Product Details

• Actors: Gary Cooper, Susan Hayward, Richard Widmark, Hugh Marlowe, Cameron Mitchell
• Directors: Henry Hathaway
• Format: Import, Subtitled, Color, NTSC
• Region: All Regions
• Run Time: 96 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0016SQAQI
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #305,034 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

GARDEN OF EVIL (1954) Gary Cooper, Richard Widmark, Cameron Mitchell and Susan Hayward star in this suspenseful action-thriller. Directed by Henry Hathaway and shot on location in the lava fields of Mexico, Garden of Evil is a captivating journey through the dark heart of man that is sure to leave you changed forever. When a ship carrying three American fortune hunters strands them in Mexico, fate deals them a great hand from the bottom of the deck. In exchange for a fat payday, they journey into the heart of evil to rescue a trapped miner. With death surrounding them and murderous Apache warriors at their heels, it will take all their cunning and bravery to escape with their payday and their lives. Imported from South Korea with English soundtrack and removeable Korean subtitles.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Garden Of Evil - A Garden of Golden Performances, April 5, 2006

By 

Glen Morris (Plano, Texas) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Garden Of Evil [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - United Kingdom ] (DVD)

Garden of Evil (1954) ranks along with The Searchers and Shane as one of the greatest mythic westerns ever filmed. A superb script is matched by flawless performances by Richard Widmark, Susan Hayward, and Gary Cooper, who all seem to have been born to play these roles. In the hands of lesser talent, this film would have come off as vastly overly pretentious, but the absolute sincerity and conviction of the cast and director send this film into the highest levels of mythic art.

The story is simple, but classic. On a trip around Cape Horn to the California gold fields, three Americans (an ex-lawman, a gambler and a bounty hunter) are stranded in a sleepy Mexican village. An American woman walks into the bar they're in and asks for help to save her husband, who's trapped in a gold mine deep in hostile Indian country. The three Americans and a lone Mexican go, for a variety of reasons, and few return. The territory they cover along the way is as psychological as it is physical, and as archetypal as it is visceral.

Garden of Evil also features some of the most unusual and unique imagery ever seen in a western. Filmed on location in Mexico against a background of the ocean, palm trees, volcanos, a near impossible mountain pass and a village covered in lava with only the church steeple rising above it, the visuals have no trouble matching the quality of the performances.

The music is by Bernard Herrmann, one of the greatest soundtrack composers (with Citizen Kane, The Day the Earth Stood Still, and Taxi Driver to his credit) and this is one of his best scores (and justly available on CD).

There are many classic lines in this film, but the last line, spoken by Gary Cooper against a stunning sunset sums up the movie (...and life?) very nicely, "The Garden of Evil. If the Earth were made of gold, I guess men would die for a handful of dirt."

This movie is hard to find, but worth the effort. Don't miss it. There's nothing like this one.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A well-done character piece, concentrating on the evil influence of gold..., December 30, 2006

By 

Roberto Frangie "Robert" (Leon, Gto. Mexico) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Garden Of Evil [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - United Kingdom ] (DVD)

While Cooper's career spanned ninety-two feature films, in which he appeared as everything from a masked Cossack to an Italian Renaissance explorer, a foreign legionnaire, a baseball great and countless sophisticated romantic adventurers, he is best remembered as a Western star...

'Garden of Evil' tells the story of three American adventurers (Cooper, Widmark, and Mitchell) who are stranded in a Mexican fishing village after the ship that was taking them to California is put out of commission...

All three were headed for the Californian gold rush... Instead, they are now in Puerto Miguel, approached by a woman in trouble, a Spanish-speaking American woman, Leah Fuller (Susan Hayward), who offers to pay them handsomely if they escort her through hazardous Indian territory to rescue her husband who is hurt and trapped in a gold mine up there in the hills...

The mention of gold makes them agree and, together with a Mexican macho man named Vicente (Victor Manuel Mendoza), begin their long, arduous journey...

Emotions become tense when Leah discovers Vicente marking trails and, later, finds herself fighting off the crude advances of one of the three soldiers of fortune...

When the group arrives at what the Indians call the Garden of Evil, a sacred grounds atop a high mountain where the mine is located, they found Fuller (Hugh Marlowe) still alive, but embittered and with a broken leg...

The group's troubles grow when they discover they are in danger, practically harassed by savage Indians...

"Garden of Evil" was Cooper first motion picture in CinemaScope... Along the way, he proves himself a powerful leader with a commanding performance...

Susan Hayward kept her thoughts and her affections pretty much of a secret, remaining skeptical about her motives... This was her second movie with Gary Cooper since her appearance in William A. Wellman's superb, high adventure 'Beau Geste,' and her third with director Hathaway...

Richard Widmark proceeds his ways of gambling with a neat line in cynical cracks; Cameron Mitchell fails in his unwelcome sexual advances; Hugh Marlowe uses a variety of both conscious and unconscious processes to deal with his angry feelings; Victor Manuel Mendoza gets intensely angry after being hit; and Rita Moreno delights the environment with her sweet voice...

Hathaway was one of the great Hollywood veterans still in harness, a versatile director whose Westerns have been as variable in quality as his other films... Filmed on location in Mexico, his 'Garden of Evil' is a beautiful spectacle to behold... The vistas are strikingly clear and vivid... The film is a well-done character piece, concentrating on the relationships of the characters as on the evil influence of gold...

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Underrated and Forgotten Classic Western, July 11, 2006

By 

gobirds2 (New England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Garden Of Evil [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - United Kingdom ] (DVD)

GARDEN OF EVIL is a Western rich with characterization that seems stereotypical on the surface, but on analysis, runs much deeper. Susan Hayward (an enigmatic heroine) hires a group of stranded travelers in a Mexican waterfront town to follow her to a remote mine where her husband is trapped. The adventurous group is comprised of Gary Cooper (the upright, moralistic hero), Richard Widmark (a cynical witticism spouting gambler), Victor Manuel Mendoza (the good-natured Mexican guide) and Cameron Mitchell (the back-shooting kid gunslinger). They must traverse perilous and dangerous Indian territory to get to the mine, but their motives are unclear. Is it the trapped man, the lure of gold or the subdued sexual attraction that Hayward exudes that drives them? The narrative is a study of personalities in conflict, their motivations, loyalties, cowardice and heroism. Richard Widmark's character comes off as the most interesting. He lingers in the viewer's mind long after the film is over and the question is raised - which is the more honorable: the moralistic hero or the dubiously elegant yet noble rogue? Henry Hathaway is a director known for atmosphere, character and authentic locations. He combines mood and action. This film has all those elements. It is beautifully photographed, yet the picturesque landscapes are juxtaposed with disturbingly photographed death scenes, menacing ever-lurking Indians (always photographed from a distance) and even mysterious looking set designs. The church bell tower sprouting up from the dried lava is all that remains of the town outside the mine and is symbolically ominous in appearance. Frank Fenton's screenplay is filled with vague dialog and only adds to the total feeling of uneasiness that permeates this film. Bernard Herrmann's score accentuates the moodiness of this haunting adventure tale, itself also vague and non-specific. It is very untypical of the Hollywood Western. He achieved a recurrent sense of ominous fate throughout this entire film without the score ever entering into the psychological realm. This is by no means a minor score by Herrmann and I rank this as one of his great scores. GARDEN OF EVIL under Henry Hathaway's direction intelligently yet emotionally integrates the psychological aspects of his characters and even the threatening locale into the action elements found in the standard Western genre to create an unnerving and very thought provoking experience.