Prior to sentencing a murderer to the gallows, the judge, the sheriff, and the townsfolk, find themselves being intimidated by the killer's violent family. Putting asides comparisons with the similarly themed (and superior) 'High Noon' (1952), 'Day of the Bad Man' is a reasonably good western and the issue of threat to 'justice' rather than to single man makes it somewhat deeper than the Gary Cooper classic. Fred MacMurray is quite good as Judge Jim Scott (although the earnest hero who 'reluctantly straps on the gun again' had become a bit of a cliché by the late 1950s). As patriarch of the Hayes clan, a vicious family of black-hats willing to commit any violence to save one of their own from the gallows, Robert Middleton is suitably menacing as are son Howie (Skip Homeier) and cousin Jake (squinty-eyed great Lee van Cleef). Edgar Buchannan (Petticoat Junction's Uncle Joe) is along on side-kick duty and John Ericson plays the 'all show, no substance' sheriff. The storyline is predictable, with only a lazily-handled 'lover's triangle', which puts the judge and the sheriff at odds, adding any novelty to the plot. The ending seems to draw criticism as being contrived, implausible, and serving only to set up the final confrontation but I suspect that Judge Scott's actions are part of a deliberate plan to end the story 'then and there', with either his death or the deaths of the Hayes crew, to avoid the lifelong fear of revenge on himself or on the craven townies. The cinematography is great, notably the opening shot of the noose and the approaching riders.
Review of Day of the Bad Man
