Former sea captain, James McKay, moves to the wild wild west to marry and settle down with his fiancee, Patricia Terrill. Unfortunately, although the Terrill family are doing well in the new country, they are at constant odds with another family, the Hannasseys, over a piece of land that belongs to a friend of Patricia's, Julie Maragon. McKay, a gentleman, struggles to fit in, because his values are very different to those of both the Terrills and the Hannasseys. He is seen as an oddity by the locals because of this, with the ranch foreman, Steve Leech takes a particular dislike to him. McKay tries to resolve the problem, but in the process upsets a lot of people, ...  Read the complete review

This is a review of the MGM DVD. As a big fan of Westerns, this film was high on my list of ones to check out and I was attracted by the cast and director.'The Big Country' is an epic Western made in 1958 by director William Wyler who is probably most famous for his huge cinematic epic 'Ben-Hur' which was made the year after this film. In many respects 'The Big Country' is a sort of dry run for that. Everything about this film screams 'Epic!' from the huge sprawling vistas, to the rousing soundtrack and the big name cast. The story concerns James McKay [Gregory Peck] a wealthy former sea Captain who has left his life in the 'sophisticated' east to ...  Read the complete review

Land. It's always about land. Watch cinema through the ages, and there's always a struggle for land. Even today, the more land you own, the wealthier you are and seemingly the more 'friends' you can acquire. This Oscar winning film takes the age old dispute and characterises it beautifully, from the cast to the cinematography, and deserves all the praise it can get. Gregory Peck tops the billing as retired sea captain James McKay, travelling from the city to the desolate West, cowboy land where you can look as far as the eye can see and often see nothing but the plains and the occasional hill. Arid and dusty, and land for a man, when he arrives to meet his ...  Read the complete review

My mam reckons that you should never rush into a marriage type decision until you have had a chance to look at the intended in their home environment. Sound advice from a wise woman, and, offered up gratis. To support this theory I have to point to the outstanding western "Big Country". Gregory Peck plays a sophisticated and cultured easterner who heads west to meet the family of his new fiance Carroll Baker. What he finds out on the prairie is unlikely to impress him too much. His father in law, Major Terrill, is a wretched little man intent on dominating the prairies. His big rival is the rather more earthy Rufus Hennessy and their ...  Read the complete review