Area near Yakima, Washington, and the park's verdant forests and mountainous cliffs and ridges provide a majestic backdrop to a story in which every character (with the exception of Elizabeth) is morally compromised and some are thoroughly unredeemable. It’s a tale of survival rather than the more familiar Western triumph of the white hats over the black hats (or the white man over the red). In the end, it turns out that the frontier can be ruled by the same commercial considerations that apply in the most sophisticated urban capitals of the Eastern seaboard. The righteous may prevail, but only if the price is right.

The Hanging Tree Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Though released in 1959, The Hanging Tree was shot in 1958 by cinematographer Ted D. McCord (The Sound of Music). The film falls within the period when Kodak's motion picture film stock was subject to the deterioration now known as "yellow layer collapse" (discussed at greater length here). The usual alternative to a color OCN, a timed interpositive, did not exist for this film. The only other extant element was a so-called "color reversal negative", or CRI, from the Seventies, which was good enough for a standard definition DVD but of insufficient quality for Blu-ray.

WAC did not expect much from The Hanging Tree's negative, given its experience with previous projects from the era of yellow layer collapse, but when the OCN was retrieved and reviewed, it was found to be in surprisingly good condition. The decision was made to attempt a scan of the OCN, and as per current Warner policy when dealing with original elements, the scan was performed at 4K by Warner's Motion Picture Imaging facility. MPI spent many hours correcting the raw scan for color and density, and WAC subjected the result to its usual thorough cleaning to eliminate scratches, damage and age-related wear.

The resulting 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is a revelation, which instantly vaults to the top of WAC's already impressive list of restored classics. The town of Skull Creek springs vividly to life, with its combination of rickety wooden structures and ratty tents, all of it surrounded by roughly hewn fences, water wheels and sluices. The cabin where Doc Frail sets up his practice is conveniently situated on a cliff overlooking the town, allowing the camera to alternate between looking down on the expanses below and up at the doctor's domain, and the Blu-ray renders both perspectives with superb sharpness and detail. The film's richest colors are the greens and browns of the surrounding forest, compared to which Skull Creek's inhabitants have the drab and dusty appearance of people living on the fringe of civilization. (Even the gaudier attire of the town's prostitutes looks the worse for wear.) Blacks in interiors are solid and dark, but scenes set at night outdoors have the unnatural dimness and lack of contrast that are typical of day-for-night photography. Opticals (notably, dissolves and the opening titles) retain the softness that was an unavoidable side effect of that process, but the Blu-ray presentation is simply providing an accurate reproduction of the source. The film's grain pattern is exceedingly fine (except in opticals, which accentuate the grain) and naturally rendered.

WAC has encoded The Hanging Tree at its usual high average bitrate, here 34.98 Mbps.

The Hanging Tree Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Hanging Tree's mono soundtrack has been taken from the magnetic master, cleaned of any age-related deterioration and encoded as lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. It's a surprisingly robust track, effectively conveying key effects like hoof beats, gun shots, rainfall and water rushing through the ramshackle sluices constructed by the miners. Other examples can't be mentioned without spoilers but are equally well-reproduced. The dialogue is clear and natural-sounding. The title song performed by Marty Robbins was written before filming began, and composer Max Steiner had to figure out ways to build an orchestral score around it, just as he had for "As Time Goes By" in Casablanca. The three-time Oscar winner remained as inventive as ever, and The Hanging Tree's musical accompaniment is yet another of the film's delights, faithfully rendered on Blu-ray.

The Hanging Tree Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The sole extra is the film's trailer (1080p; 1.78:1; 2:47), which has been remastered in 1080p. It contains inserts specially shot for the trailer in which Cooper and Maria Schell address the audience directly, breaking the proverbial fourth wall.

The Hanging Tree Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Hanging Tree doesn't fit the traditional mold of a Western, which probably accounts for the lukewarm reaction it initially received from audiences accustomed to a genre known for clear distinctions between good guys and bad. But the film doesn't quite feel "modern" either. A product of the waning days of the studio system, it seems perched between two eras, which makes it especially fascinating to watch today. Cooper's gravitas anchors the tale and leaves no doubt who the hero is, but from moment to moment you're never quite sure what kind of hero he'll turn out to be. WAC's new Blu-ray restores the film's striking visuals, allowing it to be seen anew in its full Technicolor glory. Highly recommended.