Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

John Wayne

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    John Wayne

    Just watched The searchers again. Among the best ever first cinematic shots, that very first in the door. But what a dung beetle Wayne was. I can't understand how he became an icon. Well, a country who elected Bush twice and now maby thrice. I can. Yet, there is so much more decent people there.

    Wayne was a shit actor. He was basically Schwarzenegger of his time. He was crap to the point your skin crawls how awful he was. He was an anvil people now try to fool us into being a swiss watchmakers most special tool.

    #2
    John Wayne

    It's one of the worst movies ever, by the way.
    Apart from som of the amazing scenery shots, it's one America should be ashamed of, not proud of.
    So many stupid things in it.

    Comment


      #3
      John Wayne

      Best watched withe sound off.

      Comment


        #4
        John Wayne

        From a fairly standard critical view of the film:
        A whole generation of American directors was inspired by “The Searchers,” including Paul Schrader, John Milius, Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Michael Cimino. ... Most of these directors have tried to incorporate elements and ideas and characters of The Searchers into their movies. The Searchers has inspired many directors and writers all of whom have acknowledge their great intellectual and cinematic debts to it. About a dozen American films, which are masterpieces in their own right, ranging from “Taxi Driver,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “The Deer Hunter,” have used the same narrative premise: an obsessed and obsessive young man searching for something, to which goal he is willing to sacrifice his body and soul.
        Individual sequences, thematic ideas (revenge) and visual motifs of “The Searchers” have appeared in Clint Eastwood's “Dirty Harry” movies, Sam Peckinpah's “Ulzana's Raid,” “The Wind and the Lion,” “Dillinger,” Sergio Leone's “Once Upon a Time in the West,” and George Lucas' “Star Wars” film series.
        Critics and directors continue to be intrigued by “The Searchers” morally complex story. The film's denouement and its implications on racism has understandably led to a sharply divided response, between what could be called the pessimists and optimists. According to one optimist reader, Jim Beaver: “It is Ford's recognition and expert depiction of this ability of man to overcome even his worst nature that makes 'The Searchers' a great film.” Others think that the movie is never able to reconcile its ideological cracks and that its very contradictions and ambiguities are the reasons for endlessly revisiting and reevaluating the film.
        Inspired by or homages to The Searchers
        After Hours
        Close Encounters of the Third Kind
        The Emerald Forest
        E.T.
        Hardcore
        The Lion King
        Mona Lisa
        Paris, Texas
        Star Wars film series
        Taxi Driver

        Whole article here

        I find Paul Schrader's working out of his Searchers-related demons in his films to be particularly fascinating

        Comment


          #5
          John Wayne

          Uncle Ethan to thread ...

          Comment


            #6
            John Wayne

            I love "The Searchers" - and don't mind Big Leggy at all in it, it needs a performance like that, not Larry Olivier.

            To call it "one of the worst films ever made" even with the caveats, PPV is frankly bonkers, but it's your opinion.

            Comment


              #7
              John Wayne

              The Searchers should be used by psychologists as an Aspergers test.

              To think that such an over the top racist as Uncle Ethan, who's ready to kill his own niece without blinking, is presented as some sort of role model just because he doesn't wear a swastika tattoo on his forehead or laugh manically as he strokes a white cat's back is a textbook example of literal thinking. Uncle Ethan is clearly a man consumed by hatred and bitterness, a dead man walking.

              Comment


                #8
                John Wayne

                But enough about antipodean OTFers. What about John Wayne?

                Comment


                  #9
                  John Wayne

                  I think what's troublesome for some pepole is the fact that thus far John Wayne had played heroes you were supposed to 'root for', so a lot of people didn't know how to feel about this one.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    John Wayne

                    John Wayne Was a Nazi.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      John Wayne

                      Among my problems with The Searchers
                      - John Wayne. I can't stand his bloody voice to begin with, and I think he was a shit actor. He wasn't even one dimensional. He was undimensional.
                      - What the hell was the point with Mose? Did the character serve any other purpouse than "look at that court jester"
                      - The scenery is magnificent but there is no logic whatsoever why the family lives in a house in the middle of nowhere with soil you can't use for anything beyond digging graves. If even that without a Hilti drill. Why would a family venturing west decide to set roots there? Cattle can't graze. The only thing you can grow is tumbleweed. It almost upsets me. Again, the scenery is amazing but there is no logic to a family living there.
                      - If people find the Vietnamese in Deer Hunter being portrayed as evil, then what are the Natives in The Searchers. That’s obviously a given and nothing at all new I bring up.
                      - Then there are these brief occasions. Just one example: In the beginning when Ethan throws a bag of gold coins to the man of the house, nothing about what he’s paying for or why is explained.
                      Yes, it’s more than a bit crazy to call it the worst movie of all time. What I had in mind when saying so was the worst movie among those usually rated the highest on most top 100 or 200 or 500 of all time.

                      Comment


                        #12
                        John Wayne

                        It's not a perfect film - dodgy stereotyping of Indians, too much romanticism about families and the usual awful John Ford comedy scenes - but the racism angle was very radical for the time. Wayne's character is authentically pathological when he needs to play those scenes.

                        However there are at least two better Wayne films - Red River and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Wayne is OK IMHO if we think of him as a character actor rather than an all-round actor (which he simply could never be, as his strengths were too narrow). He's good at what he does bit he can't do much beyond what is asked of him in these films.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          John Wayne

                          I liked when Wayne critiqued Herbert Marcuse and the Frankfurt School in a 1971 Playboy interview.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            John Wayne

                            Agree about Red River & Liberty Valance. Rooster Cogburn was wasn't bad either and I liked him in John Ford's Stagecoach as well, which was Wayne's breakthrough role I believe. Stagecoach was one of the more forgotten gems he was in. It had stunning black and white photography of Monument Valley. John Ford pretty much made John Wayne's career. It's not hard to see why because Wayne was very suited to play those early western roles.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              John Wayne

                              Much to my delight, when we came back through Shannon last year, I was able to pick up a fridge magnet and key-ring advertising The Quiet Man...

                              Comment


                                #16
                                John Wayne

                                That's nothing, I pressed 25kg in the gym earlier.

                                Comment


                                  #17
                                  John Wayne

                                  MsD is big leggy.

                                  Comment


                                    #18
                                    John Wayne

                                    I loved John Wayne in The Shootist. I thought it was a wonderful film, especially as Wayne himself was dying of cancer at the time.

                                    Comment

                                    Working...
                                    X