Favorite Western Movie?

[HHP]

One of the first real hard core westerns I remember was "Lawman" with Burt Lancaster.

[Jim Owen]

Wadcutter and I agree. Seven Samurai. And Searchers.

[ewalling]

I loved the twist at the end of 'Unforgiven.' There's a theme running throughout the film that the romantic tales of the Wild West are pure bunkum. A journalist character conducts an ongoing interview with Sheriff Little Bill (Gene Hackman), in which Bill debunks various myths. One I remember is that of the gunfighter, where he says something like with the weight of the gun and the reliability of the tool, most gunfighters would have been lucky to hit a barn door. The characters all corroborate his unflattering opinions - we have a ragtaggle bunch of drunks, bullies, whores, deadbeats, toadies, and general lowlives - not a romantic hero to be seen anywhere.

And then, right at the end, something happens. The Eastwood character, a reformed thug, drunk and deadbeat who 'found a good woman and the lord' gets seriously riled when his friend is 'legally' tortured and murdered by Little Bill and his cronies. In rides Munny (I think that was his name) with half or more of a bottle of whisky inside him, armed to the hilt and intent on taking the road on down to hell once more. He bursts into the bar where Bill and his men are gathered and performs a Wild West miracle - he pulls a gun with gravity-defying speed and shoots about 6 thugs, one after the other before they even get their guns from the holsters, just like Eastwood's fantasy character in the 60s spaghetti westerns would have done. And then he rides on out of town, as his alter ego would have done years before.

It's a really inspired touch. It suggests the idea that, yes, the romantic tales of wild, handsome, lethally fast and accurate gunslingers were a myth ... in 99.9% of the cases. But maybe, maybe one or two of these tales were true - that within this sea of tales and imaginings, the occasional outlandish feat of 'wild westernness' did actually occur. And from that, we have the even more intriguing thought that in other areas of history which seem distorted by fantasy over cold fact, just maybe ... maybe a very small part of it all really did happen.

[Bikewer]

High Noon for me. Superb. Everything worked. Gary Cooper, the music....

[rokdog49]

Originally Posted by Mbroady

Blazing Saddles

That one ^^^^

[fretfile100]

How the West Was Won
Jeremiah Johnson
Missouri Breaks
Little Big Man
Dances With Wolves

[Riverwolf]

Originally Posted by ewalling

I loved the twist at the end of 'Unforgiven.' There's a theme running throughout the film that the romantic tales of the Wild West are pure bunkum...

Interesting take. You should write movie reviews.

Thanks for the replies, I even saw a few that I had forgotten I own.

[aknow]

jeremiah johnson

[KevWind]

Most my favorites have been named

So I'll just add "Valdez is Coming"

[Dirk Hofman]

Originally Posted by 00Buck

Lots of good movies listed so far. Here are a few more for consideration: The Searchers (John Wayne), Lonesome Dove series (Duvall and Jones), Sliverado (Kevin Kline and a bunch of others), Broken Trail (Duvall), High Noon (Gary Cooper) and for a couple of westerns in space Serenity (TV Series) and Outland (Sean Connery does High Noon in space).

Outland and Silverado are the two I was going to mention. Outland is great stuff.

[Richgj3]

Originally Posted by Mbroady

Blazing Saddles

Yes, yes and yes!

[EasyEd]

Hey All,

Best intro scene ever... From Big Jake



-Ed-

[Frankieabbott]

The Magnificent Seven.
Unforgiven.
Rancho Notorious.

[Rodger Knox]

With all these other John Wayne fans here I'm surprised no one has mentioned

The Shootist

[viccortes285]

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk