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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 7:29:07 GMT -5
48. The Valley of Gwangi (1969) The Valley of Gwangi is a 1969 American western-fantasy film directed by Jim O'Connolly and written by William Bast. The film is also known as Gwangi, The Lost Valley, The Valley Time Forgot, and The Valley Where Time Stood Still. It was filmed in Technicolor and is known for its creature effects provided by Ray Harryhausen, being the last prehistoric-themed film animated by him. Sometime near the turn of the 20th century, a beautiful cowgirl named T.J. Breckenridge (Gila Golan) hosts a rodeo that is struggling. Her former fiancé Tuck Kirby (James Franciscus), a heroic former stuntman working for Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, wants to buy out T.J. T.J. has an ace she hopes will boost attendance at her show - a tiny horse. Tuck meets a British paleontologist named Horace Bromley (Laurence Naismith), who was working in a nearby Mexican desert. Bromley shows Tuck fossilized horse tracks, which Tuck notices to be similar to T.J.'s horse's feet. So Tuck sneaks Bromley in for a peek. Bromley declares the horse to be an Eohippus. The tiny horse came from a place known as the Forbidden Valley. A gypsy known as Tia Zorina claims that it has a curse, and demands that it must be returned. Later a group of thieves (presumably under orders from the Gypsy) collaborate with Bromley to steal the horse and release it to the valley. Bromley collaborates in the hopes of following the horse to its home. But Carlos (Gustavo Rojo), once a member of the gypsy tribe now working for T.J.'s circus (and the one who actually delivered the tiny horse to T.J.), walks in on the theft and tries to stop it but is knocked out. Tuck arrives just as the gypsy posse leaves. He notices Carlos as he begins reviving, notices the horse missing, and sets off after it and Bromley. When T.J. and her crew discover Carlos and that the horse is missing Carlos claims Tuck has stolen it. T.J. then forms and leads a group of cowboys after Tuck and Bromley on a mission to retrieve the horse. Making their way into the Forbidden Valley, Tuck, T.J, and the rest of the group meet up and soon discover why the valley is said to be cursed as a Pteranodon swoops down and snatches a boy who had accompanied the group into the valley. After Carlos kills the Pteranodon, they spy an Ornithomimus, a small dinosaur which they chase after in the hopes of capturing it. Just as the ornithomimus is about to escape, it is killed by Gwangi, a vicious Allosaurus which pursues, almost finding and eating Bromely, however, a Styracosaurus appears and deters Gwangi away. Later, Gwangi pursues them to their base camp, where it is able to get the best of them, until they begin to rope it down, however, the Styracosaurus reappears and battles Gwangi. Gwangi emerges victorious, but decides to attack the men again. Gwangi manages to catch and kill Carlos, but knocks itself out while trying to exit the valley in pursuit of the rest of the group. Securing the creature, they take it back to town where it is to be put on display in T.J.'s show. However on opening night one of the Gypsies sneaks in and begins to unlock Gwangi's cage in an effort to free it. Instead the unfortunate man is killed and Gwangi breaks free, killing Bromley and a circus elephant (actually modelled after a prehistoric mammoth) in the process. The crowd gathered to see Gwangi is struck with fear and an stampede away from the arena ensues, and Tia Zorina is stomped and killed by the crowd. Eventually Gwangi, Tuck, T.J and Lope (the Mexican boy), end up in a cathedral which catches on fire during battle. After some close calls Tuck and T.J. manage to escape and lock the door behind them, trapping Gwangi in the burning building which then crumbles around it. Screaming in agony, Gwangi dies in the fire and the town makes Tuck the town hero. However, the town's population is also saddened by the thought of a magnificent creature like Gwangi dying such a horrible death and by the loss of life due to the dinosaur's rampage. Gwangi was originally conceived by Willis O'Brien (1886-1962), the man who created the special effects for the original King Kong (1933). The plot was inspired by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's book The Lost World (1912), with added elements from King Kong (capturing a monster and bringing it to civilisation where it runs amok). In O'Brien's scenario, then called Valley of the Mists, cowboys discover an Allosaurus in the Grand Canyon. After finally roping the dinosaur, they put it in a Wild West show, but the creature, now called Gwangi, breaks free and fights lions in the show that have also escaped. After killing the lions, Gwangi goes on a rampage around the town and is run off a cliff by a man in a truck. O'Brien passed away before The Valley of Gwangi was filmed. Although Harryhausen intended Gwangi to be an Allosaurus, he based the model of the dinosaur on a Tyrannosaurus that he had made much earlier. Harryhausen occasionally confused the two, stating in a DVD interview: "We called it an Allosaurus, occasionally... They're both meat eaters, they're both Tyrants... one was just a bit larger than the other." The apparent size of the animal on screen resembles that of an allosaur and it has three fingers on each hand (as did Allosaurus) whereas tyrannosaurs had only two. A full-size tyrannosaur may not have been feasible given some aspects of the plot. The Valley of Gwangi was the last prehistoric-themed film that Harryhausen animated, and he made much use of his experience in depicting extinct animals from his earlier films. Close to a year was spent on the special effects (there were over 300 'Dynamation' cuts in the film, a record number for Harryhausen), with the roping of Gwangi being the most labour-intensive animated sequence. It was achieved by having the actors hold on to ropes tied to a "monster stick" that was in the back of a Jeep. The jeep and stick when filmed with Gwangi are on a back rear projection plate and hidden by his body, and the portions of rope attached to his body are painted wires that are matched with the real ropes. The coordination of Gwangi's animation with live actors on horseback (and the horses appearing to react to Gwangi) was particularly difficult to film, and the source of an editorial lapse in a following scene. Gwangi bites through the ropes around his neck when first lassoed and later has his jaws roped together when unconscious. However, he is then shown being transported in a cart again held only by ropes around his neck but with jaws now un-bound. Although the animation of Gwangi was well executed (although somewhat repetitive), that of the other prehistoric animals shown in the film was less well done. The appearance and movements of the Ornithomimus were unlikely, and the pterosaurs were mistakenly given bat's wings (with elongate fingers supporting the membrane; pterosaurs had one finger forming the wing's leading edge but none on the membrane). The wings appeared to mimic those of a pterosaur from an earlier Harryhausen film One Million Years BC (1966). Interestingly, a pterosaur animated decades earlier by Willis O'Brien for King Kong shows the correct wing anatomy. Close-up sequences of the pterosaurs in Gwangi were provided by life-size models. The model of the Eohippus was supposed to have had toes but appears to have had regular hooves with 'toes' painted on (the sound effects of the animal moving also resemble hooves). The model of the Styracosaurus featured an inflatable air 'bladder' to simulate the animal breathing heavily after its combat with Gwangi (a feature first used in models made for much earlier films by Marcel Delgado). Although the habitat shown in the 'Forbidden Valley' was highly unlikely to have ever harboured large dinosaurs given its restricted canyons and sparse desert vegetation, the barren terrain may have made it easier to merge the stop-motion animation with live action sequences. Actress Gila Golan's Israeli accent was so strong that all of her lines were redubbed on the film by a voice over. Actor Laurence Naismith who plays Professor Bromley had earlier featured in Jason and the Argonauts as the shipbuilder 'Argos'. The movie was filmed in Cuenca, Spain. By the time of the film's release, interest in 'monster' films of this type was waning. Management at Warner Brothers and Seven Arts also changed and the film was released with little promotional effort on a double-bill with a biker film; it thus missed its target audience and was not as successful as earlier Harryhausen efforts. The scene where Gwangi suddenly appears from behind a hill and snatches a fleeing ornithomimosaur in his jaws was later copied in the big-budget dinosaur movie, Jurassic Park. During the 1980s hit TV series Scarecrow and Mrs. King, anytime a television was shown on in the series, The Valley of Gwangi was on the screen. Justin Parpan's 2006 children's read-aloud book, "Gwango's Lonesome Trail" (Red Cygnet Press, Inc., ISBN 1601080042) features a pre-historic dinosaur named "Gwango" roaming the contemporary American Southwest. In an episode of the situation comedy Friends, Ross watches the movie while in a hospital.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 7:31:43 GMT -5
47. Bandolero! (1968) Bandolero! is a 1968 western directed by Andrew V. McLaglen starring James Stewart, Dean Martin, Raquel Welch and George Kennedy. Posing as a hangman, Mace Bishop arrives in town with the intention of freeing his brother Dee from the gallows. Dee and his gang have been arrested for a bank robbery in which Maria Stoner's husband was killed. After freeing his brother, Mace successfully robs the bank on his own after the gang has fled with the posse in pursuit. Dee has taken Maria as a hostage. The posse, led by local sheriff July Johnson and deputy Roscoe Bookbinder, chases the fugitives across the Mexican border into territory policed by bandoleros, whom Maria describes as men out to kill any gringos (foreigners) that they can find. Maria further warns Dee that the sheriff will follow, because they have taken the one thing that July Johnson has always wanted: her. Despite initial protestations, Maria falls for Dee and finds herself in a quandary. She had never felt anything for the sheriff, nor for her husband, who had purchased her from her family. The posse tracks them to an abandoned town and captures the gang. The bandoleros also arrive, shooting Roscoe, so the sheriff releases the outlaws so that the men can fight back in defense. In this final showdown, almost everyone is killed. Dee is fatally stabbed by the leader of the bandits, El Jefe, and then Mace is shot by another. Maria grabs a pistol and shoots El Jefe dead. Maria and the sheriff, with little left of the posse, bury the Bishop brothers and dead posse members without markers, after which Maria notes that no one will know who was there nor what had happened. The film was shot at the Alamo Village, the movie set originally created for John Wayne's "The Alamo." The Alamo Village is located north of Bracketville, Texas. The location closed in 2009 after remaining open to movie companies and the public since 1960. Larry McMurtry, the author of the novel "Lonesome Dove," reportedly paid homage to Bandolero! by using similar names for the characters in his book. Both tales begin near the Mexico border and involve bandoleros. Both have a sheriff named July Johnson and a deputy Roscoe who travel a great distance in search of a wanted criminal and the woman who has rejected the sheriff's love. Both stories have a charismatic outlaw named Dee, who is about to be hanged and who wins the love of the woman before he dies. In the Lonesome Dove miniseries, the main characters twice pass directly in front of the Alamo -- or at least a set built to replicate the Alamo.
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Post by 'Foretold' Joker on May 9, 2011 7:35:19 GMT -5
Bandolero sounds interesting might check that one out.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 7:38:55 GMT -5
46. How The West Was Won (1962) How the West Was Won is a 1962 American epic Western film. The picture was one of the last "old-fashioned" epic films made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to enjoy great success. It follows four generations of a family (starting as the Prescotts) as they move ever westward, from western New York state to the Pacific Ocean. Filmed in, and using pre-existing Cinerama curving widescreen process stock footage, the movie is set between 1839 and 1889. The fundamental idea behind the film was to provide an episodic retelling of the progress of westward migration and development of America. It was inspired by a much longer and more complex series of historical narratives that appeared as a photo essay series, by the same name, three years earlier in Life magazine, which is acknowledged in the film’s credits. The all-star cast includes Carroll Baker, Walter Brennan, Lee J. Cobb, Andy Devine, Henry Fonda, Carolyn Jones, Karl Malden, Harry Morgan, Gregory Peck, George Peppard, Robert Preston, Debbie Reynolds, James Stewart, Eli Wallach, John Wayne, and Richard Widmark. The film is narrated by Spencer Tracy. The movie consists of five segments, three directed by Henry Hathaway ("The Rivers", "The Plains" and "The Outlaws"), and one each by John Ford ("The Civil War") and George Marshall ("The Railroad"), with transitional sequences by the uncredited Richard Thorpe. The screenplay was written by John Gay (uncredited) and James R. Webb. Popular western author Louis L'Amour wrote a novelization of the screenplay. In 1997, How the West Was Won was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". The score was listed at #25 on AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores. A family led by Zebulon Prescott (Karl Malden) sets out for the frontier west via the Erie Canal, the “west” at this time being the Illinois country. On the journey, they meet mountain man Linus Rawlings (James Stewart) who is traveling east to Pittsburgh to trade his furs. He and Zebulon's daughter Eve (Carroll Baker) are attracted to each other, but Linus is not ready to settle down. Linus stops at an isolated trading post run by a murderous clan of river pirates headed by "Colonel" Hawkins (Walter Brennan). Linus is betrayed when he accompanies pretty Dora Hawkins (Brigid Bazlen) into a cave to see a "varmint". She stabs him in the back and pushes him into a deep hole. Fortunately, he is not seriously wounded, and is able to rescue the Prescott party from a similar fate. The bushwhacking thieves (Lee Van Cleef plays one), including Dora, are dispatched with rough frontier justice. The settlers continue down the river, but their raft is caught in rapids and Zebulon and his wife Rebecca (Agnes Moorehead) drown. Linus, finding that he cannot live without Eve, reappears and marries her, even though she insists on homesteading at the spot where her parents died. Eve's sister Lily (Debbie Reynolds) chooses to go to St. Louis, where she finds work performing in a dance hall. She attracts the attention of professional gambler Cleve Van Valen (Gregory Peck). After overhearing that she has just inherited a California gold mine, and to avoid paying his debts to another gambler (John Larch), Cleve joins the wagon train taking her there. He and wagonmaster Roger Morgan (Robert Preston) court her along the way, but she turns them both down, much to the dismay of her new friend and fellow traveler Agatha Clegg (Thelma Ritter), who is searching for a husband. Surviving an attack by Cheyenne Indians, Lily and Cleve arrive at the mine, only to find that it is now worthless. Cleve leaves. Lily returns to work in a dance hall in a literal "Camp Town," living out of a covered wagon. Morgan finds her and again proposes marriage in a rather unromantic way. She tells him, "No, not ever." Later, Lily is singing in the music salon of a riverboat. By chance, Cleve is a passenger. When he hears Lily's voice, he leaves the poker table (and a winning hand) to propose to her, telling her of the opportunities waiting in the rapidly growing city of San Francisco. She accepts. Linus joins the Union army as a captain in the American Civil War. Despite Eve's wishes, their son Zeb (George Peppard) eagerly enlists as well, looking for glory and an escape from farming. Corporal Peterson (Andy Devine) assures them the conflict won't last very long. The bloody Battle of Shiloh shows Zeb that war is nothing like he imagined and, unknown to him, his father Linus dies there. He encounters a similarly disillusioned Confederate (Russ Tamblyn) who suggests deserting, to which Zeb agrees. However, by chance, they overhear a private conversation between Generals Ulysses S. Grant (Harry Morgan) and William Tecumseh Sherman (John Wayne). The rebel realizes he has the opportunity to rid the South of two of its greatest enemies and tries to shoot them, leaving Zeb no choice but to stab and kill him. Afterwards, Zeb rejoins the army. When the war finally ends, he returns home, only to find his mother has died. She had lost the will to live after learning that Linus had been killed. Zeb gives his share of the family farm to his brother, who is more tied to the land, and leaves in search of a more interesting life. Following the daring riders from the Pony Express and the construction of the transcontinental telegraph line in the late 1860s, two ferociously competing railroad lines, the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad, one building west and the other east, open up new territory to eager settlers. Zeb becomes a lieutenant in the U.S. cavalry, trying to maintain peace with the Indians with the help of grizzled buffalo hunter Jethro Stuart (Henry Fonda), an old friend of Linus. When ruthless railroad man Mike King (Richard Widmark) violates a treaty by building on Indian territory, the Arapaho Indians retaliate by stampeding buffalo through his camp, killing many, including women and children. Disgusted, Zeb resigns and heads to Arizona. In San Francisco, widowed Lily auctions off her possessions (she and Cleve had made and spent several fortunes) to pay her debts. She travels to Arizona, inviting Zeb and his family to oversee her remaining asset, a ranch. Zeb (now a marshal), his wife Julie (Carolyn Jones) and their children meet Lily at Gold City's train station. However, Zeb also runs into an old enemy there, outlaw Charlie Gant (Eli Wallach). It is revealed that Zeb killed Gant's brother in a gunfight. When Gant makes veiled threats against Zeb and his family, Zeb turns to his friend and Gold City's marshal, Lou Ramsey (Lee J. Cobb), but Gant is not wanted for anything in that territory, so there is little Ramsey can do. Zeb decides he has to act rather than wait for Gant to make good his threat to show up someday. Suspecting Gant of planning to rob an unusually large gold shipment being transported by train, he prepares an ambush with Ramsey's reluctant help. Gant and his entire gang (one member played by Harry Dean Stanton) are killed in the shootout. In the end, Lily and the Rawlingses travel to their new home. A short epilogue shows Los Angeles and San Francisco in the early 1960s, including the famous four-level downtown freeway interchange and Golden Gate Bridge, indicating the growth of the West in 80 years. The film marked then sixty-six year old Raymond Massey's last appearance as Abraham Lincoln, a role that he had previously played on stage (Abe Lincoln in Illinois and the stage adaptation of John Brown's Body), on screen (Abe Lincoln in Illinois) and on television (The Day Lincoln Was Shot, and two more productions of Abe Lincoln in Illinois). Lee Van Cleef, John Larch, Jay C. Flippen, Carleton Young and Harry Dean Stanton play very brief, uncredited roles. The film won three Academy Awards for: * Best Writing, Story and Screenplay — Written Directly for the Screen (James R. Webb) * Best Film Editing * Best Sound It was also nominated for: * Best Picture * Best Art Direction — Set Decoration, Color (George Davis, William Ferrari, Addison Hehr, Henry Grace, Don Greenwood, Jr., Jack Mills) * Best Cinematography, Color * Best Costume Design, Color * Best Music, Score — Substantially Original (Alfred Newman and Ken Darby) How the West Was Won is one of only two dramatic feature films (the other being The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm) made using the three-strip Cinerama process. Although the picture quality when projected onto curved screens in theatres was stunning, attempts to convert the movie to a smaller screen suffer from that process's technical shortcomings. When seen in letterbox format the actors' faces are nearly indistinguishable in long shots. John Ford complained about having to dress such huge sets since Cinerama photographed a much wider view than the standard single camera process to which Hollywood directors had become accustomed. An even more difficult problem was that the film had to be shot with the actors artificially positioned out of dramatic and emotional frame, and out of synchronization with one another. Only when the three-print Cinerama process is projected upon a Cinerama screen will the positions and emotions of the actors synchronize, such as normal eye-contact or emotional harmony between actors in a dramatic sequence. In flat screen projection of the film, the actors appear to never make eye contact or relate to one another, so as to carry a complete scene to emotional or dramatic completion. Stuntman Bob Morgan, husband of Yvonne De Carlo, was severely injured and lost a leg during an accident while filming. The film would later inspire an ABC television series of the same name. Crest Digital was given the task of restoring the original Cinerama negative for How the West Was Won in 2000 and built their own authentic Cinerama screening room in order to complete the process. There have also been efforts, led by HP, to combine the three image portions and make the Cinerama image look more acceptable on a flat screen. This has finally been accomplished on the latest DVD and Blu-ray Disc release. The lines at which the three Cinerama panels joined were formerly glaringly visible (as seen in the stills reproduced on this page), but this has been largely corrected on the Warner Bros. DVD and Blu-ray Disc, although the joins can still be seen in places, especially against bright backgrounds. The restoration also corrects some of the geometric distortions inherent in the process; for instance, in the final shot, the Golden Gate Bridge appears to curve in perspective as the camera flies underneath it, whereas in the Cinerama version, it breaks into three straight sections at different angles. The Blu-ray also contains a "SmileBox" version, simulating the curved screen effect. The aspect ratio of Cinerama was 2.59:1. Although Warner's new DVD release of the film states the Ultra Panavision 70 ratio of 2.89:1, which was used in selected shots. The restored Warner Bros. release has been shown on television since October 2008, on the Encore Westerns channel. The music for the film was composed and conducted by Alfred Newman. The soundtrack album was originally released by MGM Records. Dimitri Tiomkin, well known for scores to western films, was the first composer approached to compose the music for the film. However, Tiomkin became unavailable as a result of eye surgery, and Newman was hired as a replacement. The score is widely considered to be one of Newman's best, and appears on the AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores list. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Score, losing to Tom Jones.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 7:59:31 GMT -5
Here is the list so far.
50. The Gunfighter (1950) 49. Quigley Down Under (1990) 48. The Valley of Gwangi (1969) 47. Bandolero! (1968) 46. How The West Was Won (1962)
Now for taglines (or clues in one film's case) to the next five films.
* Struggle ensues in the great blizzard of 1899 * JOHN FORD'S EPIC OF THE FIGHTING CAVALRY! * John Ford's Masterpiece of the Frontier * No place to run. No reason to hide. * The man of "True Grit" is back and look who's got him!
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 10:50:17 GMT -5
45. Rooster Cogburn (1975) Rooster Cogburn, originally promoted as Rooster Cogburn (... and the Lady), is a 1975 film sequel to the 1969 western film True Grit. The film stars John Wayne, in his penultimate film, who reprises his role as U.S. Marshal Reuben J. "Rooster" Cogburn. Katharine Hepburn co-stars as spinster Eula Goodnight, who teams up with Rooster to recover a stolen shipment of nitroglycerin and find her father's killer. Because of his drunkenness and questionable use of firearms, aging U.S. Marshal Rooster Cogburn has been stripped of his badge. But he's given a chance to redeem himself after a village in Indian Territory is overrun by a gang of violent, ruthless criminals, who've killed an elderly preacher, Rev. George Goodnight. His spinster daughter, Eula Goodnight, wants to track the criminals down and makes Rooster an unwilling partner. But Rooster must use care, because the criminals, led by Hawk and Breed, have stolen a shipment of nitroglycerine. The screenplay was written by actress Martha Hyer, the wife of producer Hal B. Wallis, under the pen name "Martin Julien". Director Stuart Millar, a longtime Hollywood producer, had directed only one film, When the Legends Die, prior to helming Rooster Cogburn. The film was shot in Deschutes County, Oregon, west of the town of Bend (for the mountain scenes), and on the Rogue River in the counties of Josephine and Curry, west of the town of Grants Pass (for the river scenes). Smith Rock State Park was a setting as well; the Rockhard/Smith Rock Climbing Guides building at the park entrance was originally built as a set for the movie, where it was portrayed as "Kate's Saloon". Rooster Cogburn marks the only time Hollywood veterans John Wayne and Katharine Hepburn would appear together in a film. It was the final film from producer Hal B. Wallis. Although the film was promoted as Rooster Cogburn (...and the Lady), the opening credits of the film give the title as simply Rooster Cogburn. Strother Martin, who portrays Shanghai McCoy in this film, also appeared in True Grit, playing a different character. With elderly stars and a formulaic plot that was basically a rehash of True Grit with elements from The African Queen (in which Hepburn also starred), the film was poorly received by critics. It proved to be only a moderate hit at the box office. There had been plans for a third Rooster Cogburn movie, entitled Sometime, but Wayne made only one more film, The Shootist (1976), before his death from cancer in 1979. A third Cogburn movie did go ahead in 1978, albeit as a low-budget TV movie starring Warren Oates.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 10:53:19 GMT -5
44. Open Range (2003) Open Range is a 2003 American Western film co-starring, co-produced, and directed by Kevin Costner, based on the novel The Open Range Men by Lauran Paine. Starring alongside Costner are Robert Duvall, Annette Bening, and Michael Gambon. The film received mostly positive reviews, and was a modest success at the box office, making about $58 million in the U.S. alone. Open Range is a contemporary Western set in Montana in 1882 (the year is seen on a new grave marker) though the movie was filmed entirely on location in Alberta, Canada. The background of the movie concerns the "range wars" that occurred in the American West in the late 19th century. The "wars" pitted those that believed in the "Law of the Open Range" — free access to water and grass for everyone, against the "barbed wire" men — land barons, who used the new fencing to define their empire and block the free-range cattlemen from moving their herds. "Boss" Spearman (Robert Duvall) is a free-range cattleman, who, with hired hands Charley Waite (Kevin Costner), Mose (Abraham Benrubi), Button (Diego Luna), and dog Tig are driving a herd cross country. Charley is a former soldier who fought in the Civil War and feels guilty over his past as a killer. Boss sends Mose to the nearby town of Harmonville for supplies. The town is controlled by a ruthless Irish immigrant land baron, Denton Baxter (Michael Gambon), who hates free-rangers. Mose is badly beaten and then jailed by the town marshal, Poole (James Russo), whom Baxter "owns." Many townspeople accept that Baxter is all-powerful and corrupt while others harbor animosity towards him. The only friendly inhabitant they meet is Percy (Michael Jeter), a livery stable owner. Boss and Charley become concerned when Mose doesn't return. They retrieve him from jail but not before getting a stern warning from Baxter about free-ranging on his land. Mose's injuries are so severe that Boss and Charley take him to Doc Barlow (Dean McDermott). There they meet Susan Barlow (Annette Bening). Charley is attracted immediately, but assumes that Susan is the doctor's wife. It turns out that Baxter does not really want Boss to move on; he wants the herd. After catching masked riders scouting their cattle, Boss and Charley sneak up on their campfire in the dark of night. Baxter's henchmen are forced to strip and are sent back to town on foot. Another ambush, however, happening at the same time, results in the killing of Mose and the dog Tig. Button is badly injured and left for dead. Charley and Boss vow to avenge this injustice. They leave Button at the doctor's house and go into town, where during a flash flood Charley saves a townsperson's dog. Boss and Charley are threatened by Poole but refuse to back down. Shortly thereafter, they lock Poole in his own jail. Boss knocks him out with chloroform he has stolen from the doctor's office. Other henchmen meet the same fate; they are locked up in Poole's cells and knocked out with the drug. Charley and Boss psychologically prepare themselves for the upcoming battle. Charley learns that Sue is the doctor's sister, not his wife. Charley declares his feelings for her (at Boss's urging) and she gives him a locket for luck. In the town store, knowing that a bloody confrontation with Baxter is inevitable, Boss and Charley buy expensive cigars and chocolate, reasoning that they might be unable to enjoy these later. Charley leaves a note with Percy, the livery stable owner, in which he states that if he should die, money made from the sale of his saddle and gear are to be used to buy Sue a new tea set. Outmanned in a gunfight, Boss and Charley are pitted against Baxter and his many henchmen. Charley doesn't wait to be drawn upon first, cold-bloodedly shooting Butler (Kim Coates), the gunman who shot Button and killed Mose. The bullets begin to fly and Boss is wounded. Some of Baxter's men flee as Charley cuts them down one by one — Charley even manages to wound Baxter himself early in the fight. Rallied by Percy, the town begins to join the fight against Baxter. Even the frail Button stumbles out of his recovery bed in the doctor's house to side with his friends. Baxter endangers innocent women and children to save himself. He ends up wounded and alone, trapped in the jailhouse. Boss rushes the jail. They both end up seated on the floor, pulling the triggers on empty guns. Boss stops just short of killing the mortally wounded Baxter, saying "I'm not going to waste a bullet to ease your pain." With the battle over, Charley witnesses the casualties: dead bodies, shaken innocent bystanders, destroyed property. He speaks to Sue in private, telling her he must leave all this behind. Sue pleads with him to stay, saying, "I have a big idea about you and me, but I won't wait forever for you. But I will wait, for a time, for you to come back to me." Charley does return, proposing marriage. They embrace and kiss. Charley and Boss decide to give up the cattle business and settle down in Harmonville, taking over the saloon, whose owner (Baxter) was killed in the gunfight. The film received mostly positive reviews, receiving a "fresh" 79% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Roger Ebert gave it 3.5 stars out of 4, calling it "... an imperfect but deeply involving and beautifully made Western ..." Peter Bradshaw of the The Guardian gave the film 4 stars out of 5, writing, "Duvall gives his best performance in ages" in a "... tough, muscular, satisfying movie." The film won the 2004 Western Heritage Award, and was nominated for a Golden Satellite Award, an MTV Movie Award (Diego Luna), a Motion Picture Sound Editors Award as well as a Taurus Award for stunt artist Chad Camilleri.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 10:55:51 GMT -5
43. She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) She Wore a Yellow Ribbon is a 1949 western film directed by John Ford and starring John Wayne. The film was the second of Ford's trilogy of films focusing on the US Cavalry (and the only one in color); the other two films were Fort Apache (1948) and Rio Grande (1950). With a budget of $1.6 million, the film was one of the most expensive westerns of the time, but became a major hit for RKO and remains a popular classic today. Known for its breathtaking views of Monument Valley located in the Navajo reservation, at the northern edge of Arizona; the cinematographer, Winton Hoch, won the 1950 Academy Award for Best Color Cinematography. Ford and Hoch based much of the film's imagery on the paintings and sculptures of Frederic Remington. The film is named after a song common in the U.S. military, "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon", which is still used today to keep marching cadence. It is a variant of the song "All Around My Hat". On the verge of his retirement at Fort Starke, a one-troop cavalry post, the aging US Cavalry Capt. Nathan Cutting Brittles (John Wayne) is given one last patrol, to take his troop and deal with a breakout from the reservation by the Cheyenne and Arapaho following the defeat of George Armstrong Custer. His task is complicated by being forced at the same time to deliver his commanding officer's wife and niece, Abby Allshard (Mildred Natwick) and Olivia Dandridge (Joanne Dru), to an east-bound stage, and by the need to avoid a new Indian war. His troop officers, 1st Lt. Flint Cohill (John Agar) and 2nd Lt. Ross Pennell (Harry Carey, Jr.) meanwhile vie for the affections of Miss Dandridge while uneasily anticipating the retirement of their captain and mentor. Rounding out the cast are Capt. Brittles' chief scout, Sgt. Tyree (Ben Johnson), a one-time Confederate cavalry officer; his First Sergeant, Quincannon (Victor McLaglen); and Major Allshard (George O'Brien), long-time friend and commanding officer. After apparently failing in both missions, Capt. Brittles returns with the troop to Fort Starke to retire. His lieutenants continue the mission in the field, joined by Capt. Brittles after "quitting the post and the Army". Unwilling to see more lives needlessly taken, Capt. Brittles takes it upon himself to try to make peace with Chief Pony That Walks (Chief John Big Tree). When that too fails, he devises a risky stratagem to avoid a bloody war by stampeding the Indians' horses out of the camp and back to the reservation. The movie ends with Brittles being recalled to duty as chief of scouts with the rank of lieutenant-colonel and miss Dandridge and lieutenant Cohill becoming engaged. The film's narrator references Pony Express rider's concerns over George Custer's defeat at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Custer was killed in 1876, whereas the Pony Express made its last ride fifteen years earlier in 1861 after only a year of service.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 11:05:04 GMT -5
42. The Great Silence (1968) The Great Silence (Il grande silenzio, 1968), or The Big Silence, is an Italian spaghetti western. It is widely considered by critics as the masterpiece of director Sergio Corbucci and is one of his better known movies, along with Django (1966). Unlike most conventional and spaghetti westerns, The Great Silence takes place in the snow-filled landscapes of Utah during the Great Blizzard of 1899. The movie features a score by Ennio Morricone and stars Jean-Louis Trintignant as Silence, a mute gunfighter with a grudge against bounty hunters, assisting a group of outlawed Mormons and a woman trying to avenge her husband (one of the outlaws). They are set against a group of ruthless bounty hunters, led by Loco (Klaus Kinski). Winter 1898. The rough weather brings hunger and privation to the small village of Snowhill in Utah. In order to survive, the poor people start to steal and rob. Therefore they become outlaws and have to hide in the mountains, because of the bounty rewarded on them. While people are suffering, the village becomes a paradise for bounty hunters, who can hardly be opposed by the poor, who are labelled as outlaws. When Pauline's husband falls prey to the unscrupulous bounty hunter Loco (Klaus Kinski), she hires a mute gunfighter, Silence (Jean-Louis Trintignant), to kill Loco. Since Silence as a child had to watch his parents being killed by bounty hunters, he tramps through the country chasing those who are killing people for money under the cloak of the law. In order to not violate the law and be added to the blacklist of the bounty hunters, he provokes them to pull out their weapon first. Then he has a reason to act in "self-defense" and shoot them. But Loco does not let himself be provoked. Not until after he lures the new sheriff – who had been given the impossible task by the governor to re-establish order in the region and to grant amnesty to those starving in the mountains – to his death, does Loco face up to the final fight with Silence? The film is famous for its bleak ending, a bloody scene in which the sympathetic characters are gunned down by the greedy bounty hunters, "all according to the law," as Loco comments. The director was forced to shoot an alternate ending for the North African and Asian markets, where the hero's death in the end would have been deemed unacceptable. The Fantoma DVD features the alternate "happy" ending without sound. The comic sheriff played by Frank Wolff returns from the "dead" (after having been trapped in a frozen lake by Loco) to save the day. It is unlikely that an English or Italian audio track was ever created for this ending. The film was greatly inspired by two films: Day of the Outlaw (1959), directed by Andre De Toth and Black Sabbath (1963), directed by Mario Bava. Day of the Outlaw was a black-and-white western starring Robert Ryan and set in the snowbound town of Bitters, Wyoming, disrupted in the film by the arrival of seven outlaws on the run from the cavalry with a stolen army payroll. The segment from Bava's Black Sabbath titled 'Wurdulak' was also an inspiration for the film. "A nobleman, Count Vladimir D'Urfe (Mark Damon) discovers the headless corpse of Alibek (a Turkish bandit) in the snowbound mountains on his way to Yessey. He takes it to a nearby peasant house, where he finds a family living in fear. Their father, an old man named Gorka (Boris Karloff) has been hunting for the bandit for days and is due back at ten o'clock that night; Alibek is a wurdulak (a vampire): 'a cadaver always seeking blood'. If Gorka hasn't returned by the appointed hour, his family must kill him, as he has been vampirised too." The film also draws from the basic theme of A Fistful of Dollars (1964) in that there are "warring factions fighting over a town." As in Django Sergio Corbucci again used medieval motifs of witch craze. Also, the film bristles with catholic motifs. With this film, Sergio Corbucci brought together different approaches of the spaghetti western genre with highly political themes from contemporary history. On the one hand, the main hero is not only close-lipped, he is mute. The muteness of Trintignant is a joke, which is typical for Corbucci. Because a western hero never talks much, Corbucci exaggerates this genre-typical must and depicts the main hero as a mute. Besides the end, another aspect is the emphasis on law and its organs. For example, Klaus Kinski as the villain mentions several times that he has not violated a single law. This is clarified by the Ahasuerus figure of the justice of the peace, played by Luigi Pistilli, who is the merchant of the village too. Here, the double-dealing zeitgeist becomes clear: the actions of the state and its law are controlled by the capital. Even the demonstration of this aspect was perceived as criticism on America and capitalism. Because of its interpretation, the law fails as a moral instance. With its law, the state only protects the property and rewards bounty instead of supporting the people themselves. Pure privation forces the people to steal in order to survive. But because of the inevitable criminal act, they become criminals who are chased by bounty hunters in order to ensure law and order. Thus, the "evil" bounty hunters are those who ensure law and order, whilst the "poor" are fought as lawbreakers. Silence himself is not a saviour. In fact, Corbucci provides Silence with a reason for his acting (a traumatic childhood experience), but he also lets Pauline explicitly mention that Silence claims the same sum for killing Loco as Loco received for killing Pauline's husband. And Silence also cleverly interprets the law in order to perform a contract killing under the cloak of self-defense. In spite of this fact, Silence, like other heroes in spaghetti westerns, functions as a role model and sympathetic character for the audience. From that point of view, it is a remarkable consequence of Corbucci, that he lets Loco triumph. All sympathetic characters, as well as the defenseless hostages, are killed in cold blood. Corbucci dedicated the story about a good man, who dies in a barbaric hell, to the memory of Jesus, Martin Luther King, and Che Guevara. The reference to Che Guevara and Jesus becomes apparent by the destruction of Silence's hands. Jesus was nailed on the cross and the hands of dead Che Guevara were sent to Fidel Castro in a preserving jar. Corbucci previously used the motif of the destroyed hands in Django. This symbolism is intended to point out the impossibility of the revolution, because the execution of Silence does not save the hostages, just as Che Guevara's assassination did not change mankind significantly. The film is understood as a critical answer to For a Few Dollars More by Sergio Leone, who depicted the bounty hunters uncritically, almost naïvely. Therefore, Corbucci proceeded in a very sociological manner and created the first part of a trilogy, which deals with the topic "revolution". While the impossibility of revolution was pointed out in The Great Silence, the topic was picked up again and solutions were pointed out in the films The Mercenary and Compañeros. The Great Silence is considered a cult film that is convincing because of its complexity. In fact, while the political aspect has sometimes overlooked in subsequent decades, the film is still looked at by many as a high water mark for the Euro-western genre. The Austrian director Michael Haneke is a great fan of the film too and refers to the ending as unique. The only piece with a similar plot structure coming to his mind, is Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea. Reportedly, Jean-Louis Trintignant only agreed to play in a spaghetti western under the condition that he did not have to learn any lines for the role. That's why the main character conveniently became a mute in the story. Location shooting took place in the Italian Dolomites, around the ski resorts of Cortina d'Ampezzo (Veneto) and San Cassiano in Badia. It was also shot at Bracciano Lake, near Manziana in Lazio and the Elios town set in Rome was used for several of the Snow Hill scenes (including two nights sequences and the build-up to the final duel). The scenes were shot at night so that the fake "snow" looked more convincing; shaving foam was used to give the street a snowbound look. For the daylight scenes, the Elios set was swathed in fog, to disguise the fact that the surrounding countryside had no snow. Jean-Louis Trintignant is famous for the films A Man and a Woman, Bernardo Bertolucci's The Conformist, Roger Vadim's And God Created Woman, and Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Three Colors: Red. Silence's distinctive rapid-firing pistol is a Mauser C96, which started being manufactured in 1896. That Mauser pistol reappeared in Clint Eastwood's Joe Kidd (1972), while the snowbound setting was used in Pale Rider (1985) and briefly in Unforgiven (1992); in the early Seventies there was even a rumor that Eastwood was going to remake The Great Silence. The only words Silence utters are as a boy, played in flashback by child actor Loris Loddi (from The Hills Run Red, 1966). As his mother is shot, he cries out, "Mamma! Mamma!", though the English dubbed voice is being reused from the final scene of Corbucci's Johnny Oro (1966). Currently a musical project by the Finnish Progressive Music Association is running, which encourages bands and musical artists to musically interpret the film. The Spaghetti Epic 3. The Hungarian progressive rock band Yesterdays wrote a 20 minutes long epic called Suite Pauline based on the main character's story (this song is also featured on the Spaghetti Epic 3 CD). Anima Morte also recorded a version of the main theme for the Cani Arrabbiati - Opening themes tribute compilation. The music by Ennio Morricone was later sampled by Thievery Corporation. The grindcore band Cripple Bastards released an album with the same title.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 11:07:56 GMT -5
41. Fort Apache (1948) Fort Apache is a 1948 western film directed by John Ford and starring John Wayne and Henry Fonda. The film was the first of the director's "cavalry trilogy" and was followed by She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949) and Rio Grande (1950), both also starring Wayne. The story, which screenwriter James Warner Bellah based loosely on George Armstrong Custer and the Battle of Little Bighorn, as well as the Fetterman Massacre of 1866, was one of the first to present an authentic and sympathetic view of the Native Americans involved in the battle (Apache in the film, Sioux in the real battles). The film was awarded the Best Director and Best Cinematography awards by the Locarno International Film Festival of Locarno, Switzerland. After the American Civil War, highly-respected veteran Captain Kirby York (John Wayne) is expected to replace the outgoing commander at Fort Apache, an isolated U.S. cavalry post. York had commanded his own regiment during the Civil War and was well-qualified to assume permanent command. To the surprise and disappointment of the company, command of the regiment was given to Lieutenant Colonel Owen Thursday (Henry Fonda). Thursday, a West Point graduate, was a general during the Civil War. Despite his Civil War combat record, Lieutenant Colonel Thursday lacks experience with the Indians he is expected to oversee, and is an arrogant and egocentric officer. Accompanying widower Thursday is his daughter, Philadelphia (Shirley Temple). She becomes attracted to Second Lieutenant Michael Shannon O'Rourke (John Agar), the son of Sergeant Major Michael O'Rourke (Ward Bond). The elder O'Rourke a recipient of the Medal of Honor as a major with the Irish Brigade during the Civil War, entitling his son to enter West Point and become an officer. However, the class-conscious Thursday forbids his daughter to see someone he does not consider a gentleman. When there is unrest among the Indians, led by Cochise (Miguel Inclan), Thursday ignores York's advice to treat the natives with honor and to remedy problems on the reservation caused by corrupt Indian agent Silas Meacham (Grant Withers). Thursday's inability to deal with Meacham effectively, due to his rigid interpretation of Army regulations stating that Meacham is agent of the United States government and therefore entitled to Army protection (despite his own personal contempt for the man), coupled with Thursday's prejudicial and arrogant ignorance regarding the Apache drives the Indians to rebel. Eager for glory and recognition, Thursday orders his regiment into battle on Cochise's terms, a direct charge into the hills, despite York's urgent warnings that such a move would be suicidal. Thursday relieves York and orders him to stay back, replacing him with Captain Sam Collingwood (George O'Brien). By deliberately misinterpreting his orders York spares the younger O'Rourke from battle. Thursday's entire command is nearly wiped out, but a few soldiers manage to escape back to the ridge where Captain York is positioned. Thursday himself survives but then returns to die with the last of his trapped men. Cochise spares York and the rest of the detachment because he knows York to be an honorable man. Subsequently, now Lieutenant-Colonel Kirby York commands the regiment. Meeting with correspondents, he introduces Lt. O'Rourke, now married to Philadelphia Thursday. A reporter asks Colonel York if he has seen the famous painting depicting "Thursday's Charge." York, about to command a new and arduous campaign to bring in the Apaches, while believing that Thursday was a poor tactician and foolhardedly led a suicidal charge, says it is completely accurate and then reminds the reporters that the soldiers will never be forgotten as long as the regiment lives. Some exteriors for the film's location shooting were shot in Monument Valley, Utah. The exteriors involving the fort itself and the renegade Indian agent's trading post were filmed at the Corriganville Movie Ranch, a former Simi Hills movie ranch that is now a regional park in the Simi Valley of Southern California. In the ball scene Col. Thursday dances while the band plays the tune of "Oh, Dem Golden Slippers", a minstrel song which was written in 1879, after the film was probably set.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 11:16:17 GMT -5
Here is the list so far.
50. The Gunfighter (1950) 49. Quigley Down Under (1990) 48. The Valley of Gwangi (1969) 47. Bandolero! (1968) 46. How The West Was Won (1962) 45. Rooster Cogburn (1975) 44. Open Range (2003) 43. She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) 42. The Great Silence (1968) 41. Fort Apache (1948)
Now for taglines to the next five films.
* He's the right hand of the devil * Simple. Powerful. Unforgettable. * The deadliest range war ever to EXPLODE on the screen! * THE LEGEND - John Wayne is........ * They were seven - And they fought like seven hundred!
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 14:06:35 GMT -5
40. Chisum (1970) Chisum is a 1970 Warner Bros. Technicolor western motion picture starring John Wayne, Forrest Tucker, Christopher George, Ben Johnson, Glenn Corbett, Geoffrey Deuel, Andrew Prine, Bruce Cabot, Patric Knowles, and Richard Jaeckel. Directed by Andrew V. McLaglen, it was adapted for the screen by Andrew J. Fenady from his short story, Chisum and the Lincoln County Cattle War. Although this movie is historically inaccurate in many details, it is loosely based on events and characters from the Lincoln County War of 1878 in New Mexico Territory, which involved Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid among others. John Chisum (John Wayne), a virtuous, patriarchal land baron, locks horns with greedy Lawrence Murphy (Forrest Tucker), who will stop at nothing to get control of the trade and even the law in Lincoln County. Chisum is an aging rancher with an eventful past and a paternalistic nature towards his companions and community. Murphy, a malevolent land developer, plans to take control of the county for his own personal gain. The story begins Murphy's men tipping off Mexican rustlers who plan to steal Chisum's horses. Chisum and his sidekick Pepper (Ben Johnson) stop the bandits with help from a newcomer to the area, William Bonney (Geoffrey Deuel), also known as Billy the Kid. A notorious killer, Billy has been given a chance to reform by Chisum's philanthropic neighbor, rancher Henry Tunstall (Patric Knowles). Billy also falls for Chisum's newly arrived niece, Sallie (Pamela McMyler). Murphy is buying up all the stores in town and using his monopoly to push up the prices. He appoints his own sheriff and deputies. He also brings in a lawyer, Alex McSween (Andrew Prine), whose principles lead him to switch sides and seek work with Chisum and Tunstall. The two ranchers set up their own bank and general store in town under McSween's control. Chisum's land and cattle remain targets. Murphy's men attempt to steal Chisum's cattle before he can sell them to the Army. Chisum's ranch hands are warned by Pat Garrett (Glenn Corbett), a passing buffalo hunter. Garrett agrees to help Chisum and soon befriends Bonney. Together they foil an attack by Murphy's men on the wagons bringing in provisions for the new store. Fed up with Murphy's underhand activities, Tunstall rides off to Santa Fe to seek the intervention of Gov. Sam Axtell (Alan Baxter). On the way he is intercepted by Murphy's deputies, who falsely accuse him of cattle rustling and shoot him dead. Chisum and Garrett hunt down the deputies and ride them back towards town for trial. Bonney, seeking revenge for the murder of his mentor, overpowers Garrett and shoots dead both deputies. Before Sheriff Brady (Bruce Cabot) can organise a posse, Billy rides into town and kills him too. Murphy appoints bounty hunter Dan Nodeen (Christopher George) as the new sheriff, giving him orders to hunt down Bonney. Nodeen has a score to settle, as a previous encounter with Bonney has left him with a permanent limp. Billy's plans for revenge are only just beginning. He breaks into McSween's store looking for dynamite. He is spotted by Nodeen, who gets Murphy's men to surround the store. McSween comes out unarmed but Nodeen shoots him in cold blood. Chisum is alerted by McSween's wife (Lynda Day George) and rides into town. The main street is blocked, so Chisum stampedes his cattle through the barricades. He tracks down Murphy and takes him on in a fist fight which ends with both men falling from a balcony. Murphy ends up impaled on steer horns. With his paymaster dead, Nodeen flees with Billy in pursuit. The film ends with Garrett taking over as sheriff and settling down with Sallie. It's been learned that General Lew Wallace takes over as governor of the area. With law and order restored, Chisum can resume his iconic vigil over the Pecos valley. Michael A. Wayne, executive producer, took on the project of making Chisum because he felt the story summed up well his father's political views. The sizeable cast is packed with familiar faces from earlier John Wayne films, as well as friends such as Forrest Tucker. It was filmed in 1969 in Durango, Mexico. The picturesque vistas of the area were captured by cinematographer William H. Clothier. The film was originally made for 20th Century Fox, but they sold the film to Warner Bros. John Wayne was on the set of Chisum when he heard of his nomination for an Academy Award in 1970 for True Grit. During filming, John Mitchum, brother of Robert, introduced John Wayne to his patriotic poetry. Seeing that Wayne was greatly moved by the word, Forrest Tucker suggested that the two collaborate to record some of the poetry, which resulted in a Grammy-nominated spoken-word album, America: Why I Love Her. Released in June 1970, it was a relative success, grossing over $12 million at the box office. U.S. President Richard Nixon commented on the film during a press conference in Denver, Colorado on 3 August 1970. In doing so, he used the film as a context to explain his views on law and order: "Over the last weekend I saw a movie-I don't see too many movies but I try to see them on weekends when I am at the Western White House or in Florida--and the movie that I selected, or, as a matter of fact, my daughter Tricia selected it, was "Chisum" with John Wayne. It was a western. And as I looked at that movie, I said, "Well, it was a very good western, John Wayne is a very fine actor and it was: a fine supporting cast. But it was just basically another western, far better than average movies, better than average westerns." I wondered why it is that the western survives year after year after year. A good western will outdraw some of the other subjects. Perhaps one of the reasons, in addition to the excitement, the gun play, and the rest, which perhaps is part of it but they can get that in other kinds of movies but one of the reasons is, perhaps, and this may be a square observation-is that the good guys come out ahead in the westerns; the bad guys lose. In the end, as this movie particularly pointed out, even in the old West, the time before New Mexico was a State, there was a time when there was no law. But the law eventually came, and the law was important from the standpoint of not only prosecuting the guilty, but also seeing that those who were guilty had a proper trial."
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 14:18:21 GMT -5
39. High Noon (1952) High Noon is a 1952 American western film directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. The film tells in real time the story of a town marshal forced to face a gang of killers by himself. The screenplay was written by Carl Foreman. In 1989, High Noon was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant", entering the registry during the latter's first year of existence. The film is #27 on the American Film Institute's 2007 list of great films. Will Kane (Gary Cooper), the longtime marshal of Hadleyville, New Mexico Territory, has just married pacifist Quaker Amy (Grace Kelly) and turned in his badge. He intends to become a storekeeper elsewhere. Suddenly, the town learns that Frank Miller (Ian MacDonald) — a criminal Kane brought to justice — is due to arrive on the noon train. Miller had been sentenced to hang, but was pardoned on an unspecified legal technicality. In court, he had vowed to get revenge on Kane and anyone else who got in the way. Miller's three gang members — including his younger brother Ben (Sheb Wooley of The Purple People Eater and Rawhide fame) — wait for him at the station. The worried townspeople encourage Kane to leave, hoping that would defuse the situation. Kane and his wife leave town, but — fearing that the gang will hunt him down and would be a danger to the townspeople — Kane turns back. He reclaims his badge and scours the town for help. His deputy, Harvey Pell (Lloyd Bridges) resigns, because he wants the glory of facing Frank Miller for himself. Helen Ramírez (Katy Jurado), Kane's former lover, supports him, but there is little she can do to help. Disgusted by the cowardice and ingratitude of her neighbors, she sells her business and prepares to leave town. Amy threatens to leave on the noon train, with or without Kane, but he stubbornly refuses to give in. He interrupts Sunday church services looking for deputies. While many townspeople profess to admire Kane, nobody volunteers. In the end, Kane faces the Miller Gang alone. Kane guns down two of the gang, though he himself is wounded in the process. Helen Ramirez and Amy both board the train, but Amy gets off when she hears the sound of gunfire. Amy chooses her husband's life over her religious beliefs, shooting Pierce from behind. Frank then takes her hostage to force Kane into the open. However, Amy suddenly attacks Frank who is forced to push her aside, giving Kane a clear shot, and Kane shoots Frank Miller dead. As the townspeople emerge, Kane contemptuously throws his marshal's star in the dirt and leaves town with his wife. There was some controversy over the casting of Cooper in the lead role: at 50, nearly 30 years older than co-star Kelly, he was considered too old for the role. Zinnemann was highly influenced by the books of Karl May, which he had read as a child. Some scenes were filmed on various locations in California: * the town scenes were filmed in present-day Columbia State Historic Park; * the church is Saint Joseph's Catholic Church in Tuolumne City; * the train station is in Jamestown. According to the 2002 documentary Darkness at High Noon: The Carl Foreman Documents, written, produced, and directed by Lionel Chetwynd, Foreman's role in the creation and production of High Noon has over the years been unfairly downplayed in favor of Foreman's former partner and producer, Stanley Kramer.[3] The documentary was prompted by and based in part on a single-spaced 11-page letter that Foreman wrote to film critic Bosley Crowther in April 1952.[3] In the letter, Foreman asserts that the film began as a four-page plot outline about "aggression in a western background" and "telling a motion picture story in the exact time required for the events of the story itself" (a device used in High Noon).[3] An associate of Foreman pointed out similarities between Foreman's outline and the short story "The Tin Star" by John W. Cunningham, which led Foreman to purchase the rights to Cunningham's story and proceed with the original outline.[3] By the time the documentary aired, most of those immediately involved were dead, including Kramer, Foreman, Fred Zinnemann, and Gary Cooper. Kramer's widow rebuts Foreman's contentions; Victor Navasky, author of Naming Names and familiar with some of the circumstances surrounding High Noon because of interviews with Kramer's widow among others, said the documentary seemed "one-sided, and the problem is it makes a villain out of Stanley Kramer, when it was more complicated than that." MODA Entertainment’s new documentary, Inside High Noon, which appears on the Lionsgate Ultimate Collectors DVD released in 2008, also explores the natural personality behind the production. Written, directed and produced by filmmaker John Mulholland, the documentary includes interview subjects, including the sons of director Fred Zinnemann (who says the production design was based on the photographs of Civil War photographer Mathew Brady) and Carl Foreman. It also includes an interview with President Bill Clinton who provides a political commentary on the film. One noteworthy fact about this documentary: four minutes were taken out of the final cut, presumably at the insistence of Lionsgate. This crucial chunk is about John Wayne’s dislike for the film, ending with a kicker that shows The Duke’s critical opinion of the film. The film's production and release also intersected with the second Red Scare and the Korean War. Writer, producer and partner Carl Foreman was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) while he was writing the film. Foreman had not been in the Communist Party for almost ten years, but declined to name names and was considered an "un-cooperative witness" by the HUAC. When Stanley Kramer found out some of this, he forced Foreman to sell his part of their company, and tried to get him kicked off the making of the picture. Fred Zinnemann, Gary Cooper, and Bruce Church intervened. There was also a problem with the Bank of America loan, as Foreman had not yet signed certain papers. Thus Foreman remained on the production, but moved to England before it was released nationally, as he knew he would never be allowed to work in America. Kramer claimed he had not stood up for Foreman partly because Foreman was threatening to dishonestly name Kramer as a Communist. Foreman said that Kramer was afraid of what would happen to him and his career if Kramer did not cooperate with the Committee. Kramer wanted Foreman to name names and not plead his Fifth Amendment rights. Foreman was eventually blacklisted by the Hollywood companies. There had also been pressure against Foreman by, among others, Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures (Kramer's brand new boss at the time), John Wayne of the MPA and Hedda Hopper of the Los Angeles Times. Cast and crew members were also affected. Howland Chamberlin was blacklisted, while Floyd Crosby and Lloyd Bridges were "gray listed." Upon its release, the film was criticized by many filmgoers, as it did not contain such expected western archetypes as chases, violence, action, and picture postcard scenery. Rather, it presented emotional and moralistic dialogue throughout most of the film. Only in the last few minutes were there action scenes. In the Soviet Union the film was criticized as "a glorification of the individual." The American Left appreciated the film for what they believed was an allegory of people (Hollywood people, in particular) that were afraid to stand up to HUAC. However, the film eventually gained the respect of people with conservative/anti-communist views. Ronald Reagan, a conservative and fervent anti-communist, said he appreciated the film because the main character had a strong dedication to duty, law, and the well being of the town, despite the refusal of the townspeople to help. Eisenhower loved the film and frequently screened it in the White House, as did many other American presidents. Bill Clinton cited High Noon as his favorite film, and screened it a record 17 times at the White House. Actor John Wayne disliked the film because he felt it was an allegory for blacklisting, which he actively supported. In his Playboy interview from May 1971, Wayne stated he considered High Noon "the most un-American thing I’ve ever seen in my whole life" and went on to say he would never regret having helped blacklist liberal screenwriter Carl Foreman from Hollywood. Ironically, Gary Cooper himself had conservative political views, and was a "friendly witness" to the HUAC several years earlier, although he did not "name names" and later strongly opposed blacklisting. Wayne accepted Cooper's Academy Award for the role as Cooper was unable to attend the presentation. In 1959, Wayne teamed up with director Howard Hawks to make Rio Bravo as a conservative response. Hawks explained, "I made Rio Bravo because I didn't like High Noon. Neither did Duke. I didn't think a good town marshal was going to run around town like a chicken with his head cut off asking everyone to help. And who saves him? His Quaker wife. That isn't my idea of a good Western." Irritated by Hawks' criticisms, director Fred Zinnemann responded, "I admire Hawks very much. I only wish he'd leave my films alone!" Zinnemann later said in a 1973 interview, "I'm told that Howard Hawks has said on various occasions that he made Rio Bravo as a kind of answer to High Noon, because he didn't believe that a good sheriff would go running around town asking for other people's help to do his job. I'm rather surprised at this kind of thinking. Sheriffs are people and no two people alike. The story of High Noon takes place in the Old West but it is really a story about a man's conflict of conscience. In this sense it is a cousin to A Man for All Seasons. In any event, respect for the Western Hero has not been diminished by High Noon." The movie won Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Gary Cooper), Best Film Editing (Elmo Williams and Harry W. Gerstad), Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture (Dimitri Tiomkin), and Best Music, Song (Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington for "Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin'", sung by Tex Ritter). It was nominated for Best Director, Best Picture, and Best Writing, Screenplay. Entertainment Weekly ranked Will Kane on their list of The 20 All Time Coolest Heroes in Pop Culture. Its loss in the Best Picture category to The Greatest Show on Earth, by Cecil B. DeMille, is usually seen as one of the biggest upsets in the history of the Academy Awards. This loss is often cited as an effort to satisfy Senator Joseph McCarthy, who pursued communists at the time, and DeMille was one of his supporters. Producer Carl Foreman would later be blacklisted from Hollywood. Ironically, despite despising the film, it was John Wayne who picked up Gary Cooper's Academy Award. Mexican actress Katy Jurado won the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress for her role of Helen Ramirez, becoming the first Mexican actress to receive the award. American Film Institute recognition * 1998 AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies #33 * 2001 AFI's 100 Years…100 Thrills #20 * 2003 AFI's 100 Years…100 Heroes and Villains: - Will Kane, hero #5 * 2004 AFI's 100 Years…100 Songs: - "High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me, Oh My Darlin')" #25 * 2005 AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores #10 * 2006 AFI's 100 Years…100 Cheers #27 * 2007 AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) #27 * 2008 AFI's 10 Top 10 #2 Western film In 1989, twenty-two-year-old Polish graphic designer Tomasz Sarnecki transformed Marian Stachurski's 1959 Polish variant of the High Noon poster into a Solidarity election poster for the first partially-free elections in communist Poland. The poster which was displayed all over Poland shows Cooper armed with a folded ballot saying "Wybory" (i.e. election) in his right hand while the Solidarity logo is pinned to his vest above the sheriff's badge. The message at the bottom of the poster reads "W samo po³udnie: 4 czerwca 1989" which translates to "High Noon: 4 June 1989." In 2004 former Solidarity leader Lech Wa³êsa wrote: “ Under the headline "At High Noon" runs the red Solidarity banner and the date—June 4, 1989—of the poll. It was a simple but effective gimmick that, at the time, was misunderstood by the Communists. They, in fact, tried to ridicule the freedom movement in Poland as an invention of the "Wild" West, especially the U.S. But the poster had the opposite impact: Cowboys in Western clothes had become a powerful symbol for Poles. Cowboys fight for justice, fight against evil, and fight for freedom, both physical and spiritual. Solidarity trounced the Communists in that election, paving the way for a democratic government in Poland. It is always so touching when people bring this poster up to me to autograph it. They have cherished it for so many years and it has become the emblem of the battle that we all fought together. ” According to an English professor at Yeshiva University, High Noon is the film most requested for viewing by U.S. presidents. It has been cited as the favorite film of Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Bill Clinton. The conflict of the role of the Western Hero is ironically portrayed in the film Die Hard. The villain confuses John Wayne as the hero walking off into the sunset with Grace Kelly only to be corrected by the protagonist. High Noon is the favourite film of DCI Gene Hunt of Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes. Hunt makes periodic references to the film throughout the two series' five seasons. There were many remakes and sequels like: * A made-for-TV sequel, High Noon Part II: The Return Of Will Kane (produced in 1980, 28 years after the original movie was released), featured Lee Majors in the Cooper role. CBS-TV ran this in a 2-hour time-slot on November 15, 1980. * The 1980 science fiction film Outland borrowed from the story of High Noon for its plot. The movie starred Sean Connery. * In 2000, High Noon was entirely re-worked for cable television with Tom Skerritt in the lead role. * In 2002, The Simpson's 13th Season Finale "Poppa's Got a Brand New Badge" draws inspiration from both High Noon and The Sopranos, when Homer, in charge of Spring Shield Security, has to face by himself the revenge of Fat Tony, whose operations Homer had disrupted. * In 1966, Four-Star produced a "High Noon" TV pilot. The 30-minute pilot was called "The Clock Strikes Noon Again" and was set 20 years after the original movie. Peter Fonda plays Will Kane Jr., who goes to Hadleyville after Frank Miller's son kills his father (the Gary Cooper character). His mother (the Grace Kelly character) died shortly after from grief. In Hadleyville, Will Kane Jr. meets Helen Ramirez, once again played by Katy Jurado (she played this same character in the original movie). Helen returned to town and was now running a hotel/restaurant. The script was written by James Warner Bellah. No series came from this unsold TV pilot. * Gary Cooper has a cameo as his "High Noon" character Will Kane in "Alias Jesse James" (1959). He is wearing his "High Noon" tin star. After shooting a bad guy, Will says the line "Yup".
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 14:22:43 GMT -5
38. They Call Me Trinity (aka My Name Is Trinity) (1970) They Call Me Trinity (Italian: Lo chiamavano Trinità) also known as My Name is Trinity, is a 1970 Italian spaghetti western film starring Terence Hill and Bud Spencer. In the first scene, Trinity (Terence Hill) comes into view accompanied by the movie's song. His horse is dragging him around in a travois. He is filthy, yet seems perfectly content as the horse drags him across the desert and through water crossings. When the horse stops near a dwelling, Trinity gets up, pulls on his boots, gets stung by a scorpion hiding in the boot but is clearly insusceptible to the venom then he drags his Colt 45 in holster and walks inside. It is the Chaparral Stagecoach Station and restaurant. The Mexican owner, noting Trinity's wretched appearance, tells him he will sell him a plate of beans if he has money to pay, a fly infested misshapen slattern prepares the dish. Trinity takes the frying pan along with the plate, scraping the beans from the plate back into the pan and proceeds to eat from the pan with gusto, punctuated by occasional loud burping. The eating scenes are a frequent comic element of the movies in which the team of Terence Hill and Bud Spencer appear. There are two white men in the restaurant with an injured Mexican prisoner. The two men are bounty hunters and are disappointed to see that Trinity's face does not appear in their batch of Wanted posters and proceed to disparage him for his sooty unkempt appearance. After Trinity has eaten every scrap in the pan, he gets up, strolls over to the men's table, and calmly relieves them of their prisoner. When they ask him his name so they'll know what to put on the headstone, he answers, "They call me Trinity." The resulting double-take foreshadows Trinity's notoriety. Trinity offers them a disarming grin when they refer to him as the "Right Hand of the Devil" and tell him that it's said he has "the fastest gun around." As he walks outside with their prisoner, the men stick their rifle through a window in preparation to shoot Trinity. But in one smooth movement from behind his back and apparently without aiming, Trinity drops both men in their tracks. It's a zen move showing his effortless, almost mystic skill with a gun. He casually gives the injured Mexican his spot on the travois as he perches himself backwards on the horse so the men can converse as they travel. Soon they reach a small town where an enormous man with a sheriff's star on his chest is seated outside his office, apparently trying to read a newspaper. He is being harassed by three local toughs standing in the street loudly demanding that he release their friend from jail. Trinity stops to watch the developing gunfight, predicting to the Mexican that the toughs will be "stiff before they hit the ground." When the enormous man quickdraws them with his left hand and outshoots them without blinking, the Mexican asks Trinity who the fast gun is and is told the enormous man is the "Left Hand of the Devil." It quickly becomes apparent that Trinity and the enormous man, an omnipotent bearded buffoon with squinty eyes - comically called Bambino (baby), are brothers. Bambino (played by Bud Spencer) is merely posing as the sheriff of the small town while he awaits the arrival of his gang from the penitentiary from which he escaped. He is not happy to see his troublemaking brother. However, the two form a temporary partnership to deal with Major Harriman (Farley Granger), who is attempting to run a group of pacifist Mormon farmers off their land with the intention of using their property to graze his own horses. The fact that these horses are valuable and unbranded explain Bambino's grudging willingness to work with his little brother even though he considers Trinity to be a shiftless bum without ambition. However, Trinity has fallen in love with two Mormon sisters and is genuinely concerned with the Mormon settlers' welfare. He persuades Bambino and Bambino's henchmen to help train the pacifistic Mormons to fight, and in the final battle, the Mormon leader finds in the Book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible that "there is a time for fighting," and the Mormons are unleashed against Major Harriman's goons, using the dirty fighting tricks they learned. Bambino is flabbergasted and then infuriated to learn that Trinity has given the Major's horses to the Mormons. Trinity is about to be happily married to the two Mormon sisters when he learns to his horror that being a married Mormon means actually having to work. So he skips out and goes after Bambino. But his brother has had enough of him and sends him off in the opposite direction. Trinity gets the last laugh, though. He directs the real sheriff (who has come looking for Bambino) in Bambino's direction. There are slight differences between the original Italian version and the dubbed English version. In the former, the injured Mexican has more dialogue explaining that he was arrested for knifing a gringo who tried to rape his wife. This film was a huge success worldwide and took Terence Hill and Bud Spencer to the level of international stardom. It is credited with starting the "comedy western" craze that swept Italy for a short time. A sequel, Trinity Is Still My Name was soon produced and proved to be an even bigger success. Terence Hill and Bud Spencer would pair up in over a dozen other films, using the formula of brawls and jokes established here. Several of Hill's and Spencer's Westerns made prior to Trinity were rereleased in the United States to take advantage of their newfound popularity with one given a "Trinity" title. In the English version, the scenes where a man on a horse rides past Bud Spencer have the exchange "good evening sheriff" with Spencer grumbling "shut up" whilst the Italian version is silent. The Italian version has the two Mormon women quote suggestive Biblical dialogue to seduce Hill that is not in the English version. The English version adds a loud clap of thunder when the head Mormon remarks about God helping them through sending them the two brothers to protect them whilst the thunder is not on the Italian soundtrack. The film is considered to be in the public domain in the United States, and many poor quality DVDs have been made of it. Hen's Tooth Video officially released this film and its sequel on DVD in the US on September 4, 2007. Both are new digital transfers from the original negatives. Parts of the soundtrack, composed by Franco Micalizzi, are featured in the videogame Red Dead Revolver.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 14:31:36 GMT -5
37. The Magnificent Seven (1960) Magnificent Seven is a 1960 American western film directed by John Sturges about a group of hired gunmen protecting a Mexican village from bandits. The seven are played by Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Robert Vaughn, Brad Dexter and Horst Buchholz, with their adversary, the bandit Calvera, portrayed by Eli Wallach. The film's iconic music was composed by Elmer Bernstein. It is a remake of Akira Kurosawa's 1954 film, Seven Samurai. A Mexican village is periodically raided by bandits led by Calvera (Eli Wallach). As he and his men ride away from their latest visit, Calvera promises to return. Desperate, the village leaders travel to a border town to buy guns to defend themselves. They approach a veteran gunslinger, Chris (Yul Brynner). He suggests that they hire fighters instead, saying that men are cheaper than guns. They ask him to lead them but Chris rejects them, telling them a single man is not enough. They keep asking and he eventually gives in. He manages to recruit men even though the pay is a pittance. First to answer the call is the hotheaded, inexperienced Chico (Horst Buchholz), but he is rejected. Harry Luck (Brad Dexter), an old friend of Chris, joins because he believes Chris is looking for treasure. Vin (Steve McQueen) signs on after going broke from gambling. Other recruits include Bernardo O'Reilly (Charles Bronson), a powerful gunfighter of Irish-Mexican descent[1] who is also broke, Britt (James Coburn), fast and deadly with his switchblade, and Lee (Robert Vaughn), who is on the run and needs someplace to lie low until things cool down. Chico trails the group as they ride south and is eventually allowed to join them. Even with seven, the group knows they will be vastly outnumbered by the bandits. However, their expectation is that once the bandits know they will have to fight, they will decide to move on to some other unprotected village, rather than bother with an all-out battle. Upon reaching the village the group begins training the residents. As they work together the gunmen and villagers begin to bond. The gunfighters enjoy a feast prepared by some of the women but they realize that the villagers are starving themselves so that the gunfighters will have enough to eat. They then stop eating and share the food with the village children. Chico finds a woman he is attracted to, Petra (Rosenda Monteros), and Bernardo befriends the children of the village, although he can never imagine himself as one of the villagers themselves.[2] Although these paternal tendencies will have fatal consequences, the villagers come to respect and even admire him.[3] Lee, meanwhile, struggles with nightmares and fears the loss of his gunfighting skills. Calvera comes back and is disappointed to find the villagers have hired gunmen. After a brief exchange, the bandits are chased away. Later, Chico, who is Mexican himself, and thus blends in, infiltrates the bandits' camp and returns with the news that Calvera and his men will not simply be moving on, as had been expected. They are planning to return in full force, as the bandits are also broke and starving, and need the crops from the village to survive. The seven debate whether they should leave. Not having expected a full-scale war, some of the seven as well as some of the villagers are in favor of the group's departure but Chris adamantly insists that they will stay. They decide to make a surprise raid on the bandit camp but find it empty. Upon return to the village they are captured by Calvera's men who have been let into the village by those villagers fearful of the impending fight. Calvera spares the gunfighters' lives because he believes that they have learned that the farmers are not worth fighting for and because he fears American reprisals if they are killed. Calvera has them escorted out of town and then contemptuously returns their guns and gun belts. Despite the odds against them, and despite their betrayal by the villagers, all of Chris' group except Harry decide to return and finish the job the next morning (Harry refuses to go back when he learns there is no monetary reward). During the ensuing battle Harry returns in the nick of time to rescue Chris from certain death but is shot and fatally wounded. Bernardo is shot and killed protecting children he had befriended; Lee overcomes his fear of death and kills several men before he is shot dead. Britt is also slain but not before sticking his switchblade into the ground where he falls. Seeing the gunmen's bravery the villagers overcome their own fear, grab whatever they can as weapons, and join the battle. The bandits are routed and Calvera is shot by Chris. Puzzled, he asks why a man like Chris came back but dies without an answer. As the three survivors leave Chico decides to stay with Petra. Chris and Vin ride away, pausing briefly at the graves of their fallen comrades. Chris observes, "The Old Man was right. Only the farmers won. We lost. We'll always lose." Filming began on March 1, 1960, on location in Mexico, where both the village and the U.S. border town were built for the film. The first scene shot was the first part of the six gunfighters' journey to the Mexican village, prior to Chico being brought into the group. The cinematographic process was anamorphic. This process was developed in the 1940s but not widely used until the 1960s. A film with anamorphic aspect ratio appears wider (more panoramic) than when shot and projected at a ratio of 4:3 (width:height), which had been the industry standard until wide-screen formats gained popularity. This change was intended to give the cinema a look that would further distinguish it from - and give a competing edge over - television (which used the 4:3 format). The film's success inspired three sequels: * Return of the Seven (1966) * Guns of the Magnificent Seven (1969) * The Magnificent Seven Ride (1972) None of these were as successful as the original film. The film also inspired a television series, The Magnificent Seven, which ran from 1998 to 2000. The plot of The Magnificent Seven directly inspired the 1980 sci-fi film, Battle Beyond the Stars, which included actor Robert Vaughn as one of the seven mercenaries hired to save a farming planet from alien marauders. The 1986 comedy Three Amigos directly parodies many aspects of The Magnificent Seven, from the hiring of a team of Americans to defend a small Mexican village, to the training of the villagers by the mercenaries, to the megalomaniacal over-the-top character of the Mexican gang leader. The film's score along with the main theme is by Elmer Bernstein. The score was nominated for an Academy Award in 1961. The original soundtrack was not released at the time until reused and rerecorded by Bernstein for the soundtrack of Return of the Seven. Instead electric guitar cover versions by Al Caiola in the US and John Barry in the UK were successful on the popular charts. A vocal theme not written by Bernstein was used in a trailer. Starting in 1963, the theme was used in commercials in the USA for Marlboro cigarettes. A similar-sounding (but different) tune was used for Victoria Bitter beer in Australia. The theme was included in the James Bond film Moonraker (also from United Artists). Other uses include a passage in the track "No Opportunity Necessary, No Experience Needed" on the 1970 album Time and a Word by the progressive rock band Yes; in the 2004 documentary film Fahrenheit 9/11; in the 2005 film The Ringer; as entrance music for the British band James, as well as episodes of The Simpsons that had a "western" theme (mainly in the episode titled "Dude, Where's My Ranch?"). The opening horn riff in Arthur Conley's 1967 hit "Sweet Soul Music" is borrowed from the theme. The Mick Jones 1980s band Big Audio Dynamite covered the song, as "Keep off the Grass." In 1992, the main theme of The Magnificent Seven came into use on a section of the Euro Disneyland Railroad at Disneyland Paris. Portions of the theme play as the train exits the Grand Canyon diorama tunnel behind Phantom Manor, enters Frontierland, and travels along the bank of the Rivers of the Far West. In 1994 James Sedares conducted a re-recording of the score performed by The Phoenix Symphony Orchestra (which also included a suite from Bernstein's score for The Hallelujah Trail, issued by Koch Records; Bernstein himself conducted the Royal Scottish National Orchestra for a performance released by RCA in 1997, but the original film soundtrack was not released until the following year by Rykodisc (Varèse Sarabande reissued this album in 2004). 1. Main Title and Calvera (3:56) 2. Council (3:14) 3. Quest (1:00) 4. Strange Funeral/After The Brawl (6:48) 5. Vin’s Luck (2:03) 6. And Then There Were Two (1:45) 7. Fiesta (1:11) 8. Stalking (1:20) 9. Worst Shot (3:02) 10. The Journey (4:39) 11. Toro (3:24) 12. Training (1:27) 13. Calvera's Return (2:37) 14. Calvera Routed (1:49) 15. Ambush (3:10) 16. Bernardo (3:33) 17. Surprise (2:08) 18. Defeat (3:26) 19. Crossroads (4:47) 20. Harry's Mistake (2:48) 21. Calvera Killed (3:33) 22. Finale (3:27) The score was listed at #8 on AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores. Although The Magnificent Seven is modeled so closely on Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai (also originally released in the USA under the title "The Magnificent Seven") that they share even some dialogue (in different languages), there are several notable differences: * Samurai's villagers are sent to town to hire swordsmen. In this remake, the villagers are sent to town originally to buy guns. Chris tells them that in fact, it will be cheaper to hire gunmen than to buy guns. Howard Hughes in Stagecoach to Tombstone says that the original screenplay for The Magnificent Seven followed Seven Samurai on this point, but was changed on the insistence of the Mexican censors concerned about the degree to which the Mexican peasants in the film were portrayed as dependent upon American saviors. The change allowed the peasants to be depicted as willing to defend themselves on their own, turning ultimately to American aid only because of practical concerns. * In Samurai the reason of using a total of seven ronin was based on tactics. In Return of the Seven, Chris says "luck" is why seven gunmen are needed; implicitly it's the same reason in all the films. * Katsushiro, the aspiring young samurai, and Kikuchiyo, the would-be samurai whose hatred for the farmers hides a painful past, are combined into the single character, Chico. Unlike Kikuchiyo, Chico is not killed at the climax of the film. * The combination of Katsushiro and Kikuchiyo opens a slot for the Robert Vaughn/Lee character - a gunfighter who has lost his nerve. His pursuit of perfection in his gunplay does mirror Kyuzo. * The Katsushiro and Kikuchiyo combination also opens a slot for the character of Harry Luck, the gunfighter who is convinced there is some financial gain in protecting the village. There is no comparable character in the original (though his first scene mirrors Gorobei's first appearance), all the samurai take the job knowing there is nothing more to gain from the job than what's promised. * Another combination of sorts takes place with Bernardo O'Reilly - his first appearance is based on Heihachi's debut (chopping wood perfectly, until he hears about the opposition they face) while his scenes with the children place him closer to Kikuchiyo. Incidentally, Charles Bronson (Bernardo) would later co-star with Toshiro Mifune (Kikuchiyo) in the movie Red Sun. * In the original, the samurai make a pre-emptive strike against the bandits' campsite, losing one of their own in the process. Thus, when the bandits attack the village, the samurai are short one man, and three more are killed in the battles. In this version, that attack takes place after Calvera's band are initially driven off, and they find that the camp is abandoned. * In Seven Samurai, the village is fortified to keep the bandits out until the climactic battle. In the remake, Chris states that the new walls were built to trap the bandits inside the village. * The bandit leader Calvera plays a much larger role than any of the unnamed bandits in the original. * Chico and Katsushiro both fall in love with a farmer's daughter, but in Seven Samurai, Katsushiro's relationship with the girl leads to a dramatic confrontation, and by the end the girl recognizes the impossibility of bridging the class divide and must ignore the samurai once the fighting is over. In The Magnificent Seven, Chico's relationship never results in scandal, and he stays behind to be with the peasant girl, purposefully rolling up his sleeves in order to start laboring. * In Seven Samurai, the village elder is killed by the bandits when he refuses to abandon his house, which is an outlying house that the Samurai determined could not be protected. In The Magnificent Seven, the village elder likewise refuses to abandon his house but suffers no repercussions for it. * In Seven Samurai, when Kikuchiyo attempts to impress the other samurai by deciding on his own to infiltrate the bandit camp, he is sharply rebuked. He believes he deserves praise because of the success and daring nature of his mission. Instead, Kambei berates him for failing to operate as a member of the team, which Kambei stresses is paramount in a war effort. In The Magnificent Seven, Chico receives no such reprimand upon returning from his reconnaissance mission to the bandit camp, and in speaking about it later, he says that he is certain that the other gunmen were impressed by what he did. * In The Magnificent Seven, neither the villagers nor the gunmen initially expect a battle to the death with bandits, resulting in internal conflict when it becomes clear that such an assault is pending and not all are in favor of risking their lives. This leads to the fearful villagers betraying the gunmen in order to prevent the deadly engagement, thus allowing Calvera to capture the men. Only at the very end of the film, after the climactic battle has already begun, do those villagers who had been against the battle finally take up arms and join in the fight against the bandits. By contrast, Seven Samurai features no such competing factions among the villagers and samurai. Although the villagers in Seven Samurai are also portrayed as frightened of the samurai and momentarily regretful for hiring them, all involved know from the outset that there ultimately will be a full-scale siege of the village. As such, after the initial acceptance of the samurai into the village, the villagers and samurai remain united throughout, with all of the villagers fully participating in the conflict from the beginning. The film is ranked #79 on AFI's 100 Years...100 Thrills.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 14:46:03 GMT -5
36. Blood On The Moon (1948) Blood on the Moon (1948) is an RKO black-and-white "psychological" western directed by Robert Wise with cinematography by Nicholas Musuraca. The film, starring Robert Mitchum, Barbara Bel Geddes, and Robert Preston has many film noir elements. It was shot in California and some of the more scenic shots at Red Rock Crossing, Sedona, Arizona. The picture is based on the novel Gunman's Chance by Luke Short. Drifter cowboy Jim Garry receives a job offer by mail from smooth-talking Tate Riling. Garry rides into an Indian reservation and finds himself in the middle of a feud between cattle ranchers and homesteaders. Garry doesn't realize that his new boss Riling is a criminal. Riling intends to swindle naive landowners in an elaborate scheme involving a plan to make sure that cattle owner Lufton and his family don't get grazing land, thereby losing their stock. At first aligning himself with Riling, Garry finally figures out that his so-called friend is up to no good. He switches loyalty to Lufton and his daughters, leading to a bloody showdown. The New York Times gave the film a good review and lauded Robert Mitchum's acting and Lilly Hayward's screenplay: "...Blood on the Moon still stands out from run-of-the-range action dramas. The reason is obvious enough. This picture has a sound, sensible story to tell and, besides, it is well acted. Robert Mitchum carries the burden of the film and his acting is superior all the way...Lillie Hayward's screen play, taken from a novel by Luke Short, is solidly constructed and by not over-emphasizing Jim Garry's inherent honesty, she has permitted Mr. Mitchum to illuminate a character that is reasonable and most always interesting. The same can be said of the rancher's daughter, whom Miss Bel Geddes represents. Others who give worthy help include Walter Brennan, Mr. Preston, Phyllis Thaxter, Frank Faylen and Tom Tully. And a word should be said, too, for the direction by Robert Wise. A comparative newcomer to the directorial ranks, he has managed to keep the atmosphere of this leisurely paced film charged with impending violence." The film was also reviewed favorably by Variety magazine: "Blood on the Moon is a terse, tightly-drawn western drama. There's none of the formula approach to its story telling. Picture captures the crisp style used by Luke Short in writing his western novels...Picture's pace has a false sense of leisureliness that points up several tough moments of action. There is a deadly knock-down and drag-out fist fight between Mitchum and Preston; a long chase across snow-covered mountains and the climax gun battle between Preston's henchmen and Mitchum, Brennan and Bel Geddes that are loaded with suspense wallop."
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 15:00:17 GMT -5
Here is the list so far.
50. The Gunfighter (1950) 49. Quigley Down Under (1990) 48. The Valley of Gwangi (1969) 47. Bandolero! (1968) 46. How The West Was Won (1962) 45. Rooster Cogburn (1975) 44. Open Range (2003) 43. She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) 42. The Great Silence (1968) 41. Fort Apache (1948) 40. Chisum (1970) 39. High Noon (1952) 38. They Call Me Trinity (aka My Name Is Trinity) (1970) 37. The Magnificent Seven (1960) 36. Blood On The Moon (1948)
Now for taglines to the next five films.
* Alone.......each is a bombshell. Together........they're dynamite. * In a town with no justice, there is only one law... Every man for himself. * Rod Steiger and James Coburn will blow you apart in..... * The story of a boy suddenly alone in the world. The men who challenge him. And the girl who helps him become a man. * The Time Has Come
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bob
Salacious Crumb
The "other" Bob. FOC COURSE!
started the Madness Wars, Proudly the #1 Nana Hater on FAN
Posts: 78,361
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Post by bob on May 9, 2011 15:32:34 GMT -5
I'm kinda surprised none of mine have been named yet
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Post by 'Foretold' Joker on May 9, 2011 16:43:44 GMT -5
Cool list so far, gotta check out some of these.
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Post by Seth Drakin of Monster Crap on May 9, 2011 17:28:25 GMT -5
35. Duck, You Sucker (1971) Duck, You Sucker! (Italian: Giù la testa), also known as A Fistful of Dynamite and Once Upon a Time… the Revolution, is a 1971 spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Leone and starring Rod Steiger and James Coburn. It is the second part of a trilogy of epic Leone films including the previous Once Upon a Time in the West and the subsequent Once Upon a Time in America, released thirteen years later. The last western film directed by Leone, it is considered by some to be one of his most overlooked films. The setting is 1913 Mexico at the time of the Revolution. Juan Miranda (Rod Steiger), a Mexican outlaw leading a bandit family, meets John (Sean) Mallory (James Coburn), an early Irish Republican explosives expert on the run from the British. Noting his skill with explosives, Juan relentlessly tries to make him join a raid on the Mesa Verde national bank. John in the meantime has made contact with the revolutionaries and intends to use his dynamite in their service. The bank is hit as part of an orchestrated revolutionary attack on the army organized by Doctor Villega (Romolo Valli). Juan, interested only in the money, is shocked to find that the bank has no funds and instead is used by the army as a political prison. John, Juan and his family end up freeing hundreds of prisoners, causing Juan to become a "great, grand, glorious hero of the revolution". The revolutionaries are chased into the hills by an army detachment led by Colonel Günther Reza (Antoine Saint-John). John and Juan volunteer to stay behind with two machine guns and dynamite. Much of the army's detachment is destroyed while crossing a bridge which is machinegunned by them and blown to bits by John. Col. Reza who commands an armoured car, survives. After the battle, John and Juan find most of their comrades, including Juan's family and children, have been killed by the army in a cave. Engulfed with grief and rage, Juan goes out to fight the army singlehanded and is captured. John sneaks into camp where he witnesses executions of many of his fellow revolutionaries by firing squad. They had been informed on by Dr. Villega, who has been tortured by Col. Reza and his men. This evokes in John memories of a similar betrayal by Nolan (David Warbeck), his best friend, whom John kills for informing. Juan faces a firing squad of his own, but John arrives and blows up the squad and the wall with dynamite just in time. They escape on a motorcycle John is driving. John and Juan hide in the animal coach of a train. It stops to pick up the tyrannical Governor Don Jaime (Franco Graziosi), who is fleeing (with a small fortune) from the revolutionary forces belonging to Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata. As the train is ambushed, John, as a test of Juan's loyalty, lets him choose between shooting the Governor and accepting a bribe from him. Juan kills Jaime, and also steals the Governor's spoils. As the doors to the coach open, Juan is greeted by a large crowd and again unexpectedly hailed as a great hero of the revolution, the money taken away by revolutionary General Santerna (Rik Battaglia). On a train with commanders of the revolution, John and Juan are joined by Dr. Villega, who has escaped. John alone knows of Villega's betrayal. They learn that Pancho Villa's forces will be delayed by 24 hours and that an army train carrying 1,000 soldiers and heavy weapons, led by Col. Reza, will be arriving in a few hours, which will surely overpower the rebel position. John suggests they rig a locomotive with dynamite and send it head on. He requires one other man, but instead of picking Juan, who volunteers, he chooses Dr. Villega. It becomes clear to Villega that he knows of the betrayal. John nonetheless pleads with him to jump off the locomotive before it hits the army's train, but Villega feels guilty and stays on board. John jumps in time and the two trains collide, killing Villega and a number of soldiers. The revolutionaries' ambush is successful, but as John approaches to meet Juan, he is shot in the back by Col. Reza. An enraged Juan riddles the Colonel's body with a machine gun. As John lies dying, he continues to have memories of his best friend, Nolan, and a young woman both apparently loved. John recalls killing Nolan after being betrayed by him to the law. Juan kneels by his side to ask about Dr. Villega. John keeps the doctor's secret and tells Juan that he died a hero of the revolution. As Juan goes to seek help, John has a flashback to his time in Ireland with Nolan and a girl whom they both were in love with; knowing his end is near, sets off a second charge he secretly laid in case the battle went bad. The film ends with Juan staring at the burning remains, asking forlornly: "What about me?" When Once Upon a Time in the West was released, Leone had said he would not have made another western for some time, because he had grown tired of all the things associated with the genre, such as horses and firearms. In fact, when the project first began Leone didn't intend to direct the picture himself. Peter Bogdanovich, his original choice for director, soon abandoned the film due to perceived lack of control. According to Leone, Sam Peckinpah agreed to direct the film after Bogdanovich's departure, only to be turned down for financial reasons by United Artists. Leone's collaborators Donati and Vincenzoni, noting the director's frequent embellishment of the facts concerning his films, claim that Peckinpah did not even consider it - Donati claimed Peckinpah was "too shrewd to be produced by a fellow director". Leone then recruited his regular assistant director Giancarlo Santi to direct, with Leone supervising proceedings, and Santi was in charge for the first ten days of shooting. However, Coburn and Steiger refused to play their roles unless Leone himself directed, and the producers pressured him into directing the film. He agreed, and Santi was relegated to second unit work. The inspiration for the firing squad scene came from Francisco Goya, and in particular from his set of prints The Disasters of War. Leone showed the prints to director of photography Giuseppe Ruzzolini in order to get the lighting and colour effects he wanted. The film is believed to have been influenced by Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch, and it shares some plot elements with Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, a western also starring Coburn and released a year later. The role of John Mallory was to be played by Jason Robards, but the studio wanted a bigger name for the lead, so James Coburn was recruited. Clint Eastwood was also approached by Leone for the role, but he saw it as just a different take of the same character he had already played in the Dollars Trilogy, and he also wanted to part with the Italian film industry, so he declined the offer and starred in Hang 'Em High. George Lazenby was then approached to play the role, but he declined. The role of Juan Miranda was written for Eli Wallach, but Wallach had already committed to another project with Jean-Paul Belmondo. After Leone begged Wallach to play the part, he dropped out of the other project and told Leone he would do his film. However, the studio never wanted Wallach; they wanted an actor who had more international appeal, and they already had Rod Steiger signed on by that point. Leone offered no compensation to Wallach, and Wallach subsequently sued. A young Malcom McDowell, then mostly known for the film if...., was considered for the part of Nolan. Exterior filming mostly took place in Andalusia, Spain. Some of the locations used previously featured in Leone's Dollar Trilogy films; for example, the Almería Railway Station, used for the train sequence in For a Few Dollars More, returns in this film as Mesa Verde's station. The flashback scenes were Sean, his girlfirend, and friend are driving in the car were shot at Howth Castle in Co.Dublin (as was the deleted scene which was supposed to be in the movie as another flasback before Sean is killed by the explosion in the films ending) and Toners pub on Baggot Street, Dublin. At first, Leone was dissatisfied with Steiger's performance in that he played his character as a serious, Zapata-like figure, but once Leone explained him the mistake they were both content with the result. As filming progressed, Leone modified pieces of the script: as he did not originally plan on directing Duck, You Sucker, he thought the script was "conceived for an American filmmaker". Duck, You Sucker! was one of the last mainstream films shot in Techniscope. Despite the politically charged setting, Duck, You Sucker! was not intended as a political film: Leone himself said that the Mexican Revolution in the film is meant only as a symbol, not as a representation of the real one, and that it was chosen because of its fame and its relationship with cinema, and he contends that the real theme of the film is friendship: "I chose to oppose an intellectual, who has experienced a revolution in Ireland, with a naïve Mexican… you have two men: one naïve and one intellectual (self-centred as intellectuals too often are in the face of the naïve). From there, the film becomes the story of Pygmalion reversed. The simple one teaches the intellectual a lesson. Nature gains an upper hand and finally the intellectual throws away his book of Bakunin's writings. You suspect damn well that this gesture is a symbolic reference to everything my generation has been told in the way of promises. We have waited, but we still are waiting! I have the film say, in effect 'Revolution means confusion'." Another theme is amoral non-engagement: Juan is very loyal to his family (consisting of his six children, each from a different mother), but he cannot be trusted by anyone else. He is also very cynical about priests, and he doesn't care about codified law. This relates most closely to those aspects of Southern Italian life observed by Edward Banfield and others. The film also explores the relationship between Mexican bandits and peasant communities at the time of the revolution, idealised by figures like Juan Josè Herrera and Elfego Baca, which Leone may have had in mind in his creation of the character of Juan. The soundtrack of Duck, You Sucker! was composed by Ennio Morricone, who collaborated with Leone in all his previous projects. Elvis Mitchell, former film critic for the New York Times, considered it as one of Morricone's "most glorious and unforgettable scores". He also sees "Invention for John", which plays over the opening credits and is essentially the film's theme, "as epic and truly wondrous as anything Morricone ever did". A CD version was never released in the United States, though many tracks can be found in Morricone's compilation albums. Music was recorded in April 1971 and second recording sessions in August/September 1971. A 35th anniversary OST was issued in 2006 with previously never released recording session and alternate takes. The film was moderately successful in Italy, where it grossed 2 billion lire on its first run. Duck, You Sucker! failed to gain any substantial recognition from the critics at the time of debut, especially compared to Leone's other films, winning him only a David di Donatello for Best Director. Of the 19 critical reviews of the film collected by the aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 16 were favourable (84% of the reviewers). The Chicago Reader praised it for its "marvellous sense of detail and spectacular effects". The New York Observer argues that Leone's direction, Morricone's score and the leads' performance "ignite an emotional explosion comparable to that of Once Upon a Time in the West". In Mexico, where the film is known as Los Héroes de Mesa Verde, it was refused classification and effectively banned until 1979 because it was considered offensive to the Mexican people and the Revolution. The film was originally released in the United States in 1972 as Duck, You Sucker!, and ran for 121 minutes. Many scenes were cut because they were deemed too violent, profane or politically sensitive, including a quote from Mao Zedong about the nature of revolutions and class struggle. Theatrical prints were generally of poor quality, and the film was marketed as a light-hearted western, not at all as Leone intended it, and it did not succeed in gaining press notice. In part because of this, United Artists reissued the film under the new name of A Fistful of Dynamite, meant to recall the notoriety of A Fistful of Dollars (which was also released by UA along with its "sequels"). According to Peter Bogdanovich, the original title Duck, You Sucker! was meant by Leone as a close translation of the Italian title Giù la testa, coglione! (translated: "Duck Your Head, Asshole!"), which he contended to be a common American colloquialism. (The expletive coglione (a vulgar way to say "testicle") was later removed to avoid censorship issues.) One of the working titles, Once Upon a Time… the Revolution, was also used for some European releases. In 1989, Image Entertainment released the film on laserdisc, including some material cut from the original US version and lasting 138 minutes. This version was released in Europe as Once Upon a Time… The Revolution, again intended to evoke an earlier Leone film, Once Upon a Time in the West. Subsequent re-releases have largely used the title A Fistful of Dynamite, although the DVD appearing in The Sergio Leone Anthology box set, released by MGM in 2007, used the original English language title of Duck, You Sucker!. In 2003, following the restoration of Leone's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, MGM re-released the film in higher-resolution with an enhanced soundtrack for the complete 157-minute cut. The restored version had a brief art house theatrical run in the U.S. and was packaged in a two-disc DVD special edition, which was not made available in the U.S. market until 2007.
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