Cat Ballou is a comedy western starring Jane Fonda, Lee Marvin, Michael Callan, Dwayne Hickman, Nat King Cole, Stubby Kaye, Tom Nardini, and Reginald Denny.
The film opens with the titular heroine (Fonda) awaiting execution as a two-man Greek chorus of "shouters" (Cole and Kaye) sing us the "Ballad of Cat Ballou." Going back, we learn that she was trained as a schoolmarm and then headed back home to her small Wyoming town, only to learn that her father Frankie (John Marley) is getting bullied by the local business interest. In fact, they've hired notorious gunman Tim Strawn (Marvin) to enforce their will. Cat, meanwhile, has picked up a wanted criminal named Clay (Callan) and his uncle Jed (Hickman), and they agree to help out and watch out for Frankie.
Since violence is in the offing, however, that's not gonna be enough, so they hire washed up gunman Kid Shelleen (Marvin again) to protect Frankie. He fails miserably, Frankie is gunned down, and the local sheriff (Bruce Cabot) won't lift a finger. Cat takes her outlaws, Kid, and her father's Sioux hired hand Jackson (Nardini) and heads out to become an outlaw herself. They rob a train, Cat takes matters into her own hands and shoots Percival, the dude in charge (Denny), and we wind up back where we started with Cat on her way to the gallows.
I'd never heard of this movie, but it's one of Michelle's favorites, and I really enjoyed it. It's an odd comedy, just on the verge of being a black comedy (the moment that got closest is Frankie getting shot, and it's such a tonal shift that I wasn't sure that he actually got hit after the shot rang out). Fonda has a nice arc, taking her from a fairly morally upright schoolmarm-to-be to a wanted thief and outlaw, but the story takes enough time to establish her and show her trying to get justice for her father the right way that her turn as a train robber doesn't seem totally out of left field. She's also been established to be a fan of stories of the Wild West, and there's some dissonance between what she's romanticized and what actually happens, but this all stays fairly light.
Lee Marvin, meanwhile, won an Oscar for his dual role as brothers Tim Strawn and Kid Shelleen, and he exudes some real menace as Strawn (impressive for a guy with no nose) and takes Kid from a pathetic drunk to a legendary gunfighter and back.
Callan and Hickman play their characters well enough, though I had trouble telling them apart sometimes. Callan's Clay has a romance plot with Cat, and that's nice, though I thought it was interesting that all of the men around Cat obviously feel for her one way or another. There's real attention to the dynamics and relationships between these people, but it's allowed to unfold as the story goes on, and that makes it organic and fun to watch. And, of course, it's a lot of fun to see Nat King Cole and Stubby Kaye pop in every now and then to sing to us about the characters and let us zip through exposition.
My Grade: A-
Rewatch Value: Medium-high
Next up: Commando
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