A Time for Killing
A Time for Killingis a 1967 Western film that is more of a down look at war and revenge than it is a rollicking gunplay in the American frontier . Also known asThe Long Ride Home , A Time For Killingisa Civil War Westernset in a Union prisoner - of - war bivouac near the Mexican border where Major Tom Wolcott ( Glenn Ford ) is in charge of an inept group of Union guard and scheming Confederate prisoners . The prisoners are led by Captain Dorrit Bentley ( George Hamilton ) , a Southern gentleman who is not as gallant as he would like to believe .
Along with beingHarrison Ford ’s first credited movierole as Lt . Shaffer , A meter for Killingis well know for tack managing director early on in production . The cinema was first set to bedirected by B - movie legend , Roger Corman , who allow for after reported fights with Columbia Studios , who grew frustrated with his careful filmmaking ( viaFilmInk ) . He was replaced with Phil Karlson , who channelize the majority of the film . After the Confederate prisoners escape and fly to Mexico , they capture Wolcott ’s fiancé , Emily Biddle ( Inger Stevens ) , lead off a race across the West for Wolcott as he set about to save his love .
Captain Dorrit Bentley Assaults Emily
Bentley Goes Back On His Promise To Protect Emily
When the Confederate soldiers break loose from the prison camp , they set up their eye on Mexico . Bentley desire to proceed fighting for the southerly cause from even further south even if the residual of the Confederacy gives up , which is beginning to look like a possibility in the waning eld of the American Civil War . On their way down , the grouping , which also includes Harry Dean Stanton as Sgt . Dany Way and Max Baer Jr. as Sgt . Luther Liskell , just so encounter to stumble across Emily , who is make her way home from visiting her fiancé .
A Serious Man is one of the Coen brothers most complex films and even its ending does not extend much more account than the sleep of the moving picture .
The prisoners ambush and wipe out Emily ’s escort and take their Equus caballus and supplies . posture himself as a chivalrous southerly man , Bentley promises that no scathe will come to Emilyfrom either him or his fellow soldier . Later , it becomes readable that Bentley has less control over his men than he implied because Emily goes to wash her face in a river and the sight of her unclothed neckline nearly send out the man into a hysteria over her . In the ruckus , Emily smack Bentley on the second joint with his scabbard , abase him in front of the other men .
Later , the Confederates reach a small townspeople and there , Bentley receive word that the war is over . Desperate to keep his " unit " integral , he hides the content . With his succeeding grim , and his pridefulness still hurting , Bentley take it out on the only person he can : Emily . He drag her upstairs to a room and when she riposte below bloodied and with her dress torn , it ’s obvious that the " gallant " Bentley is nothing more than a low , desperate criminal , beholden to his frailty and ego as much as anyone . fortuitously , Major Wolcott make it just at that moment .
Major Tom Wolcott Catches Up With The Escaped POWs
Wolcott Refuses To Chase Bentley Over The Border
Major Wolcott has been flush the countryside looking for Emily . The expert tracker and his squad , which let in Billy Cat ( Timothy Carey ) , Sgt . Cleehan ( Kenneth Tobey ) , Owelson ( Kay E. Kuter ) , and Zollcoffer ( Dick Miller ) , have found the prisoners ' hideout and Wolcott cognize mightily away what happened to his fiancé . Ford does his well - intimidate playing in this mo , trying to hold in his rageas he hears the Confederates have ridden off . He and his Union soldier set off in pursuit in a final running game to the Mexican margin .
Emily is an outstandingly ego - possessed character inA Time for Killing .
Once he gets there , Bentley and the Confederates taunt the Union soldier for being too late . Emily demands that Wolcott shoot Bentley . Emily is an unusually ego - possessed character inA Time for Killing . While most damsel - in - suffering characters of the era were beholden to the whim of the people around them , Emily is tempestuous with her assault , and her outrage at having her retribution steal is direful and moving . Wolcott apologizes and aver he ca n’t . The war is over and Bentley does n’t want more men to exit , not for Emily ’s honour at least , he enjoin his umbrageous fiancé .
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Major Wolcott Takes Revenge On Captain Bentley
Wolcott And Emily Part Ways
Bentley seals his own fate , however . Whether because he ’s ashamed of his actions or because he ’s been drive to desperation by the Confederacy ’s defeat , he open fire on Wolcott , chip in him ample reason to spoil into Mexico and kill the baddie . The Confederate and Union soldiers have a gunplay , resulting in a Union triumph . Wolcott stands over the dead Bentley in a grim cellar before exiting it . Instead of finish to embrace Emily , he walks mighty by her , abandoning his bride - to - be .
The Real Meaning Of A Time For Killing’s Ending
Wolcott And Bentley Have Opposing Moral Codes
ThroughoutA Time for Killing , Major Wolcott tries his best to keep the peace between the Confederates and the Union soldiers . In the beginning of the movie , Wolcott stops a cruel cast of execution on a Confederate prisoner sentenced to die and takes great pains to deal the men in his stead with respect and so that no hurt comes to them . For his reward , his fiancé is raped , his humanity are dash at , and he is forced to exact violent retribution .
Wolcott and Bentley are play against one another ; the man who talk quietly and carries a big spliff , and the other , who is all barque and no sting .
Everything that Wolcott believe in ends up being for nada . Stoic and taciturn , Wolcott lets his actions address for themselves , andit ’s this mum , grim , but fair nature that begin to produce friction between him and Emily . It ’s Bentley who Emily feel more comfortable with and trusts to an extent . His honeyed words and notions of being fair and honorable obscure an malevolent nature , but his frontage is enough to get others to watch and trust him . Wolcott and Bentley are play against one another ; the valet who speaks softly and carries a big peg , and the other , who is all bark and no bite .
A Time for Killing, set during the Civil War, follows Confederate soldiers escaping a Union prison, led by a captain aware of the war’s end. Their journey to the Mexican border leads to a tragic clash with an uninformed Union search party, driving conflict amid the historical backdrop.
A Time for Killingis base on the 1961 novel , The Southern Blade , by Nelson Wolford .
While Wolcott ends up coming out on top in the remainder , killing Bentley , he also loses his fiancé in the procedure , who is outraged that he would choose the law over Justice Department for someone he loves . A Time for Killingis a amazingly brutal film , which is appropriate considering the savagery and misery of the Civil War . Wolcott ’s adhesiveness to the police force and his refusal to show his emotions does allow him to defeat evil , but it also rob him of some of his humanness . It ’s a deal that entrust the interview oppugn if they would do the same .
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A Time for Killing , set during the Civil War , follows Confederate soldiers escaping a Union prison house , lead by a captain cognisant of the warfare ’s end . Their journeying to the Mexican mete leads to a tragic clash with an uninformed Union lookup company , drive dispute amid the diachronic backdrop .
