Doc (film)

Doc
Directed byFrank Perry
Written byPete Hamill
Produced byFrank Perry
StarringStacy Keach
Faye Dunaway
Harris Yulin
Michael Witney
Denver John Collins
Dan Greenburg
CinematographyEnrique Bravo
Gerald Hirschfeld
Edited byAlan Heim
Music byJimmy Webb
Production
company
Distributed byUnited Artists
Release date
  • August 1, 1971 (1971-08-01)
Running time
91 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Doc is a 1971 American Western film, which tells the story of the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral and of one of its protagonists, Doc Holliday. It stars Stacy Keach, Faye Dunaway, and Harris Yulin. It was directed by Frank Perry. It was the first film of his to not be written by Eleanor Perry; Pete Hamill wrote the original screenplay. The film was shot in Almeria in southern Spain.

Plot

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Doc Holliday (Stacy Keach) and Kate Elder (Faye Dunaway) spend time at the Continental Hotel in Tombstone, Arizona, hoping to find his old friend Wyatt Earp (Harris Yulin), deputy marshal of Cochise County, who is striving to become the town's new sheriff in the election campaign.

Along the way, Doc meets up with Virgil and Morgan Earp, two of Wyatt's brothers, and follows them to Tombstone. Once Wyatt becomes the sheriff, he and his friend face a fierce resistance from the "Cowboys" gathered around the Clanton family, who want to keep control of the town and don't accept Earp's authority. The Cowboys include Ike Clanton (Michael Witney), Tom and Frank McLaury, and Billy Claiborne.

Doc teaches the Kid (Denver John Collins) how to shoot a pistol. When the Civil War ended, he left Atlanta, Georgia and went to Richmond, Virginia and then to Baltimore, Maryland, to be a dentist. After some time he decided to go out to the West, looking for a drier environment to cure his tuberculosis, for which he visits a Chinese for herbs. (At another point in the movie, he is taking laudanum.)

In the end, the showdown at the OK Corral takes place during a fiesta. John Behan (Richard McKenzie), Wyatt Earp, and Doc Holliday all survive the gunfight. Ike Clanton, Tom and Frank McClaury, and Billy Claiborne do not.

Cast

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Awards

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References

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  1. ^ Philip Loy, R. (July 2004). Westerns in a Changing America, 1955–2000. McFarland. ISBN 9780786418718.
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