This indisputably finest of "noir-Westerns" sets its dark storyline under cinematographer James Wong Howe's oppressive clouds and menacing cliffs. Less Freudian psychodrama than fated family tragedy, Pursued revolves around the great brooding performance of Robert Mitchum, haunted by an obscure childhood nightmare of flashing spurs and gunshots. The complex flashback structure finds adult Mitchum, in turn-of-the-century New Mexico, beset by the return of a one-armed nemesis (Dean Jagger) and still disturbed by his love-hate relations with his foster-mother (Judith Anderson, in a steely performance) and foster-sister (Teresa Wright, whose openness plays off Mitchum's gloom.) The passionate darkness of Niven Busch's script for Pursued might recall Duel in the Sun-the chaotic adaptation from his novel Mr. Busch entertainingly discussed here last year. But with Pursued Niven Busch had absolute control over a production of which everyone had reason to be proud. Director Raoul Walsh, after a career of memorable Westerns (The Big Trail, They Died with Their Boots On, etc.), looked back on Pursued as his favorite: "I love that movie." Scott Simmon