Tony's Picks - Westerns

I like movies. I like them a lot. I especially like war movies, film noir, and Westerns. If I was to list every Western that I like I would never be able to finish this. These are the Western movies that immediately come to mind as “must see.” Ask me in a month and the list might change [slightly]...

The Wild Bunch [1969] – This is Sam Peckinpah’s masterpiece. Up until the making of this film, no Western had ever been this violent or this bloody. Peckinpah’s vision was to have his audience feel what it was like to be shot. Until then, people got shot, people fell down, and they didn’t bleed very much. One didn’t see many bullet holes in people. Peckinpah’s use of slow motion amplified the effect of what bullets can do to “soft pudgies” once they made impact with human flesh. This is the story of Pike Bishop [William Holden] and his gang of aging outlaws [Ernest Borgnine, Warren Oates, Ben Johnson] looking to make one last big score because they are all looking at the “end of the line.” Deke Thornton [Robert Ryan] is a former member of Bishop’s gang who is “hired” by a railroad boss [under the threat of going back to prison] to kill Pike and his gang. You know that when Bishop utters the line “if they move, kill ‘em”, that it’s “game on.” This movie features several Oscar winners [past and future] – William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Edmund O’Brien, and Ben Johnson. Warren Oates and Robert Ryan weren’t too shabby either. The Wild Bunch is my favorite Western.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid [1969] – Unlike The Wild Bunch, this movie with Paul Newman and Robert Redford is a more light-hearted affair, but it’s just as serious. The theme is similar – two aging outlaws are facing an uncertain future in fast-changing times. Like Pike Bishop and his gang, they too are staring the end of the line dead in the face. After robbing one train too many, Butch and Sundance [together with Katherine Ross] are pursued all the way to Bolivia by a dream team of lawmen [hired by a railroad boss – sound familiar?], whose only mission is to catch and kill Butch and Sundance. This is one of those movies that if I’m channel surfing and come upon this movie, the surfing stops, no matter how many times I’ve seen it. “Who are those guys?”

The Searchers [1956] – John Wayne didn’t think much of Clint Eastwood’s anti-hero Western characters, and yet Ethan Edwards is as big an anti-hero as any portrayed by Eastwood. This is by far [it isn’t even close] the Duke’s best performance. John Ford once remarked “I didn’t know the sonofabitch could act.” Ethan Edwards is a Civil War vet [a Confederate] for whom the war never ended. He would never swear loyalty to the Union. He liked fighting so much that he went to Mexico to fight the French. A racist, unreconstructed rebel, he also thinks the only good Indian is a dead Indian. When Edward’s brother, his sister-in-law and nephew are killed and their daughters Lucy and Debbie are kidnapped by Comanches, Edwards [with his nephew Martin Hawley (Jeffrey Hunter)] goes in search of his nieces. The search takes five years, during which time Lucy is found by dead [and presumably raped by said Comanches], further enraging Edwards. Edwards mutilates the Comanche corpses he finds, gouging out their eyes so their spirits would wander forever in the afterlife. Edwards and Hawley catch up to Debbie [a sixteen-year-old Natalie Wood], who insisted she wanted to remain with her Comanche captors. Edwards thought “better dead than red” and tried to kill Debbie. But ultimately, Edwards and Hawley bring her “home.” The last scene is a poignant one. There seems to be an unspoken agreement between Edwards and all the other characters that although his dirty job is done, he has no place in a world of domesticity. A door literally closes while Edwards walks away.

Unforgiven [1992] – As great Westerns go, this movie deserves every bit of praise showered upon it. Clint Eastwood had the script of this movie in his stack of stuff for years, but he waited until he was old enough to play Will Munny. Character development is deep in this film. The Munny character is a sober, repentant widower with two small children and a drunken, violent outlaw past. Gene Hackman’s sheriff Little Bill Daggett is especially loathsome after he refuses to jail a cowboy who slashed a prostitute’s face. Richard Harris’s “English Bob” is a braggart who wastes no opportunity to trash America and has the conceit to travel with his own biographer. One does not feel sorry for English Bob when Little Bill beats the shit out of him for not surrendering his firearms. The movie’s payoff comes when Munny, after hearing that his partner Ned Logan [Morgan Freeman] is killed by Little Bill, starts to drink. Once he takes that first sip, there’s an “oh shit!” moment and you know that Munny is about to flip a switch.

High Plains Drifter [1973] – Carol and I always referred to this movie as the “Paint the Town Red” movie. There is a bit of the supernatural at play when a stranger with no name enters the mining town of Lago. He’s able to gun down three gunfighters without getting as much as a scratch. He manages to avoid getting shot when a prostitute tries to kill him while he’s taking a bath. He has dreams of the local sheriff and the night he was whipped to death by outlaws while the townspeople of Lago did nothing and watched it happen. Is the stranger the ghost of the dead sheriff? It’s never said, but it’s implied. When the outlaws who killed the town sheriff  are released from prison and return to Lago [by which time all the buildings are painted red] to settle old scores, they kill several of the townspeople, and take the rest to the saloon. The town [which, unknown to everyone, the stranger renamed “Hell”] is set on fire. One by one, the outlaws end up dead. It seemed as if he was both nowhere and everywhere at the same time. The next day, a tombstone with the dead sheriff’s name is placed at his hitherto unmarked grave. The dwarf who made it says he never caught the stranger’s name, but the stranger tells him he already knows it. He rides off into the shimmering desert heat and vanishes. Clint Eastwood made a similar movie [Pale Rider] in 1985. Only in this movie, the stranger is a preacher, but he’s really one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse [Death].

The Outlaw Josey Wales [1976] – Josey Wales [Clint Eastwood] is a Missouri farmer whose home is attacked by pro-Union Kansas militia. They kill his wife and son and burn his house down. Wales joins a Confederate guerilla band. When the Civil War ends, Wales’ band of guerillas are offered amnesty if they surrender and swear loyalty to the Union. Wales refuses. When his band surrenders, they’re quickly massacred, while Wales escapes and becomes a fugitive. Wales is hunted by the Kansas militiamen men and bounty hunters alike. His mission is to kill those who killed his family before they can kill him. When confronted by a bounty hunter we hear the best line of the movie – “Dyin’ ain’t much of a livin’, boy.” When he’s identified by a snake oil salesman [“my God, it’s Josey Wales!”], Wales wastes little time in killing a group of Union soldiers who are dumbstruck by the sight of him [“Are you gonna pull those pistols or whistle Dixie?”]. There’s a predictable but satisfying climax when Wales and the militia commander finally meet. Chief Dan George provides the necessary comic relief to keep things from getting too serious.

Bad Day at Black Rock [1955] – Five Academy Award winners – Spencer Tracy, Ernest Borgnine, Dean Jagger, Walter Brennan, and Lee Marvin. Robert Ryan brings his usual intensity to a cast that [with the exception of Spencer Tracy] has a very dark secret to hide. This film is essentially a crime drama but is considered a neo-Western. Set in a California desert town after the end of World War II, one-armed Spencer Tracy travels to the town of Black Rock, where a train hadn’t stopped in over four years. The townspeople are suspicious of the stranger in their midst and act accordingly. Tracy’s mission – to give a medal awarded to the son of a man named Komoko, but Komoko is dead [the “very dark secret”]. One year before The Searchers, racism is addressed head on.

No Country for Old Men [2007] – Joel and Ethan Coen make a lot of off-the-wall movies, but this neo-Western [their first] isn’t one of them. Set in West Texas, this is a story about what NOT to do if you see a drug deal gone bad. Leave the investigating to the professionals. If you don’t, a psychopathic hitman with a birth control haircut will come after you and probably kill you for inconveniencing him. This psychopath will be like Robocop. If he gets hurt, he’ll shake it off like a minor inconvenience and keep coming for you. He’ll kill you, he’ll kill your wife, and he’ll kill anybody who tries to help you. Running away to Mexico won’t help you. If you’re a county sheriff and this happens in your jurisdiction, take one look at this carnage and ride off into the sunset of retirement.

Hell or High Water [2016] – Like No Country for Old Men, this is another neo-Western set in West Texas. The film is an advertisement for avoiding reverse mortgages. A family is about to lose its ranch due to foreclosure. Toby Howard [Chris Pine] and his ex-con brother Tanner [Ben Foster] have other ideas. To save their ranch, they rob banks all over West Texas. They launder their stolen money through an Indian casino in Oklahoma. They have the casino convert their winnings into a check made out to the bank that has the reverse mortgage on the ranch, making the money untraceable. Marcus Hamilton [Jeff Bridges] and Alberto Parker [Gil Birmingham] are the two Texas Rangers who are after the Howard brothers. Hamilton, who is constantly making Indian jokes at Parker’s expense, is close to retirement. But he and Parker figure out how Howards’ methods and their next target. Margaret Bowman steals the show with her portrayal as a very salty waitress in a restaurant that serves only T-bone steaks. Parker doesn’t survive the movie, nor does Tanner Howard. Toby Howard pays off the reverse mortgage and puts the ranch into a trust for his two sons. The ranch has oil under it, and it makes the trust a fortune. Ironically, Toby uses the same bank that tried to screw his mother out of the ranch to administer the trust, and the huge monthly checks that are deposited into it. Afraid to lose Toby’s business, the bank doesn’t cooperate with law enforcement to solve the Howards’ crimes, so they get away with it.

Hud [1963] – If a honey badger took human form, it would be Paul Newman’s Hud. He didn’t give a shit about anybody except himself. In his mind, rules that he doesn’t like don’t apply to him. He’ll screw anything that walks or crawls, especially if they’re already married. The Bannons have a housekeeper named Alma [Patricia Neal]. Hud’s nephew Lonnie also lives at the Bannon house. He practically worships his uncle Hud. Hud’s father Homer Bannon [Melvin Douglas] doesn’t like him very much. He blames Hud for his older brother’s death. Hud is highly annoyed with his father. Hud wants to lease parts of the ranch to oilmen to bring some much-needed cashflow into the ranch, but Homer wants nothing to do with oil. It’s a constant struggle between a man’s disappointment with his son, and a son’s constant anger at his father because Homer hates him. Things come to a head when their entire cattle herd has to be slaughtered because some of the cattle purchased by Homer have foot-in-mouth disease. A drunken Hud tries to rape Alma [saved by Lonnie]. Homer dies shortly thereafter, Alma leaves the Bannons for parts unknown, and Lonnie gets over his Hud hero worship. Lonnie leaves the Bannon ranch. One assumes Hud leases the ranch to the oilmen but that is never revealed.

The Long Riders [1980] – Four sets of brother actors [David, Keith and Robert Carradine, James and Stacy Keach, Dennis and Randy Quaid, Christopher and Nicholas Guest] star in this excellent movie from director Walter Hill that tells the story of the James-Younger Gang. You get the sense of the close-knit community of family, neighbors, and strangers who just hate banks that will go the extra mile to protect their local folk heroes. The outlaws are presented as family men. Jesse James has a moral code, booting Ed Miller from the gang after he kills a bank teller in a robbery. Before their last job, he got his nose out of joint because the rest of his gang were entertained at a brothel while he stayed at home with his wife. The Pinkertons who are trying to apprehend them were depicted as trigger-happy incompetents. The real Belle Starr was an outlaw, but Hill turns her into a prostitute. There’s a great knife fight between Cole Younger and Cherokee Sam Starr.[Younger wins]. The climax is an ambush scene in Northfield, Minnesota that pays homage to Sam Peckinpah. He would be proud. The post-Northfield downward spiral is completed after Bob Ford shoots Jesse James in the back. Frank James surrenders to the Pinkertons to bury his brother. Fade to black…As a bonus, Ry Cooder created a superb soundtrack which I highly recommend.

The Shootist [1976] – I have a soft spot for this one because it’s John Wayne’s last movie, and it’s a good one. It’s not great, but it’s good. J.B. Books is an ageing gunfighter who has many kills to his credit. He lives by a simple creed - “I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, I won’t be laid-a-hand on. I don’t do these things to other people and I require the same of them.” It’s the beginning of the twentieth century [January 1901]. He’s dying and wants to see a doctor he knows [James Stewart]  in Carson City, Nevada for a second opinion. The doctor confirms Books’ original diagnosis. He gives him six weeks, maybe two months left to live, and that it will be painful at the very end. Knowing this, Books plans ahead for his own death. He doesn’t want to die a bedridden, agonizing death – he wants to go out in a blaze of glory. Until that time comes, he rents a room from Bond Rogers [Lauren Bacall]. Her impressionable son Gillom [Ron Howard] takes a liking to Books, who teaches him how to shoot. Meanwhile, two crooks try to kill him so they could gain notoriety for being the guys who killed J.B. Books [he kills them instead]. An old flame tries to marry Books, only for him to find out she wants stories of his exploits so she can “be somebody.” After ordering his own tombstone from the local undertaker [John Carradine], he invites three men to have a drink with him at the local saloon on January 29th, his birthday. One man [Richard Boone] has a longtime grudge against him. The other two [Hugh O’Brian and Bill McKinney] are eager to earn fame by killing the famous gunfighter. In the end, Books and his guests have their shootout. Books’ “guests” all die, Books is shot in the back by the bartender and subsequently dies, and Gillom kills the bartender. Given that John Wayne died of cancer three years after this movie, one can’t help but think this film is art imitating real life. The Duke wasn’t dying yet, but The Shootist is a very poignant elegy.

Trilogies

Fort Apache [1948] / She Wore a Yellow Ribbon [1949] / Rio Grande [1950] - John Ford’s Cavalry Trilogy. If you don’t like these, you’re unAmerican.

A Fistful of Dollars [1964] / For a Few Dollars More [1965] / The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly [1966] – What is understood need not be discussed. Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Western trilogy that made Clint Eastwood a star. Any questions?