10 Best Movies That Play Out In Real Time
5. High Noon
Westerns aren't exactly the most natural of genres for the real time treatment, but the Gary Cooper-starring 1952 film High Noon is proof perfect of how effective it can be.
Cooper plays Will Kane, a Marshall on the eve of retiring to settle down with his recently wed wife Amy Fowler (Grace Kelly), who learns that a violent outlaw he sent to jail, Frank Miller (Ian MacDonald), is returning to town with vengeance on his mind.
Rather than run as his wife advises, Kane proudly digs his heels in, and as both we and Kane await Miller's inevitable arrival at noon, the urgency of the ticking clock is massively amplified by that wait counting down in real time.
Director Fred Zinnemann does a fantastic job of using real time to box the protagonist into an existential quandary - which, thankfully, transpires into a happy ending.