Hud (1963)

Years ago, I watched the movie Blue Denim (1959) starring Brandon de Wilde as a 15-year-old who gets his girlfriend an illegal abortion. I wanted to see other movies he was in as a teenager, so I watched All Fall Down (1962) and Hud (1963) which were strangely similar movies. In both, de Wilde plays a kid who idolizes someone he shouldn't, Warren Beatty in All Fall Down and Paul Newman in Hud.

Hud was set in Texas. Lonnie (de Wilde) lives with his grandfather (Melvin Douglas) and Uncle Hud (Paul Newman) on his grandfather's ranch. The cattle are put under quarantine because of hoof and mouth disease.

Melvin Douglas is distressed at the thought that his cattle may have to be killed which I found a little surprising. Don't they slaughter them anyway?

I had forgotten how much western dialog there was in it. Douglas refers to dying as "throwing in the sponge".  At a funeral someone says that the man went to a better place and de Wilde says, "not unless dirt is a better place than air."

Poor Brandon de Wilde died after a car accident at age thirty.