Great Film overall

Excellent but underrated film

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Rebel soldier Matt Weaver returns to town after the Civil War, only to find that his home has been sold by unscrupulous town boss, Sam Brewster. Brewster, fearing for his safety, hires gunfighter Jules Gaspard d'Estaing to eradicate Weaver. But as d'Estaing's settles in to town it becomes clear to him just what a corrupt and morally bankrupt bunch the townsfolk are.It grieves me to mark a film like this, with so many good people involved with it, down so low. The thematic heart of this picture is fabulous, nothing none of us haven't seen before, but tales of hired gunmen straightening out dirty towns are always of interest if handled with care and a commitment to the moral essence. Invitation To A Gunfighter, in spite of starring Yul Brynner, George Segal, Brad Dexter, Pat Hingle and Strother Martin, and being directed by Orson Welles collaborator Richard Wilson, is ploddingly paced and acted like a low budget C movie. The score from David Raksin is intrusive and completely out of sync with the nature of the piece, whilst the back lot location is all too evident.The piece briefly picks up entering the final third, where thankfully Brynner is asked to earn his pay outside of walking around glumly, but it's a false dawn as the finale has all the excitement of a runny nose. I'm in the minority judging by the comments written for this film thus far, so maybe it caught me at a bad time, but the chances of me ever seeking this one out again are remote to say the least. 3/10

Found this to be a pleasant surprise. Talky but interesting psychological western, much more intelligent than typical gunfighter fare. Also, I would venture to say that "High Plains Drifter" might have taken a bit of inspiration from this film, which predates it by many years.Light on the action but the characters are more than one dimensional stereotypes and all good performances.Totally misrepresented by the one line summary, "Town hires a gunslinger to kill an outcast then hires the outcast to kill the gunslinger," as 95% of the movie is about the first half of that sentence.Check it out!

One thing you can say about Yul Brynner: Either he is awesome, or he sucks, there's little middle ground for Brynner. Unfortunately, this isn't one of his best "Cajun" gunslinger performances. George Segal's performance out-paces and outshines Brynner, but the real star of this work is Janice Rule.A town boss hires a gunslinger to kill an outcast, then hires the outcast to kill the gunslinger. Well, it's more complicated than that, but to go into it would spoil the comedic and dramatic twists.It's not terrible, but it's not great, either. All in all, it's only decent, and typical for its time.It rates a 5.3/10 from...the Fiend :.

I've got a real affection for this film, as a fan of Yul Brynner and off-kilter Westerns – that wonderful American art form, a mould into which absolutely any story at all can be poured. Into this mould are poured a tired, hurting, dusty town, morally bankrupt, cowardly, racist. Add a rebellious 'reb' in a town full of sanctimonious 'unionists', a miserable marriage, an old, soured love story, and, of course, the unfathomable, memorable Jules Gaspard D'Estaing, played by Brynner with his usual class and intensity.But every appearance of good or prosperity or right in this town is a lie; the grieving widow's husband brought on his own death; the Mexicans living across the wash work for the whites "if they want to eat"; the town's "rooster", Mr Brewster, got rich by taking advantage of the Civil War, and everyone's deep in debt. Ruth's marriage to Crane Adams is a sham, and everything serves to illustrate that no one wins, except perhaps the rooster. Into this poisoned air stalks Brynner, his dancer's walk and dandyish clothing of less concern to white townsfolk than his rich skin tone. Considerable time is spent by those around him, trying to work out who he is. The cold-blooded killer – he seems to be trying to convince himself that this is what he is – becomes the moral centre of the storm, and his steadily building rage spills over in a powerful scene in which he literally lays waste the town. But as Shakespeare most memorably put it, "all are punished".It is a trifle heavy on the morality; and I'm guessing a vehicle dreamt up for Brynner. But I still stand by this film as an all time favourite. I really like the interaction between Brynner and Janet Rule, whose low voice and gentle persuasion chip away at the gunfighter's hard edges. For all its imperfections it has some of those ingredients I always want to see in a film: flawed but compelling characters, a troubled romance, a different world peopled by humans, not heroes.