BS: Movie lovers- Westerns

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Don Firth
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 07:36 PM

Absolutely "Quigley Down Under."

I fell madly in love with Crazy Cora. When Quigley is beaten to within an inch of his life and left to die out in the desert, Crazy Cora finds him and says, "Don't worry, on a new job it's quite common for things not to go well at first."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,Terp
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 07:39 PM

Hombre and One Eyed Jacks are probably my two favorites with Lonesome Dove (the first series with Duvall and TL Jones) and Silverado a not too distant second.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: pdq
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 07:57 PM

"The Hanging Tree" had some early work by George C. Scott, whom I also think of at the same time as Lee J. Cobb.

The theme song is sung by Marty Robbins.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns TONITE NOW on TCM
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 08:27 PM

As I write Turner Classic Movies is showing Santa Fe w/ Randolph Scott.
Then they are showing The Long Riders; then (a favorite of mine) Colorado Territory, which is a western remake of High Sierra starring Joel McCrea. Jack, you couldn't have started this threads more fortuitously.
Please forgive my adding to your thread title, but I wanted to emphasize that this is now.
JotSC

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: catspaw49
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 08:32 PM

Its amazing how many of these I've seen...........Here's a few more that I haven't seen listed yet:

The Cheyenne Social Club---Far from the classic or authentic types but just a fun movie. Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda, two old friends together again.
Broken Lance---Spencer Tracy, Richard Widmark, Katy Jurado, and a good plot.
Bad Day at Black Rock---a modern western tale with Spencer Tracy and one helluva' supporting cast!
Winchester '73---Perhaps the definitive Jimmy Stewart Western; no list is complete without it.


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,meself
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 08:43 PM

Nobody's mentioned 'Nevada Smith". If you saw it on a big screen at an impressionable age, you never forgot it.

Also worthy of mention: "Tom Horne".

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 09:15 PM

Brokeback Mountain? (I didn't see it; heard it sucked.)

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Don Firth
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 09:36 PM

Whoa!

"The Ox Bow Incident" (1943), starring Henry Fonda, Dana Andrews, Anthony Quinn.

Heavy!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: kendall
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 09:41 PM

No one has mentioned "A bride comes to Yellow Sky" Robert Prston.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 10:51 PM

I also liked Silverado. Good movie.

One I enjoyed as a kid, but it would probably seem rather dated now, was "Night of the Grizzly" with Clint Walker.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 11:00 PM

You mentioned Brokeback Mountain, Rapaire. I wouldn't say it "sucked" at all. I'd say it was a very intelligently scripted and well-acted and convincing film. Everyone in it acted very well. Be that as it may, it wouldn't rank as any kind of favorite of mine or one I wish to see again, because I simply can't relate much to a serious film like that about two men having a sexual relationship. I don't object to it, I just can't empathize with it, that's all. If it was two women having such a relationship I could relate to it fine, but two men having a passionate physical relationship just does not compute in my brain for some reason...it's a little like watching two trucks having a sexual relationship, sort of. I go blank. I just don't personally get it. I can't imagine being there.

But I will say this. The acting was great. The script was great. The characterizations were great. It was a very well done movie. And as a story of a genuine (and tortured) love affair between two people over many years? Convincing.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 11:01 PM

No mention of the Sheepman starring Glenn Ford and Shirley MacLaine.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 11:04 PM

"Brokeback Mountain" ... music score was good.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 11:29 PM

Heh! ;-) For me, Number 6, everything in that movie was darned good except for that one little problem....I can't relate to men getting sexually turned on by other men. I certainly CAN relate to men loving one another deeply for their whole lives, dying for one another, etc...it just doesn't work for me on a sexual level.

"Through these fields of destruction
Baptisms of fire
I have witnessed your suffering
As the battle raged higher
And though it hurt me so bad then
In the fear and alarm
You did not desert me, my brothers in arms."

Yes, a love like that between men I can surely understand. Friends will die for friends.

I sometimes think that we human beings could love one another with less conflict and confusion if we didn't even have the sexual aspect playing its part in our lives. It seems to cause tremendous confusion in people, not to mention terrible jealousies and insecurities, and there are so many other ways to love a person deeply besides those that revolve primarily around the sex drive.

I'm simply theorizing, of course. The sexual aspect is an inescapable fact of life for anyone born in a physical body and past puberty. I remember how I loved people before I was old enough to be concerned about sex....and frankly, I think it was a better form of love then. It was less confused and conflicted in its nature, because it stemmed wholly from the heart. Sexual love stems partly form the heart, partly from the loins. That often leads to conflicts and misunderstandings.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 11:34 PM

I agree with ya 100% L.H. ... it was a damned good movie... with a damned good music score by Gustavo Santaolalla.

... biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 12:35 AM

Yeah, it's heavy, Don, but SO well done and such a lesson to be taught and learned.

Has anyone mentioned Legends of the Fall?

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 12:55 AM

Is Legends of the Fall a Western?

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: mrdux
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 01:08 AM

here's my ongoing list of q

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: mrdux
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 01:14 AM

that is, here's my ongoing list of twenty:

Destry Rides Again
Stagecoach
My Darling Clementine
Red River
The Cavalry Trilogy:
    Fort Apache
    She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
    Rio Grande
Winchester '73
The Searchers
The Magnificent Seven
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence
Ride the High Country
Cat Ballou
Once Upon a Time in the West
The Wild Bunch
Valdez is Coming
Little Big Man
The Outlaw Josie Wales
Silverado

most have already been mentioned, new additions being Rio Grande (the third and least known of John Ford's trilogy), Valdez is Coming (with a screenplay by Elmore Leonard), and Silverado. interestingly, seven of them are by John Ford, and seven feature John Wayne (who isn't a particular favorite of mine).

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 01:34 AM

Legends of the Fall is in some respects a western, Jack. It centers around a strongly traditional and rather patrician family who live on a ranch in the American West and who have numerous adventures there (as well as elsewhere). It features one or two Native American characters also. Yes, I'd say it's a western, but it's definitely not what you'd call a typical western. I'd call it sort of a Victorian melodrama, but one that takes place around an American family who live out west instead of an English family in Great Britain. It's at the cusp of the end of the world of the 1800s and the beginning of the 20th century and the horror of the First World War...the beginning of what we could call the "modern" world. In the modern world war became transformed by the machine. It became an exercise of mass mechanized armaments rather than the more formalized and bloody pageantry that had occurred in previous centuries, when formations of men in brightly colored uniforms faced off at very short range with muskets or made splendid cavalry charges across open ground.

It was the end of a great many romantic illusions and a plunge into something far deeper and colder that kills not just men's bodies, but perhaps something in their very souls. It was what gave birth to the writings of people like George Orwell and Aldous Huxley. It has bred despair in people.

That's what we're facing now. We have all been witnessing a gigantic fall from grace these last hundred years or so. We are now living in a world where many people believe in virtually nothing anymore...except material things, and momentary material advantages. Machines could live as well as that, but we are not machines.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 01:51 AM

The Left-Handed Gun with Paul Newman and John Dehner.

Not a movie, but I have the boxed set of all the 'Deadwood' episodes.
Pure brilliance!

And I agree with pretty much all the selections in everybody's posts.

Seamus (the closet Western buff)

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Slag
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 03:28 AM

I have to agree with much of what has already been said. However I would top my list with Eastwood's "The Unforgiven". Great movie, great realism and a nice contrast with the beginning of the fictionalization of the Old West and the reality of the brutality of the Old West. Second would have to be "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance." Two that haven't been mentioned but are a "must see" and #'s 3 and 4 in my list are the Lee Marvin version of "Monte Walsh" and Jason Robards' "The Ballad of Cable Hoag". Excellent films all.

I have to agree with the inclusion of "Cat Ballou" I laughed my self sick when I first saw that flick at the movie house. It was hilarious and Lee Marvin absolutely deserved the Oscar.

The question of John Wayne has recently been discussed (again!) in some other threads of late and it seems many folk either love him or hate him. I stated elsewhere that Wayne wasn't really an actor. He could only play himself. He was corny at times and his line delivery was, well, unique if nothing else, pilgrim. But there was just something about him that many folk loved. "Liberty Valance was probably his best western and he had some great immortal lines in that story. Well, done and well acted by all. Shane has to go in there around the 5 or 6 position. "Open Range" with Bob Duvall and Kevin Costner is a good story, well acted and believable. I only discovered "Silverado" a few years back and I was very impressed by the work as a whole and by Costner in particular. One of his finest efforts.

If you can find them get and watch "The Ballad of Cable Hoag" starring Jason Robards and I believe Connie Stevens. It is funny, sad poignant and it too has a ring of authenticity to it. Lee Marvin's "Monte Walsh" is head and shoulders above the Tom Selleck remake. The song in it is haunting: "Good Times Are Coming", I believe, is the title and the very last scene is worth the whole movie. It works on so many levels that you could call it "literature of the cinema".

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 03:57 AM

The ultimate "western movie spoof" - at least in close competition with Cat Ballou, has to be The Villain." (1979?)

Kirk Douglas plays Wile E Coyote to the hilt. Arnold Swarzeneger is "Handsome Stranger" (named after his father), wears the white hat and carries a seven-shooter, and Kirk's horse is as good as - but a little different than - the similar role in Cat Ballou. (Both horses should have won the oscars.)

Ann-Margret plays Ann-Margret, but does it very well.

Little Big Man is another slightly "different" one that I don't think has been mentioned. It's one that some like and some don't, and suffers from a few "disjunctions" in plot (assuming you accept that there is one), but is worth looking up, if not watching.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: fat B****rd
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 04:30 AM

And just for the sake of it, it's apparently the anniversary of Jesse James murder to-day. 1882.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 07:24 AM

My Name is Nobody (aka Il Mio Nome e Nessuno) - with Henry Fonda and Terence Hill and a truly sublime Morricone score, sacrilegiously plundered for the UK sitcom Nighty Night.

And not forgetting El Topo of course...

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 07:45 AM

Cheyenne Autumn

there were sort of atrocity westerns at one time - A Man Called Horse, Soldier Blue, and I suppose Hang em high would fit into that category.

sadism seemed to be an important feature of these films.

I'm glad its more character based nowadays.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,number 6
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 07:50 AM

question here .... what classifies a movie as a 'western' ... is it any movie that is not bound from any specific time in history, where the charcters all wear stetsons and takes place anywhere west of West Virginia, east of the Pacific shores, south of Baffin Island and north of the Rio Grande?

Could "a River Runs Through it" be considered a 'Western' movie? I think not.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 08:02 AM

If you had a venn diagram you could put inside the blob - horses, six shooters, cowboy hats...er thats it.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,number 6
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 08:13 AM

I also think a stagecoach with 6 horses running fast as the wind and the wheels turning backwards should also be included in that venn diagram ... the school marm is optional, but certainly helps in getting the stamp of certification.

Great explantion BTW weedrummer !

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,Vic at work
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 09:44 AM

Missouri Breaks

Texas across the river - Great spoof western.

However I am stunned that no one has mentioned the greatast of all-and its from my side of the pond!
          Carry on Cowboy.
Vic
(puts on black hat and sidles behind a rock)

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Wesley S
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 10:20 AM

After watching "The Horse Soldiers" with John Wayne and William Holden you would think that the only men allowed to join the Union Army were concert quality baritones. UNLESS they are having their leg removed. Then they get very drunk to kill the pain and sing like scalded cats in heat.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 10:43 AM

Good question, number 6.
Would Revolutionary War-era movies - 'Last of the Mohicans', e.g., or Davy Crockett or Dan'l Boone be considererd Westerns?

How about 1940's Roy & Gene movies with cars and horses?


Seamus

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 11:06 AM

Thanks Seamus .... "cars and horses" ... excellent point. Pat Brady driving Nellybelle confused the hell out of me. ... in fact it almost destroyed the cowboy legend to me when I was 5 years old.

How about civil war movies? I wouldn't classify them as "western" movies.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 11:32 AM

"Lonely are the Brave" with Kirk Douglas is set in the 1960s, takes place in the big city, has freeways and fast cars, and is most decidedly a western in any sense of that word. It concerns a modern day cowboy's inablity to cope with the modern world. I don't know if anyone else has mentioned it, but it is worth seeing.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Midchuck
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 11:46 AM

"Lonely are the Brave" with Kirk Douglas....I don't know if anyone else has mentioned it, but it is worth seeing.

Yup, I saw it way back when. Excellent.

Based on an Edward Abbey novel, nicht var?

P.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 12:04 PM

City Slickers, also and what about the Ultimate "modern" Western...Star Wars!:-)

I was going to post something here, but it was too long, so I started a new thread to show what an influence Westerns had on me as a child: click here!.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Midchuck
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 12:13 PM

City Slickers, also and what about the Ultimate "modern" Western...Star Wars!:-)

It is a modern western, but it is not "the Ultimate." It doesn't even come close to Firefly/Serenity. IMO. Not the least bit humble.

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Rog Peek
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 03:26 PM

I've always been a great fan of westerns, it would be too difficult coose favourites, but if I had to, then Lonely are the Brave, Outlaw Josie Wales, and Unforgiven would be among them.

Rog

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 04:27 PM

We just saw "3:10 to Yuma" this past weekend (the new one) and thought it worked quite well. I'm not an afficionado like astro though, so he'll have to chime in with the lists.

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: RangerSteve
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 05:37 PM

To answer Seamus Kennedy's question: "Last of the Mohicans" isn't a western, the action takes place in New York State, specifically the area between Albany and the Niagara River - the western part of the state, but that doesn't count. "Davy Crockett" is part western, since he ended up at the Alamo in Texas. Daniel Boon technically isn't a western either, the exciting parts of his life took place in Kentucky.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 06:37 PM

I think the movies about Daniel Boone, the Deerslayer, et al, should have a term all their own.

How about "Buckskins"?

We could use a few more good buckskins at the movies, I think. "Last of the Mohicans" was great. A really old buckskin was "Drums Along the Mohawk".

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 06:51 PM

"Buckskins" good categorization L.H. :)

Most certainly could use a few more of those.

My favourite buckskin would have to be "Revolution" with Al Pacino.

I wish someone would make a good movie about the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 06:57 PM

Making sure not to caste Paris Hilton (with her hair dyed black) in the role of Sacagawea....

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: number 6
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 07:00 PM

Good one, L.H. ... good one !! LOL

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Art Thieme
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 08:45 PM

At the top of any list of great Western films would have to be: LONESOME DOVE


A close second would be MONTE WALSH ---the earlier one with Lee Marvin----not the recent travesty that Tom Selleck did.

followed by:

The Mountain Men (Charlton Heston)
Man In The Wilderness
Black Robe
Dead Man
Conagher
Treasure Of The Sierra Madre
Walk About
Ulzana's Raid
Adventures Of A Young Man (from Hemingway's NICK ADAMS stories)
Smoke Signals
Lone Star
Viva Zapata (written by John Steinbeck)
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid
Dead Man's Walk
Jeremiah Johnson (They shoulda left the liver-eating in though.)
Pancho Villa


There are more, but these are what come to mind.
Art Thieme

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Little Hawk
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 08:50 PM

Yeah, the recent one done about the life of Pancho Villa was great, and Viva Zapata is a classic.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: Art Thieme
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 09:09 PM

The Lee Marvin "Monte Walsh" had a soundtrack theme song that was rather folk-like sung by, of all folks, Cass Elliott.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: katlaughing
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 09:14 PM

Smoke Signals! Yes, Art, if you mean the 1998 one based on Sherman Alexie's book. Wonderful movie and the book was great, too! And, soundtrack!

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: RangerSteve
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 09:54 PM

Yeah, Treasure of the Sierra Madre - how could I have forgotten that one. Should be mandatory viewing.

Subject: RE: BS: Movie lovers- Westerns
From: GUEST,Jack the Sailor
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 10:07 PM

Sierra Madre is one of my favorites. I would be reluctant to call it a Western.