The Tall T (1957) 1080p BluRay x265 HEVC AAC-SARTRE

FIVE TALL TALES: Budd Boetticher & Randolph Scott at Columbia, 1957-1960

Five classic, iconic and slyly subversive westerns collected on Blu-ray for the very first time. Containing a wealth of new and archival extras – including extensive interviews with director Budd Boetticher, expert audio commentaries, appreciations by filmmakers Martin Scorsese and Clint Eastwood, and new critical analyses by film critics Christopher Fraying, Edward Buscombe and Kim Newman – this collectable five-disc box set also contains an 80-page book with newly commissioned essays, archival interviews and film credits, and is strictly limited to 6,000 numbered units.

Perhaps the grittiest and grimmest of the Randolph Scott-Budd Boetticher collaborations, The Tall T was adapted by Burt Kennedy from the Elmore Leonard short story The Captive. Scott plays a former ranch foreman who, along with newlyweds Maureen O'Sullivan and John Hubbard, is held hostage at a deserted stagecoach station by ruthless bandit Richard Boone and his henchmen Henry Silva and Skip Homeier. Since we already know that Boone has no qualms about killing a freckle-faced 10 year old boy, we shudder to think of what's in store for Scott and his fellow captives once Boone carries out his plan to rob the next stagecoach. In Boetticher's time-honored Mexican Standoff fashion, Scott bargains with Boone for the life of O'Sullivan, but his efforts are undercut by Hubbard's cowardly treachery. The film's sparse, carefully controlled tension level bursts into full-out bloodshed only minutes before the final fade-out. Curiously, the title The Tall T is never explained at any time; certainly the "T" doesn't refer to Randolph Scott, whose character name is Pat Brennan.

Extras

• Martin Scorsese on 'The Tall T'
• The Guardian Interview with Elmore Leonard
• Audio commentary by Jeanine Basinger
• Image Gallery
• Trailer