Trailer
Plot summary
Dodge City, Kansas, is holding its Centennial shooting contest on the Fourth of July, and the prize is a one-in-a-thousand Winchester 1873 repeating rifle. Lin McAdam comes to town with his friend High Spade, trailing Dutch Henry Brown, with whom he has an old quarrel. When a man forces the saloon pianist Lola Manners toward a departing stagecoach, Lin steps in, then backs off once he learns the man is the marshal, Wyatt Earp, who confiscates the guns of every stranger. Lin and Dutch find each other in a saloon with no weapons at hand. Both enter the contest, and Lin outshoots his rival.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Winchester '73 (1950)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- James Stewart's agent Lew Wasserman won him 50 percent of Winchester '73's profits, eventually about $600,000, plus control over the choice of director and co-stars; it is acknowledged as the first confirmed time in the sound era that an actor was paid in "points".
- Universal ran magazine ads asking the public to find surviving "One of One Thousand" Model 1873 Winchester rifles, bringing many unknown originals to light and drawing interest to antique gun collecting; the winner got a new Model 1894 because the 1873 was out of production.
- Winchester '73 was first set to be directed by Fritz Lang, but Universal refused to let him produce it through his own company, Diana Productions; James Stewart's own pick, Anthony Mann, replaced him.
- Anthony Mann disliked the property and agreed to make it only if he could rewrite it completely; he brought in a new writer, Borden Chase, and the two started from scratch on the script.
- Winchester '73 turned a significant profit, gained a reputation as a classic of the Western genre, and durably helped redefine how the public saw star James Stewart.
- The Winchester company's own expert marksman, Herb Parsons, performed the film's trick shooting and helped train its star, James Stewart.
