...and They Lived Happily Ever After

The Beguiled is a 1971 American Southern Gothic psychological thriller film directed and produced by Don Siegel, and starring Clint Eastwood, Geraldine Page and Elizabeth Hartman. Based on Thomas P. Cullinan's 1966 novel, the film is set during the Civil War and follows a wounded Union soldier (Eastwood) who is reluctantly taken into care at a girls' school in Confederate territory. The film marks the third of five collaborations between Siegel and Eastwood, following Coogan's Bluff (1968) and Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970), and continuing with Dirty Harry (1971) and Escape from Alcatraz (1979). The Beguiled was released by Universal Pictures on May 28, 1971. Initial critical reception was polarized and the film was a commercial disappointment, but retrospective reviews have been much more positive. Quentin Tarantino called it "the closest Siegel ever came to making an art film."