La loi du Seigneur

This piece of authentic homespun Americana is still one of a handful of truly great films made by its director William Wyler. It won the Palme d'Or at Cannes, something almost unheard of for an American film at the time. It's simplicity itself; a tale of Quakers during the American Civil War and very smiliar in style and tone to Andrew McLaglen's "Shenandoah". Gary Cooper, (never better), is the peace-loving farmer, Dorothy McGuire, (equally good), is his wife and Anthony Perkins, (brilliant in only his second film and picking up an Oscar nomination), is the son who goes off to fight.

Wyler, who himself served in the Second World War, was too canny a director to make an outright anti-war film though the message of the picture is clear. He was also too good a director to fudge it. It may move at a quiet, almost stately pace while remaining one of his most overtly cinematic pictures. A huge hit in its day, it seems now to have all but disappeared.