Clark Gable was the picture of suave and debonaire, everybody's first choice for a romantic leading man. Almost in a class by himself, he was the king of Hollywood. Gary Cooper was everyman, the guy next door, a pure natural and likable in his films. Both were great actors; both passed off the scene relatively early. But as great as they were, there was one actor who rose from obscurity to surpass them both and became the quintessential all-American tough guy. Whether as a cowboy, a soldier, a pilot, a g-man, or in any number of other roles, John Wayne gave us strong heroes and heroic accomplishments. In his roles he became the image of all that is great about America. Most importantly, he was believable in all the roles he played.
Critics often say he was limited to his cowboy image because he couldn't act. Certainly there were some roles he was not up to. For example, could you imagine John Wayne as the swashbuckling Rhet Butler in Gone With the Wind? Of course not! But who else could anybody imagine in that role? Nobody could have played Rhet Butler except Clark Gable.
But, they say, John Wayne was only good as a cowboy. He couldn't do drama, or comedy, or romantic roles. Oh yeah? I have a few suggestions. If you want drama watch The Wings of Eagles. Comedy? Check out North to Alaska or Donovan's Reef. Romantic leads? True, Duke Wayne is not often thought of as a big screen lover, yet as a leading man he always got the girl, and nobody ever complained that his on screen romances were stiff or unreal. Neither were they indecent or even risque. He played opposite some of the great leading ladies of his day from Marlene Dietrich, to Sofia Loren, to Maureen O'Hara, and when he got together with the fiery redhead, they sizzled.
The best way to judge John Wayne's talent is to ask yourself, "Who else could have played his role instead?" They made a remake of Stagecoach in 1966 with Alex Cord as the Ringo Kid, and starring Bing Crosby and Ann Margaret. It was a total flop. Think about it. Who else could have played the Ringo Kid, or Rooster Cogburn or Sergeant Stryker? Who would you rather have seen wrestling rhinos in Hatari? He may not have been the greatest overall talent, but he was the greatest at what he did, and he was better than most people think.
There have been many great actors, some of whom were just larger than life. Gable and Cooper, Bogey and Cagney, Robert Mitchum, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood to name a few. But as with King Saul in ancient Israel, there is one that stands head and shoulders above all the rest. Born Marion Morrison in Winterset, Iowa in 1907, and known by his nickname, Duke, John Wayne is bigger than them all.
The following is a review of my favorite John Wayne movies. The first five are my favorites in that order. The rest are my favorites in the order of any input I've received. I hope you will enjoy my reminiscent journey through the movies of a great American.
1. The Searchers 2. Angel and the Bad Man 3. Hatari 4. Donovan's Reef 5. The Quiet Man 6. Sands of Iwo Jima 7. Rio Grande 8. Eldorado 9. Big Jake 10. True Grit 11. Stagecoach 12. The Big Trail 13. Tall in the Saddle 14. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance 15. McLintock!
1. The Searchers
Arguably the best western movie ever made as well as the best performance ever given, John Wayne plays the role of a lifetime. The Searchers is a piece of Americana, a vivid, realistic portrayal of pioneer struggles in the Texas of the 1860's. Duke is Ethan Edwards, a man on a self-imposed mission to find his niece, Debbie, played by Natalie Wood, who was kidnapped by a band of Comanches led by a mysterious chief named Scar, who murdered her entire family. Followed by his adopted nephew, Martin Pawley, played by Jeffrey Hunter, he relentlessly pursues the Indians for over five years.
The search for his niece, however, masks a deeper, more subtle sub-plot about Ethan Edwards' search for himself. He comes back from the Civil War a bitter and angry man looking for revenge. It's hard to imagine a darker, colder, more sinister character, yet Duke does the impossible making Edwards sympathetic and desirable even in his hatred. Edwards is a complicated character, much more than is apparent in the opening scenes of the movie. When he says good-bye to his sister-in-law for the last time and gently kisses her on the forehead he very tenderly reveals a secret love that fuels the intensity of his search later, and when he finally finds Debbie the evil that he had become is finally subdued.
Ward Bond plays the Rev. Samuel Jackson Clayton, part time preacher and part time captain of the Texas Rangers, who is on Edward's trail over an alleged murder. Vera Miles is Martin's girlfriend, Lori, whose frustrating wait for his return is highlighted in the reading of a letter that adds a light hearted moment to the intensity of the story. Patrick Wayne, Duke's son, also makes his first movie appearance as a young cavalry officer.
Filmed among the massive buttes of Arizona's Monument Valley, John Ford's cinematography gives the picture an authentic feel of the Old West. The musical opening warns of impending Indian trouble and sets the mood, while the lyrics, sung appropriately by the Sons of the Pioneers, introduce Ethan Edwards' inner struggle; "What makes a man to wander? What makes a man to roam? What makes a man leave bed and board and turn his back on home? Ride away."
The movie ends with Edwards and a rescue party bringing Debbie home. One by one they all file into the house until Duke, standing alone on the porch, reaches over with his left hand to hold his right elbow, his personal tribute to his own hero, Harry Carey, whose wife, Olive, playing a role in the movie, was watching from inside the house. As the door closes, Edwards turns and wanders off into the distance, apparently still searching for his soul.
The closing music very cleverly leaves the story unfinished. "A man will search his heart and soul, Go searching way out there; His peace of mind he knows he'll find, But where, O Lord, Lord, where? Ride away." It is a classic to end all classics leaving the audience wondering what will happen to Ethan Edwards and wanting to know more.
2. Angel and the Badman
A rip-roarin' western with gun fights, cattle stampedes, and barroom brawls, this story is about a lawman gone bad whose soul is finally won back by a Quaker girl and her family. John Wayne is Quirt Evans, an orphaned boy raised by a cattleman who is gunned down in a crooked card game. He goes on the prod seeking revenge on his arch-enemy, Laredo Stevens, played by "Wayne Stock Company" regular, Bruce Cabot.
Wounded, and racing to get to the telegraph office before it closes, Evans' horse plays out and collapses in a farmer's field. The farmer calls his daughter to bring the wagon and when she pulls the two-horse team to a stop, coming to her feet in the process, the camera pans up into the face of the lovely angel, Penelope, and the audience is introduced to a relatively new and unknown actress, Gail Russell.
Wayne often gave young, upcoming stars roles in his movies to help their careers along. Ella Raines, Harry Carey, Jr., Ben Johnson, Ken Curtis and James Arness, all benefited from his generosity, along with Gail Russell with whom he would make a second movie, Wake of the Red Witch, a year later. Russell was a tragically delicate personality who turned to drink and died of alcoholism at the age of 36. Also appearing in the picture in his very last movie role is Wayne's childhood cowboy hero from the silent era, Harry Carey, Sr., as Marshall Wistful McClintock.
The movie was filmed near Sedona, Arizona, and although it is in black and white, there are some very beautiful backdrops to the scenes. Comic relief is added by an outlaw friend of Quirt Evans, who reads a Bible the Quakers had given Evans and asks his not-yet-religious buddy questions about what it means.
In the finale the marshall gets the bad guys, Quirt takes Penny in his arms, and as they ride home to the ranch on the back of the wagon, he leaves his gun behind indicating his redemption and transformation of character. It's a terrific cowboy story, a lot of fun, and actually, the movie that made me a fan of John Wayne.
3. Hatari
Hatari is a Swahili word meaning "danger." The title suggests from the very outset what kind of real life situations the characters are going to get into. The story is about a close-knit band of men and their young, female boss, Brandy, who capture wild animals for zoos. They do their capturing the old fashioned way with ropes and brute strength. Filmed in the East African country of Tanganyika (now Tanzania) it takes us back to a simpler day when stout-hearted men put their lives on the line for the sheer joy of doing their jobs. No anesthetic darts for this crew!
John Wayne is Sean Mercer, leader of an international team that gets together every year for the "hunting" season. German actor Hardy Kruger plays Kurt Muller, a Formula One racer who drives the herding car. Red Buttons is Pockets, a Brooklyn cab driver afraid of animals even though he's chasing them in the catching car, while Valentin de Vargas plays a former bullfighter who is not afraid to get on the ground to throw a loop under the feet of a charging rhino. The story is complicated by the arrival of Dallas, a photographer played by Elsa Martinelli.
Loosely plotted and scripted as the filming went on, the story line is still successful. It is all the more appealing because the actors did all of their own stunt work. What you see is genuine. The actors did it all. Three orphaned baby elephants enter the picture and become the catalyst for bringing together hard as nails Sean and the deliciously seductive Dallas. A subplot love interest also develops between Brandy and Pockets while he blows the roof off a barn with a homemade rocket.
With their headquarters located at the base of Mt. Meru, the fifth highest mountain on the African continent, the crew traveled through some of Africa's breath-taking scenery in Manyara and the Ngorongoro crater looking for animals to fill their orders. The last order to fill is the angry rhino, one of which has already gored Little Wolf, an American Indian played by Bruce Cabot. With the hunting season over the three baby elephants chase Dallas around the town of Arusha finally cornering her in the Safari Hotel. When the first elephant catches her scent she is in a corner store called Singh's at the main roundabout in town. Singh's is still there, although under a different name, the original owners having moved back to India years ago. The headquarters for their operation is also still there, now known as the Hatari Lodge, and is open for tourists.
Henry Mancini composed a magnificent musical score capturing the mystery and the essence of the African bush. He gave us the delightful "Baby Elephant Walk" and won an Oscar nomination for his work. The movie is lengthy, around two and a half hours, but full of excitement, comedy, and a look at African culture. It is even more appealing to me now that I am living in Kenya and have been to Arusha.
4. Donovan's Reef
A south sea island paradise, an annual December 7th birthday brawl, and a very wealthy Boston socialite daughter looking for her father, missing for over twenty years sets the stage for this comedic Christmastime story. Michael Donovan, played by John Wayne, found a home on the fictional island of Haleakaloha in French Polynesia after hiding there in the jungles from the Japanese when his ship was sunk during World War II. Along with his commanding officer, Doctor William Dedham, played by Jack Warden, he has made a comfortable life for himself with a fleet of sail boats that plow the waves to nearby islands. Doc Dedham had married the island's princess after the war and had three children by her before she died.
Enter Thomas Aloysius Gilhooley, Lee Marvin, as Donovan's drinking buddy who shares his birthday of December 7. Gilhooley makes it a point every year of coming to Haleakaloha just to get in a fight with Donovan, a feud that started at Pearl Harbor in 1941. To further complicate the matters, Dedham's very proper daughter, Amelia, played by Elizabeth Allen, comes to the islands from Boston to find proof that her father is a philandering scoundrel so she can deny him any claim to the Dedham family shipping fortune.
In order to save the Doc, Donovan and Gilhooley, with the help of the island's governor, the Marquis Andre de Lage, played by Caesar Romero, hatch a plan to move the children to Donovan's place and pretend they are his. Amelia finds the situation appalling when she learns Donovan's home is over a bar that he owns named Donovan's Reef. What follows is a comical romp around the islands that includes a barroom brawl, two contenders, Donovan and de Lage, for Amelia's affections, and a Christmas pagent at the local parish church that gets rained out. Finally Amelia figures out the truth, forgives her father and embraces her half-sisters and brother, but it takes a spanking from Michael Donovan before he kisses her that makes her realize she really loves him.
A subplot love interest develops between Gilhooley and the island's washed up, but best all around talent, barroom singer, Miss Lafleur, played by former Hope and Crosby road movie girl, Dorothy Lamour. Amelia is still concerned about her prospective husband being a bar owner until she learns that Donovan has given the bar to Gilhooley as a wedding present.
Filmed on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, director John Ford used the beautiful jungle scenery as well as the ocean and beaches for backgrounds. The musical score was composed around the song Pearly Shells, a theme which fits right into the setting. The movie was the last Ford - Wayne collaboration, a partnership that had begun twenty-three years earlier and produced some of the best movies ever made. Donovan's Reef is a different twist for a Christmas story, but it is very satisfying and a sheer pleasure to watch.
5. The Quiet Man
The Quiet Man is a nostalgia piece. It was John Ford going back to his homeland, Ireland, where he was born in 1895, rediscovering the emerald isle, and in doing so retelling the Shakespeare tale, The Taming of the Shrew. The story goes back to a more relaxed time when cars were few, horse drawn carts were common, and a chaperone required for any serious courtship. Green fields and narrow lanes lined with stone walls provide the sentimental backdrop for a story narrated by the local priest, Father Peter Lonergan, played by Ward Bond.
Into this pristine setting comes Sean Thornton, played by John Wayne. Thornton was born in a little cottage in the countryside and lived there as a lad until his family moved to Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. He had become a boxer but in his last fight he had killed his opponent. Now haunted by the memory of what he had done he has returned home to the little village of Innisfree intent on buying the cottage that had been his childhood home.
Riding across the countryside in a horse drawn cab, he stops to view the scenery and down the hill sees a vision of loveliness that he can hardly believe. It is auburn-haired Mary Kate Danaher, Maureen O'Hara, running barefoot through the field herding a flock of sheep. She sees him too and casts a lingering glance and the plot is fixed. Sean Thornton has eyes for Mary Kate. It will not be a smooth courtship, however, as Mary Kate's brother, Squire Red Will Danaher, played by Victor McLaglen, wants to buy the same cottage that Thornton does and refuses to allow him to see his sister.
The development of the movie is about Sean and Mary Kate getting together. Two stronger characters in love with each other may have never been seen on the silver screen. Sean, caring only about a peaceful life, and Mary Kate, obsessively materialistic, don't seem to stand a chance until they sneak away from their chaperone. Then when they get caught in a rain storm and seek shelter in the ruins of an old stone building the sparks fly. But the struggle isn't over yet.
When they finally marry, Will Danaher refuses to give Mary Kate her dowry, and Mary Kate refuses her marriage bed until she gets it and runs away. Sean catches her at the train station, drags her home to her brother demanding the dowry. Mary Kate finally realizes Sean's love is genuine and as she goes home to prepare his supper, the greatest two fisted, rock 'em sock 'em brawl ever seen in a movie erupts. Starting at a furnace on a hillside, Sean and Will beat each other senseless down the hill, through the woods, across streams, and into town. A crowd following them and getting larger as they go, escorts them to the local tavern where everybody stops for a drink, and then the fight continues. In the end all is resolved, and Sean and Will become friends.
Duke and Maureen O'Hara would eventually make five movies together and the chemistry between them was magic in every one, but in The Quiet Man their passion is so intense you can almost feel it. Those who think John Wayne was not a romantic lead need to watch this movie. This is the greatest love story ever put on film.
6. Sands of Iwo Jima
A memorial to all Marines who fought in World War II, Sands of Iwo Jima follows Sgt. Stryker, John Wayne, and his squad across the Pacific to the bloodiest battle in Marine Corps history. Over 6,800 Marines died and 25,000 were casualties on this rock hard volcano island 600 miles east of Okinawa. The battle was the Marine Corps' greatest victory and the movie pays homage to them all.
Stryker is a hard luck Marine with family problems back home and a tendency to drown his sorrows in a bottle. Busted several times, he never seems to be able to get ahead, but he's tough as nails and the perfect choice to train a squad of Marines and lead them into battle. Privately he's a loner who doesn't socialize. Professionally he's a slave driver pushing his men to get prepared for war, earning their hatred and their respect.
Wayne's performance is riveting as he portrays the deeply troubled, yet deeply caring and devoted Sgt. Stryker. He keeps a tight rein on his men once they land in order to keep them alive. At night when Japanese soldiers call out in English for a medic and one Marine wants to disobey Stryker's orders not to go help, fire flashes in his eyes as he threatens to shoot the Marine if he leaves the foxhole. A moment later you see the anguish on his face and a tear in his eye as he listens to the lonely voices in the night. The range of emotions and the powerful performance as a solid leader of Marines earned Duke his first Oscar nomination.
The Marines take Mt. Suribachi and as they sit down to take a break Stryker is killed by a sniper just before the famous flag raising on the mountain top. The picture taken of that event is the most reproduced picture in the history of photography. It electrified the home front and has caused a patriotic stir in the hearts of millions ever since. Three of the Marines in the picture, squad leader Sgt. Mike Strank, Cpl. Harlan Block, and PFC Franklin Sousley would lose their lives on Iwo Jima before the battle was over. One has to wonder if the character of Sgt. Stryker wasn't modeled after Sgt. Strank, a dedicated Marine who, on the eve of the Iwo campaign, turned down a promotion in order to take his Marines through the battle. The other three were sent back to the States on a war bond tour. In 1949 all three, Jack Bradley, Ira Hayes, and Rene Gagnon, were invited to make cameo appearances in the movie.
Sands of Iwo Jima ends with the new squad leader saying, "Saddle up, let's get back into the war." As the squad moves out the Marine Hymn begins to play in the background and crescendos into the end credits. It is a movie to make every Marine, of which I am a former one, proud.
7. Rio Grande
The third of John Ford's "Trilogy" about the Old West (Fort Apache and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon), Rio Grande is singularly significant for pairing John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara together for the first time. Wayne is Lt. Col. Kirby York, a northerner married to Kathleen York, O'Hara, a southern aristocrat who grew up on a plantation mansion in the Shenandoah Valley. During the war York is forced to burn his wife's mansion, which caused her to leave him. Sgt. Quincannon, played by Victor McLaglen, led the party that lit the fires and feigns sorrow at having done the deed when he sees Kathleen.
Fifteen years have passed since the mansion was torched and a young trooper, Jeff York, played by Claude Jarman, Jr., is assigned to York's command on the western frontier. Col. York hasn't seen his son since he was an infant and the relationship is strained. The situation is further complicated when Trooper York's mother arrives to take him home because he is underage. Wanting to prove himself to his father young York refuses to go.
Kathleen's presence unnerves her normally firm and in control husband, and when Quincannon arranges for a musical serenade at dinner he is totally dumbfounded. The Sons of the Pioneers led by Ken Curtis sing a love song that ends with a repeated fading line, "Hope she's gonna stay." York, fidgeting like a young man unsure of his sweetheart's feelings, and not wanting to appear too forward tells Kathleen, "The music was not of my choosing." O'Hara completely steals the scene when, looking coy, she replies, "I'm sorry. I wished that it had been." York rolls his eyes knowing he's really blown a great opportunity to impress the woman he still loves.
Shot in black and white, the film is typical of John Ford's masterful lighting sequences. When captive Indians start chanting in the night the tension builds until out of the shadows their fellow braves attack. The Indians take women and children hostage and while Col. York leads the regiment to their rescue, his son volunteers for a dangerous mission earning his father's respect. Col. York is wounded in the ensuing battle but when the column comes home Kathleen runs to meet her husband and the family is happily reunited.
The interaction between these two strong personalities is a portend of what will follow in future movies. Neither is a typically ego-centric movie neophyte worried about image and control. Wayne and O'Hara play off each other as well as any two ever did on film, unselfishly giving the upper hand to the other whenever the scene requires it. They became life-long friends and it was O'Hara, along with Elizabeth Taylor, that petitioned Congress to strike a gold medal for Duke that said, "John Wayne, American." The medal was approved only weeks before he died. They were a magical movie couple and it's only too bad they didn't make more than five movies together.
8. Eldorado
The title invokes the mythical charm of the fabled cities of gold in this yarn about two of the four fastest gunfighters in the West (one is dead) caught up in the middle of a range war. John Wayne is Cole Thornton, hired by rancher Bart Jason to kill his erstwhile friend, fast gun turned lawman, J.P. Harrah, played by Robert Mitchum, who is now the sheriff of Eldorado. Jason is trying to steal water rights from a rival rancher named MacDonald.
After some playful sparring about friendship and trust with Harrah, Thornton decides not to take the job. Riding a splendid appaloosa he returns the money Jason had already sent and in a deft display of horsemanship backs his steed passed a line of hostile gunmen proving that John Wayne really did know how to handle a horse.
Thornton rides to the MacDonald place to tell them he's not taking the job, but MacDonald, fearing that he's coming for a shootout, leaves his young son hidden on the trail to warn them of Thornton's coming. In a moment of panic the boy shoots at Thornton who shoots back in defense. He takes the boy's body back to MacDonald to explain, but MacDonald's daughter, Joey, played by Michele Carey, doesn't believe the story and rides off to wait. She ambushes Thornton putting a bullet in his side, but he survives.
Thornton leaves Eldorado with the bullet lodged close to his spine which sometimes causes him to go numb. Enter James Caan as Allan Padillion Trahern, otherwise known as Mississippi, a man who wears a top hat and can't shoot straight, but gets the job done with a knife. He joins a reluctant Cole Thornton and together they ride back to Eldorado to help Harrah who is now on an endless drunk over a girl.
By this time Jason has hired the third fastest gun, Nels McCloud, played by Christopher George, leading to a showdown between a cripple, a drunk, and a man who can't shoot on one side, and McCloud and his gang of hired killers on the other. Throw in Arthur Hunnicutt as bugle blowing Bull Harris for comic relief, and Charlene Holt as Maudie, a saloon girl half Thornton's age but who is in love with him anyway, and he secretly with her, and you have the formula for an action packed western drama. A lot of fun to watch.
9. Big Jake
John Wayne is Jacob McCandles, an aging gunfighter with a huge cattle ranch, large house, barn, bunkhouse and outbuildings, and a beautiful wife, Martha, played by Maureen O'Hara, but sedentary life is not to his liking and he's wandered the Old West separated from his family for ten years. In 1909, a gang of cutthroats led by John Fain, Richard Boone, raids the huge McCandles ranch and kidnaps Jacob's grandson, Little Jake McCandles, played by John Wayne's real life youngest son, Ethan. Several ranch hands are killed and Jeff McCandles, Little Jake's father is wounded. Martha takes responsibility for his recovery and wills him to live as only one played by Maureen O'Hara could do. She sends for Big Jake.
Big Jake enters the story watching some cattlemen about to lynch a sheepherder. He decides to stay out of it until the leader of the mob kicks the sheepherder's boy and knocks him to the ground. McCandles, in a move of sheer bravado, rides into the scene, buys the sheep for a reduced price and sets the sheep man free. The lynch mob are ready to take him on until they learn his name and the leader makes a comment that will recur throughout the movie. "I thought you was dead," he said. "Not hardly," Big Jake answers.
McCandles arrives at the train station to join a posse that includes two more of his grown sons, James, played by his second oldest son, Patrick Wayne, and Michael, played by Robert Mitchum's son, Christopher. Michael arrives on a motorcycle scaring Jake's horse and landing him in a mud puddle. James, bitter over his missing father's long absence, sasses Jake until he throws him into the puddle. Jake decides not to go with the posse of Texas Rangers riding in automobiles, but sends for his Indian friend, Sam Sharpnose, played by Bruce Cabot, and takes his dog to help track the kidnappers.
They take two extra horses along and when the posse is ambushed and Michael's motorcycle wrecked, the boys join Jake and Sam and track the gang into Mexico with a large red trunk filled with one million dollars on the back of a mule. They finally reach the designated meeting place, but have to fend off would be thieves before one of the gang members comes to escort them to the exchange. When two men break into their hotel room a shotgun blast blows open the red trunk to reveal nothing but paper. Jake explains to his boys that it's the way their mother wanted it. They aren't going to pay people who have killed their workers and friends and wounded their son.
The payoff takes place in the courtyard of an old abandoned mission. When Little Jake is brought out Big Jake sees his grandson for the first time and the look in his eye causes John Fain some consternation. He warns that a rifle is trained on Little Jake. The shoe is on the other foot when Fain opens the trunk, finds the deception, and then sees Big Jake's shotgun trained on him. After a few moments of tense standoff a gun battle erupts and the dog knocks Little Jake off his horse saving his life. In the end the bad guys are all dead, but so is Sam and the dog. The boys, however, are reconciled to their father and grandfather and ready to go home.
Big Jake was John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara's last movie together. Unfortunately she was only in the first part of the film, but the old magic is still there. When Big Jake arrives, even though he's been gone for years and she speaks sharply to him, she looks admiringly at him and tells the Rangers she'd rather have him be in charge, even though her sons go with the Rangers. It's a terrific conclusion to their movie collaborations, and just as their previous four pairings, they leave you wanting more.
10. True Grit
This film will long be remembered as the performance that earned Duke Wayne his only Oscar after over forty years in Hollywood. Not that he didn't deserve more. He won a well deserved nomination for Sands of Iwo Jima, but he should have been nominated for The Quiet Man, and could easily have been considered for Red River, Island in the Sky, North to Alaska or McClintock, and he should have won hands down for The Searchers. The problem was he was a political conservative American patriot in a left-leaning business that didn't appreciate his views.
As a result critics often say that his victory for True Grit was just the Academy making up for overlooking him all those years. Maybe so, but Wayne's portrayal of Rooster Cogburn was still a super performance. He blended the hard-nosed stubborn toughness of a frontier lawman with a mixture of light-hearted comedy and drama and created a character to everyone's liking.
Rooster Cogburn is an Oklahoma territorial marshall tracking down wanted criminals in the Indian territory. Kim Darby plays Mattie Ross, the teenage daughter of a man killed by Tom Cheney who has escaped into Oklahoma. Very persistent and irritating, Mattie Ross talks Rooster into looking for Cheney, but then insists on going along.
Glen Campbell shows up as a Texas Ranger named La Boeuf, who is also looking for Cheney. Together Rooster and "La Beef," as Rooster calls him, try to outrun young Mattie on horseback but she proves to be resourceful and keeps up with them. On the trail, Rooster, half drunk from drinking in the saddle falls off his horse. When he can't get back to his feet he decides to make camp right there.
They finally camp across a ravine from Tom Cheney and a gang he has joined led by Lucky Ned Pepper, Robert Duvall. Mattie is captured and while La Beef sneaks around to rescue her from Cheney, Rooster meets Pepper and three others in a wide meadow. Putting his reins in his mouth, he charges with a pistol in one hand and a short-barreled rifle in the other. He cocks the rifle by swinging it under his arm as he rides and shoots up all four riders but his horse is shot under him and falls pinning him down. Ned Pepper, sorely wounded comes back for a final shot. La Beef then makes one of the longest shots possibly ever taken with a Sharps .54 and knocks Pepper off his horse.
Cheney hits La Beef over the head with a rock before he is killed and Mattie falls into a pit with rattlesnakes and is bitten. Rooster rescues her and takes off running her horse to death, then "borrowing" a wagon to get her to a doctor in time. The movie finishes at Mattie Ross's family cemetery where she hopes Rooster will lie beside her someday. But Rooster isn't ready just yet and proves his strength by jumping his new horse over a four-rail fence.
It's a great story, filmed in Colorado with some gorgeous scenery. Kim Darby's performance seemed a little stiff, but that seems to have been in keeping with her character. It was one of Glen Campbell's first movies, if not the first, and proved that he was a much better singer than actor. John Wayne was funny, serious, wise guy, tough guy, and well deserving of his Oscar.
11. Stagecoach
An interesting tale developing several contradictory characters (a gambler who becomes noble, an uppity socialite who becomes humble, a prostitute who becomes motherly, a drunken doctor who sobers up just in time, a banker who robs his own bank, an outlaw who is the good guy), this is the film that put John Wayne on the Hollywood map. Wayne had labored for a decade in B westerns and low budget films until John Ford finally found the script he wanted to make him a star. The producers were unsure of Ford's choice playing against such established actors as Claire Trevor, John Carradine, Andy Divine and Thomas Mitchell, who would win a best supporting Oscar for his role. Ford prevailed and Wayne rose from the obscurity of a Saturday matinee idol to a major A level star.
The story begins with the stage about to leave Tonto, Arizona for Lordsburg in New Mexico. The passengers gather, Donald Meek as a meek mannered whiskey drummer, Doc Boone, Mitchell, who drinks the drummer's supply, Dallas, Trevor, a prostitute being run out of town, Louise Platt, as an expectant Mrs. Mallory who needs to get to the cavalry post at Lordsburg to meet her wounded husband, and Hatfield, Carradine, a southern gambler, who is actually a thief, who volunteers his services for the protection of Mrs. Mallory.
The banker, who has just embezzled his bank for 50,000 dollars joins the stage at the edge of town, and Buck, Andy Devine, heads down the stage road with the sheriff on board as his shotgun rider. A cavalry escort takes them part way but when a relief column fails to appear the escort turns back. On the way the stage comes across the Ringo Kid, just escaped from jail and the sheriff arrests him and takes him on board.
Wayne makes his appearance firing a shot in the air to stop the stage. The camera zooms into his face to see the Kid's reaction when he realizes the sheriff is in the driver's box. The look in his eyes tells it all. John Wayne has arrived. He comes along peacefully telling the sheriff, "You may need me and this winchester, Curly." There is Indian sign about as the Apaches have gone on the warpath.
At an abandoned way station the drunken doctor is sobered up to help Mrs. Mallory give birth, but it is Dallas that carries the baby into the main room to show everybody. She meets the Kid's eyes, and he falls in love with her, and while she is shunned by Hatfield and Mrs. Mallory, Ringo proposes to her.
Indians catch up with them and the stage makes a mad dash across the flats with the Kid on the roof picking them off with his rifle. Hatfield is killed just when it looks hopeless, but then the cavalry arrives on the scene to rescue the stage. Ringo goes into town and faces down Luke Plummer and his two brothers who had murdered his father and brother. Then he gives himself up to Curly who allows him and Dallas to escape to his ranch across the border.
Ford's mastery of lighting in black and white is obvious when the Plummer boys come around the corner on the main street in town, their long shadows growing against a livery stable wall. Yakima Canutt does the stunt work and introduces a new technique he had invented, dropping between the harnesses of the horses and sliding under the stagecoach as it passes over him. All in all it's an enjoyable film and deserving of being the venue for John Wayne's launch to stardom.
12. The Big Trail
This is the movie that should have launched the Duke into stardom, but instead assured his Hollywood obscurity for the next nine years. It was filmed using a new technique called Fox Grandeur, a 70 millimeter widescreen format which only a few luxury theaters could play. Released in 1930 just as the country went into the Great Depression few theaters were willing to spend the money needed for the upgrade. Consequently not enough people saw the movie and its failure at the box office was unfairly blamed on its star.
The Big Trail was a monumental undertaking telling a story about crossing the Far West on the Oregon Trail. Conestoga wagons were built, hundreds of extras were used, and the movie was shot on location across the western plains and the Sierra Nevada mountains. Every effort was made to make it as authentic as possible, even lowering wagons over a cliff with ropes.
Duke Morrison, as he was known then, had gained the attention of several directors by his size and presence on the screen as an extra. He had little training in acting and the small roles he had played previously were not enough to have yet developed his skills, but director Raoul Walsh decided he could be a star and wanting to give him a chance, cast him in the lead for this film. His name, though, was a problem. Walsh was a history buff and one character he had admired was the Revolutionary War general, Mad Anthony Wayne. He thought Wayne was a tough last name. John was a solid and popular first name and the two went together well, so John Wayne was born. Wayne's friends, however, still called him Duke.
Duke is Breck Coleman, scout for the wagon train, looking for the murderers of a friend of his. Tyrone Power, Sr. is the wagon master, Red Flack. He's also the man Coleman is looking for. Marguerite Churchill is Ruth Cameron, a single woman on the train, who has Flack's attention as well as Coleman's. Flack tries several times along the trail to have Coleman bushwhacked, but when they reach Oregon the evidence is all uncovered and Coleman chases Flack through a winter wilderness and gets his revenge. On his return Ruth runs out to meet him in a redwood forest and all is well.
Dialogue in early talkies was often more melodramatic than real. Many of the actors had been stage performers and the new medium required different techniques that had not always been perfected yet. A voice coach wanted Wayne to sweep his lines with a broad dramatic flair, but Duke decided to just talk normal. It worked. He was natural in the role and regardless of the movie's lack of success, it should have served notice of the potential of a new up and coming star. Unfortunately nobody noticed it, nobody that is, except for John Ford. For whatever reasons, maybe to give Duke some seasoning or the time to develop his own method, Ford let him wallow for years in low budget movies until he felt the time was right. Then he made him a star.
13. Tall in the Saddle
Take a feisty old stage driver who has a "despise" for women, a murdered rancher, a widowed step-father who is trying to steal the land of his step-children, a manipulative guardian who sees an opportunity to do the same, and a crooked judge who is willing to help and you have the recipe for an action-packed western mystery. Into the fray comes John Wayne as Rocklin, the nephew of the murdered Red Cardell, and the rightful heir to his land.
Rocklin steps off the train and meets up with the half drunk stage driver, Dave, played by Gabby Hayes. Dave is on his last stage run because he's being fired. When he chews out one of his horses for knocking a bottle out of his hand, Rocklin tells the stage office clerk he "never feel(s) sorry for anything that happens to a woman," and Dave immediately finds a kindred spirit. Before George Hayes became "Gabby," he teamed up with Duke in many B westerns and then became Roy Rogers' sidekick in many of his films. This was the last movie he and Wayne would make together.
Rocklin helps Dave drive the stage to Santa Inez with Miss Martin, the guardian, and Clara Cardell, played by Audrey Long, who turns out to be his distant cousin, riding inside. The crooked sheriff and his deputy, Bob Clews, played by Paul Fix, another Wayne Stock Company regular, try to roust the way station manager and lay Dave out with a pistol across the brow. In Santa Inez Rocklin faces down young Clint Harolday who draws on him in a card game, then boldly ignores his sister Arly, played by Ella Raines, while she shoots at him from point-blank range. When Rocklin gets to the bar he needs a drink, but when Bob Clews comes in he shoves him to the floor stomping on his gun hand. The barkeep sets up the house and when Rocklin leaves Dave says, "Boy, oh boy, has somebody come to town."
Somebody has indeed. Rocklin, called out to a gun-fight, lays Bob Clews' brother, George, out cold in the street, gets framed for the shooting of Clint Harolday, has a knock-down-drag-out fight with Judge Garvey, Ward Bond, solves the murder of Red Cardell, proves he's the rightful heir to Cardell's property, brings the perpetrators to justice and gets the girl that wanted to shoot him in the beginning.
Even in black and white the scenery near Sedona, Arizona, where the movie was made, is stunning, setting the perfect background to an enjoyable story. Gabby Hayes provides some welcome comic relief, and newcomer, Ella Raines, holds her own as a tough-minded, high spirited girl who, in the end, succumbs to Rocklin's charms. All in all a delightful film to watch, and the very first VHS tape of John Wayne that I ever owned. I eventually collected 80 of them.
14. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
Like The Searchers, this movie is a period piece that would be good viewing for children learning about the westward expansion of the United States. It is based on events that happened in the fictional little town of Shinbone way out on the frontier when the territory was debating statehood. The story includes a one-room schoolhouse, lessons on the Constitution, an example of a local caucus to elect delegates to the territorial convention in the capitol city, and the convention itself. Along the way it deals with post-Civil War racist attitudes as well. It's a great history lesson.
There is a conflict between those who want statehood as they settle the territory, and the cattlemen from "north of the picket wire," who oppose statehood and want the open ranges to stay open. The most notorious of them all is an outlaw named Liberty Valance, played by Lee Marvin. Valance and his gang members, played by Strother Martin and Lee Van Cleef, terrorize the locals in Shinbone and warn them against voting for statehood. Into the mix comes Jimmy Stewart as Ransom Stoddard, a young attorney looking for a place to hang his shingle.
The movie opens with Stoddard and his wife, Hallie, played by Vera Miles, returning to Shinbone for the funeral of Tom Doniphon, John Wayne. By this time Stoddard has been territorial delegate, governor, ambassador to England, and now senator. The local newspaper editor wants to know what is so special about this funeral that he would come all the way from Washington to attend it. Stoddard begins to reminisce.
The story begins with Rance, as he is called, coming west on a stage that is held up by Liberty Valance and his gang. When Stoddard stands up to them Valance nearly beats him to death. The stage is run off and Tom Doniphon finds him and brings him to the back room of the local restaurant where he is nursed back to health by an illiterate young woman named Hallie, who is working as a waitress. A subplot develops as Hallie falls in love with Rance, which brings on an additional conflict because Hallie is Tom Doniphon's girl. Doniphon is a tough as nails horse trader who runs his herds north of the picket wire, but stays on the right side of the law as he builds a home for Hallie on the south side. He lets Stoddard know that Valance is the toughest man in the territory "next to me."
Stoddard is a greenhorn, unaccustomed to the ways or thinking of westerners, flat broke after the robbery, and working as a dishwasher when Liberty and his gang show up at the restaurant and one of the great movie standoffs of all time takes place. Valance trips Stoddard as he brings a steak to Doniphon, but while the gang hoots and mocks, Doniphon stands up and with a look of pure hatred says, "That was my steak, Vallance. Pick it up." They stare each other down until Rance intervenes to keep the peace.
Rance wants law and order rather than gun play but when the community elects him to be their delegate to the territorial convention Liberty challenges him to a gunfight. After Liberty burns down the newspaper office and beats the drunken editor, Dutton Peabody, played by Edmund O'Brien, Rance decides to go through with it. They face off in the street and Liberty plays with him, wounding him in the arm. When he's had enough he aims the last shot "right between the eyes." Stoddard is no gun hand and has missed every shot he's taken, but the last shot hits Liberty right in the heart. At the territorial convention Stoddard is nominated to be a delegate to Washington but is going to turn it down until Doniphon explains to him who really shot Liberty Valance.
Andy Devine gives the movie some light-hearted moments as the always hungry and cowardly Marshal Link Appleyard. Woody Strode plays Doniphon's loyal negro worker who rescues Tom when he burns his house down in a drunken stupor. John Qualen is the Norwegian owner of the restaurant, complete with accent and old world values, with Jeanette Nolan as his wife. John Ford directed the movie in black and white in order to save cost, and most of it was filmed in a sound studio, but it is a typical Ford masterpiece, maybe one of the best movies ever made in doors.
Stoddard finishes telling his tale and the editor throws his notes into the fire saying, "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." The movie closes with Rance and Hallie on the train heading back to Washington. The conductor tells them the train will make twenty-five miles per hour and sets a brand new shiny spittoon next to their seat. "Nothing's too good for the man who shot Liberty Valance," he says.
15. McLintock!
George Washington McLintock is the biggest man in the Oklahoma territory. He has the largest ranch, including a mine and a lumber mill, all of which he built from the ground up after fighting Indians to settle the land. He was happy and content until his wife, Kathryn, left him two years earlier without explanation and he's been lonely and miserable ever since.
John Wayne is G.W. McLintock and Maureen O'Hara, Kathryn, in this turn of the last century version of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew. Chill Wills is G.W.'s right hand man, Drago, who keeps the ranch operations and the house running smoothly while "Katie" is away. He has hired a widow, Mrs. Warren, played by Yvonne De Carlo, to do the cooking around the house. Next G.W.'s daughter, Becky, Stefanie Powers, comes home from boarding school, and Kathryn comes home from the capitol to take custody of Becky and get a divorce from G.W. When Kathryn discovers a drunken Mrs. Warren in an equally drunken G.W.'s arms after they fall down the stairs at the ranch house, the stage is set for some real fireworks at McLintock's annual Fourth of July picnic.
What follows is a comedic romp with serious political overtones, as well as moralizing about the greatness of America. That America was built by hard work and sacrifice is made clear when G.W. tells Mrs. Warren's son, Dev, Patrick Wayne, that he doesn't give jobs, he "hires men." He explains his love of country when he tells Becky that in his will he is giving most of his land to the government for a park so the trees won't be cut down, and will give her just enough to survive so she'll learn how to appreciate things. There is a political stab at one of the most liberal politicians in the country, Hubert H. Humphrey, through the character of the territorial governor, Cuthbert H. Humphrey, a thick-headed, longwinded, vain man who thinks he's stolen Kathryn away from G.W.
The Indians, once his feared enemies, have in peacetime become G.W.'s best friends and when he saves an old chief from a lynching, what follows is one of the funnest, as well as funniest brawls in western movie history. G.W. knocks the leader of the lynch mob down a muddy slope into a mud hole at the bottom of the mine, and starts a fight that eventually has everyone, including Kathryn down at the bottom in the sludge. A romantic interest develops between Dev and Becky, but she plays a tease stringing along Matt Douglas, Jr, played by Jerry Van Dyke, who adds some comic relief to an already funny movie. Dev won't stand for it and when they argue, Becky demands her father shoot him, and he does, but only with a starter pistol.
Due to the ineptness of the local Indian agent, Agard, played by Strother Martin, the Indians raid the town right in the middle of the July 4th celebration. Just when everyone fears a new Indian war, the real battle begins. G.W. has had all he can take from Katie and chases her through the town. When her skirt rips off, Katie continues running while everyone in town follows the action. She finally falls from a ladder into a water trough and G.W. gives her a good paddling with a coal shovel. With Katie subdued they head home and all is right with the world.
This is John Wayne's best attempt at comedy and it is good. He and Maureen O'Hara are once again wonderful together. A whole lot of fun to watch.
