bsmith5552 "Yellow Sky" is an uneven black and White western that has the look and feel of a "film noire".A gang of outlaws headed by James "Stretch Dawson" and including gambler "Dude" (Richard Widmark), Bull Run (Robert Arthur), Lengthy (John Russell), Half Pint (Harry Morgan), Walrus (Charles Kemper) and Jed (Robert Adler), ride into a dusty town and rob the local bank. While fleeing the sheriff's posse, Jed is killed and the others head for the salt flats/desert.Against all odds, the group comes upon the ghost town, Yellow Sky. There they meet the feisty young "Mike" (a pistol packing Anne Baxter) and her Grampa (James Barton). Dude is the first to suspect that the pair are hiding something. He discovers a gold mine and with the others plans to steal the booty.Meanwhile the normally stern Stretch takes a liking to "Mike". He negotiates with Grampa to share the gold 50/50. However Dude and the others have no such plan to share the loot. Stretch too plans to double cross the old man. But when he sees Grampa talking with visiting Apaches and convincing them not to attack, he sees that the old timer plans to keep his part of the bargain and therefore he will keep his part.A showdown between Stretch and the others results in Dude and the others taking over. The others pin Stretch, "Mike" and Grampa in the old man's cabin.This film has all the trappings of a "Film Noire" complete with low light B &W photography, many nighttime scenes, a dark murky landscape and a sort of "femme fatale" in the person of the "Mike" character. The biggest problem I have with this story is the cop out Hollywood ending. The film should have ended with the climatic shoot-out.Gregory Peck is as always, the stern leader of men which makes the ending of the movie a little hard to swallow. Widmark, who was just starting out makes the perfect double crossing oily villain. Anne Baxter in tight jeans and carrying a six shooter...what else is there to say.

Claudio Carvalho In 1867, in the West, the gang of bank robbers led by James "Stretch" Dawson (Gregory Peck) and formed by Dude (Richard Widmark), Bull Run (Robert Arthur), Lengthy (John Russell), Half Pint (Henry Morgan), Walrus (Charles Kemper) and Jed flee after robbing a bank. However, they are hunted down by the cavalry and Jed is killed. They decide to cross desert and the soldiers stop chasing them. They arrive dehydrated and almost dead at a ghost town called Yellow Sky but a young woman called Constance "Mike" Mae (Anne Baxter) shows the location of a spring. Soon they recover and learn that Mike lives alone with her grandfather Charles Kemper (James Barton) in a house nearby the ghost town. But Dude snoops around at the area and finds prospecting tools near the house. He suspects that Mike and her grandfather could have gold hidden somewhere in the house. The outlaws press Mike and her grandfather and they make a deal with Stretch that promises to take only half the gold. But greed and lust split the gang and Stretch, who has fallen in love with Mike, has to take a decision and choose a side. "Yellow Sky" is a highly entertaining western, despite the contradictions in the flawed story. Stretch is an outlaw that lives a conflictive situation between the gold and his love for Mike. The Grandpa sees a group of strangers stealing his savings and consequently the future if his beloved granddaughter but he saves the outlaws from the apaches. Walrus and Half Pint choose to stay with Dude and they end with Stretcher again. Dude and Lengthy are coherent characters.The sequence when the cavalry is pursuing the outlaws is impressive. Their crossing through the desert is very realistic and disturbing. My vote is eight.Title (Brazil): "Céu Amarelo" ("Yellow Sky")

MattyGibbs Yellow Sky is a unusual, moody and magnificent western. I had never heard of it previously and I'm surprised it doesn't have a much higher profile. Six bank robbers on the verge of death after escaping a posse, stumble upon a ghost town inhabited by an old man and his granddaughter. They realise that they may have an opportunity to all make a fortune however group dynamics and greed take over. It makes a change from the usual western plot but this isn't the only thing that makes this film stand well above most of it's peers. The setting is great and the filming is top class with some great cinematography. The acting is excellent from all the cast. I'm not a massive fan of Gregory Peck but he is outstanding in this as the morally ambiguous leader of the gang. There is an early appearance from Richard Widmark and Anne Baxter is captivating as the feisty granddaughter. The brilliant and convincing script sparkles despite there not being an awful lot of gun play. The characters are all interesting and I liked the fact they weren't all clichéd, a failing of many westerns. Considering what has gone before the very ending is maybe a little too twee but this is a minor gripe as the rest of the film is so good. One of the best and most enjoyable westerns I've seen to date and one which is comparable to most of the perceived classic westerns.

classicsoncall Gregory Peck's "The Gunfighter" is one of my all time favorite Westerns, and along with "To Kill a Mockingbird", I've come to accept Peck as one of my favorite classic film actors. "Yellow Sky" isn't in the same league as those pictures, but it's still not a bad little Western flick boasting a top notch cast, although most of the players weren't very well established yet back in 1948. Richard Widmark is another favorite of mine, and I kind of hoped he'd have been a bit more maniacal here, seeing as how he seemed to have been cast as a Doc Holliday type. The Dude was a gambler like Holliday, and as the story progressed he broke ranks with gang leader Stretch Dawson (Peck) in an effort to chisel a ghost town's sole occupants out of their hidden cache of gold.As a tale of greed and men falling out with each other over money and a woman the story is a fairly credible one, but the more I think about events that occurred in the picture, there were a fair number of head scratchers here. For one, where did all of Peck's wardrobe changes come from? He wore at least three different shirts in the story and they all looked pretty well pressed for traipsing across the desert. I guess he needed them to impress gun-totin' tomboy Anne Baxter, and you have to admit, they made an attractive looking pair once Dawson combed over that part of his scalp that 'Mike' grazed with a bullet. You think that was a lucky shot or a fine example of skillful marksmanship? Now stay with me on this one, but did it make sense that Harry Morgan's character was named Half Pint? Walrus (Charles Kemper) looked like a walrus and Lengthy, even though a dumb name, looked like it fit future Lawman John Russell. I'm willing to bet that someone called actor Robert Arthur 'Bull Run' by mistake, and rather than do another take, figured it would be easier to keep Arthur as Bull Run and use Half Pint for Morgan. Just a theory, but what do you think? So anyway, Peck's character goes from a bad, bad guy over the course of the story to a good bad guy, kind of like Jimmy Ringo in "The Gunfighter", although in that one he was trying to walk away from a reputation as a feared gunslinger. There again, I have a problem with story continuity and character relationships when after the gunfight with the rest of his gang that turned on him, Half Pint and Walrus become Dawson's pals again once Lengthy and the Dude make their way to Boot Hill.But you know what the biggest question mark of the story for me was? You remember how down and out the gang was after crossing the salt flat; it was even mentioned by someone that the desert went on for seventy miles. Well after all the trouble at Yellow Sky, Dawson makes his way back to the bank that was robbed to open the story, repays the bank manager what was stolen, and then makes it back to Yellow Sky looking fresh as a daisy. How did he do that?