Westerns with unusual twists or messages

[mrsl]

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I caught the last 45 minutes of The Searchers today, a movie I own but can't resist watching if I run across it while channel surfing. I found myself nearly in tears at the end which never happened before. Most westerns are basically shoot 'em up films and don't encourage any emotions but today, although I've seen it countless times, when Wayne catches Natalie and lifts her up as he had when she was little struck me, and made tears well up in my eyes. Later at the house when she got to the porch and was hugged so tightly by her aunt and uncle, the tears built up in my eyes again because I finally understood the emotional impact of an abducted child who was returned to her family. Maybe it was because there have been so many children either abducted or killed by loved ones lately in the news that those scenes hit home.

Do you western fans recall any other westerns that packed an emotional wallop on you? I can think of a few where needless deaths occurred, and when I cheered for someone to accomplish some deed or other.
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[Western Guy]

I find Westerns a surprisingly emotional genre. Right off the bat I can come up with the classic THE OX-BOW INCIDENT. Own the movie, but, as with you and THE SEARCHERS, catch it at every televised opportunity. I find myself often actually talking to the screen at this one. I cheer Fonda, Morgan, Davenport and the good guys and loathe Frank Conroy and his bunch. Jane Darwell, so loving THE GRAPES OF WRATH, is downright despicable here. I always get a shiver when Willard Robertson tells the lynch mob that God better have mercy on them because they won't get any from him. (BTW: LOVE Willard Robertson. Never a big name but always a solidly reliable actor and welcome presence in any movie).

SHENANDOAH affects me on an emotional level; the whole idea of a family trying to stay neutral during the Civil War and how they are drawn into it with tragic consequences for some. The final scene in church always raises a lump in my throat.

I could also mention THE SHOOTIST. There's no way that John Wayne playing a dying character in his final film cannot hit you emotionally. And his line to Lauren Bacall that he is a dying man afraid of the dark has to sent a shiver down you.

The Duke's farewell to his troops in SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON; Gregory Peck promising to come back to his wife and son in a year in THE GUNFIGHTER; Elisha Cook Jr.'s lonely hilltop funeral in SHANE (lots of great moments in that wonderful Western).

There are just so many . . .

[charliechaplinfan]

The Ox Bow Incident should come with a warning, I had no idea what was coming, it had Henry Fonda and Dana Andrews and that nice actress from The Grapes of Wrath, I was watching a Hollywood movie, they weren't really going to do what it looked like, were they? I can honestly say I was shocked but I liked the film, if that's the right word.

The Grapes of Wrath, does it count as a Western? I would place it in the Western category but it's not classic Western, cowboys and olden days, well not for it's time but heck, it's powerful too.

I really liked Stagecoach, I felt it surprising but refreshing. The Searchers didn't move me, I always wondered if I missed something, I watched it with Chris and he felt the same but it wasn't what I expected perhaps that was it, it was beautiful to watch, I didn't like Wayne's character but I don't think I was meant to.

I love the Cavalry trio, I do like Henry Fonda even when he's bad but I like these movies, they sit together well, I'm not sure of a message Anne but I do agree with you about these old classics, they have a heart, they feel loved and fimiliar and above all the have moving storylines, characters we understand and when a message is added it's often not thrust in our faces so powerfully that it puts us off.

[Western Guy]

Alison, I wonder what audiences at the time thought of THE OX BOW INCIDENT. With a war raging and people looking for escapism, it's not surprising the picture wasn't a success. Fonda really campaigned to get the movie made, though. Hit a chord with him as apparently as a young boy in Omaha his dad brought him out to witness a lynching. Fonda never forgot that -- hell, who could?

[charliechaplinfan]

I didn't know that about Henry Fonda, that's quite a thing for a boy to see and however good intentioned his father I'm not sure it's appropriate. I didn't know he campaigned for the part, he's made for that part. I thought about the war aspect as I was typing it, perhaps that's why a film with that strength of message was allowed to be made, it does pack an emotional wallop and it doesn't do it lightly, however the way it's played out, I think most viewers would have been like I was not expecting what happened at all, it was Hollywood after all. Perhaps it's saying something about the Nazis, the mob rules but it rules on wrong information, so many people were inflamed to fight a war, or expell Jews from their countries because of disinformation fed to them by a Goverment controlled press and radio. It takes guts and courage not to go with the mob but also it takes an independent mind and thought not to get suckered into what the majority are saying and think it out for yourself, unfortunately Fonda's character could not win out over the mob's demands even though he could see that they could be wrong. What chills too is that a woman is so vicious, when it's known that women can be as fanatical and bloodthirsty it still chills to see it being portrayed and by one who lookes so Mumsy. I also look at it as a big arguement against capital punishment of any kind but I don't think that's the message intended. Yet the townsfolk, they go back to their business, a bit sorry but they'll get over it. Could it be a message against lynchings or would they have died out by then?

[Western Guy]

I don't know if the townfolk responsible will go back to their dusty lives (and what a depressing town is presented in the picture). Willard Robertson pretty much makes it clear that a justice will be forthcoming to all but the seven men who resisted. But no punishment could be worse than what that pathetic bunch will have to live with. Watch that moment when Marc Lawrence rubs his hand down his face in obvious regret for what he participated in. Even Rondo Hatton shows a similar regret.

Just an amazing picture. You watch those end credits just in a state of numbness, no matter now many times you see the picture.

And let's face it: Red River Valley HAD to be Hank Fonda's theme.

[charliechaplinfan]

I think by the time I got to the end I was numb, the price they would have to pay seemed small in comparison to what they had done, it's not so much the killing which lets face it is bad enough but the lack of trial or judicial procedure. When you take the law into your own hands you're disavowing the state and God and mankind. When I watched it I could remember the lessons I'd had when studying Julius Caesar when it was imprinted on us how important the mob and what power it wheelded. A chilling film, not one I could watch everyday, I admit I found it hard and knowing now as I do I might find it harder, it's relentless but it's important and it's gutsy. It's something I would expect to find on stage or something that is presented on film as fait acccompli and the plot goes off from that point but to have all the vividness there on screen and the apparent innocence of the guys comdemned because I never for one moment thought they were guilty. Chris once asked me to give him a film with a message for his class towards the end of term, he sad they were silent once it got to the lynching and were as surprised as I was with the content.

[movieman1957]

I think the end of "Ride Lonesome" is pretty powerful. The site of seeing that tree being set on fire gets me when I hear the back story to the movie.

"Last Train From Gun Hill" is unusual when it puts two lifelong friends at odds when Anthony Quinn's son (Earl Holliman) is caught up in a murder of Kirk Douglass's wife. Watching a friendship being torn apart I think is great drama.

"The Fastest Gun Alive" impresses me with Glenn Ford's performance. The basic premise is kind of a stretch but watching Ford fight his demons and manhood also has great drama.

[Western Guy]

Alison, what REALLY gets me is not the hanging so much as when Marc Lawrence fires that rifle into their helpless bodies as they dangle there. Completely adding insult to injury and as powerful a movie moment at there ever was one. When I had one of my many conversations with Marc prior to our aborted effort to collaborate on a book concentrating on his lengthy film career (unlike his own self-published autobiography which focused mainly on other issues), I admitted to him that out of all his dozens of villainous film portrayals, I hated him most in THE OX BOW INCIDENT. He said he agreed, but still put Cobby in THE ASPHALT JUNGLE as his most vile film characterization.

Certainly not a film ending one would expect - especially at a time when the nation needed optimism. Then we can think of BATAAN, WAKE ISLAND. I own all of these films on DVD. I hope I'm not basically a pessimist, though my book editor questions some of the climaxes my Western novels reach. I'd prefer to think of myself in preferences and my own writing as a realist. LOVE a good happy ending but sometimes el crapo does hit the fan.

[RedRiver]

Rondo Hatton is in "Oxbow"? How many times have I seen that movie. A great example for this topic is Henry King's poetic THE BRAVADOS. An exciting, and spiritual, story with a surprise that will knock you over. Unfortunately, I can't discuss it without spoiling the end! This film and King's fine THE GUNFIGHTER would make a nice double feature.

[Western Guy]

Rondo is there, though relegated to the background. His most significant appearance comes towards the end when Henry is reading that letter (the only false note in the picture, IMO. Just can't see Dana's character writing a letter of such length, depth, clarity and insight prior to his neck being stretched). You can catch Rondo standing at the end of the bar wiping his face in anguish.

Oh yeah, THE BRAVADOS is another great Western and I agree with you about the ending - only to say that Henry Silva has never been finer.

[charliechaplinfan]

I haven't seen any of the other movies mentioned apart from The Asphalt Jungle. Is there a movie out there that packs a bigger emotional punch. I do remember that moment when the rifle is fired into the bodies. I do wonder if Hollywood would have made it if it hadn't have been war time.

[JackFavell]

Decision at Sundown really freaked me out and made me love Randolph Scott and Budd Boetticher. It's so emotional at the end, it's completely unlike Scott's usual demeanor.

The Great Silence is a very unusual western, I can't say more except to say that it's really good and worth watching even in it's nihilism.

I thought Once Upon a Time in the West ended very differently than I thought it would.

[tinker]

I recently got the dvd of The Hanging Tree and whilst I always remember it as a very powerful film, I found it quite disturbing. Gary Cooper's character is odd to say the least, almost passive in that his only real western action is to kill someone quite brutally and he almost seems to accept his fate on the Hanging Tree without resistance. And his relationship with Rune, his need to own people is also interesting to say the least.

I hadn't watched westerns for a long time but came back to get positively addicted to them over the last few years. What I had not realised was that for all the dismissal of them as shoot'em ups just how many fifties westerns like the OxBow incident, The Hanging Tree and The Gunfighter are quite serious examinations and metaphors about violence and its impact on people.

A very old movie that I have not seen on a long time was a B Audie Murphy movie called Tumbleweed. Mostly because I love horses I liked it. Tumbleweed was the ugliest muliest stubborn miserable grey mustang a hero ever got stuck with. It turns out he is also the fastest horse in the west. I think there is a metaphor in there too!!!

dee

[Western Guy]

Speaking of unusual Westerns (and Audie Murphy), NO NAME ON THE BULLET is a very unique oater with an offbeat role for Murphy and a different type of ending. Highly recommended!