High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Lonely are the Brave is a 1962 film adaptation of the Edward Abbey novel The Brave Cowboy. It stars Kirk Douglas as cowboy Jack Burns, Gena Rowlands as his best friend`s wife, and Walter Matthau as a sheriff who sympathises with Burns but must do his job and chase him down. It also featured an early score by legendary composer Jerry Goldsmith. Douglas felt that this was his favorite movie.