Hang 'Em High

Hang 'Em High
Theatrical release poster by Sandy Kossin
Directed byTed Post
Written by
Produced byLeonard Freeman
Starring
Cinematography
Edited byGene Fowler Jr.
Music byDominic Frontiere
Production
companies
Distributed byUnited Artists
Release date
  • July 31, 1968 (1968-07-31)
Running time
114 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1.6 million[1][2]
Box office$10.8 million

Hang 'Em High is a 1968 American revisionist Western film directed by Ted Post and written by Leonard Freeman and Mel Goldberg. It stars Clint Eastwood as Jed Cooper, an innocent man who survives a lynching; Inger Stevens as a widow who helps him; Ed Begley as the leader of the gang that lynched Cooper; and Pat Hingle as the federal judge who hires him as a Deputy U.S. Marshal.

Hang 'Em High was the first production of The Malpaso Company, Eastwood's production company. It was processed in DeLuxe Color.

Hingle portrays a fictional judge who mirrors Judge Isaac C. Parker, labeled the "Hanging Judge" due to the large number of men he sentenced to be executed during his service in the late 1800s as District Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Arkansas.

The film also depicts the dangers of serving as a Deputy U.S. Marshal during that period, as many federal marshals were killed while serving under Parker. The fictional Fort Grant, base for operations for that district judge seat, is also a mirror of the factual Fort Smith, Arkansas, where Judge Parker's court was located.

  1. ^ Hughes, p. 18.
  2. ^ Munn, p. 69.