High Noon High Noon High Noon is a 1952 American Western film produced by Stanley Kramer from a screenplay by Carl Foreman, directed by Fred Zinnemann, and starring Gary Cooper. The plot, depicted in real time, centers around a town marshal who is torn between his sense of duty and love for his new bride and who must face a gang of killers alone. Though mired in controversy with political overtones at the time of its release, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won four (Actor, Editing, Music-Score, and Music-Song) as well as four Golden Globe Awards (Actor, Supporting
Will Kane gets cold feet, he tells him to go to his family, and then refuses the help of a teenager." Kane was also ranked by the American Film Institute as the fifth greatest movie hero of all time. Nevertheless, although Cooper's performance has received considerable praise as indicated above, Majors and Skerritt's performances have not been so positively received. "The New York Daily News" referred to Lee Majors as "sadly miscast" as Kane in the sequel. "Entertainment Weekly" also contrasted Cooper with Skerritt to Skerritt's disadvantage. Reviewer Ken Tucker reminisces upon "the all-purpose image of Cooper that's taken hold in the