For me The Far Country is the weakest of the Mann-Stewarts and it may not make my list; Red River's ending denies it the accolade of 'Unquestioned Masterpiece', but there's more than enough in what preceded it to easily make my Top 50; I love the look of Monte Walsh more than anything, and Lee Marvin, of course; its perhaps too precious in its visuals, at times, but there's enough there to see it over the line.zedz wrote:Well obviously half of those will be on my list (though not Red River - can't get past the silly ending - or the vastly overrated Dead Man, and I tried to watch Monte Walsh last week with a friend but neither of us could stand its lame humour and visual ugliness - are there any comic westerns that actually work?) but I do sometimes wonder if The Wild Bunch or For a Few Dollars More or Rancho Notorious really is a better film than Fort Apache, or The Far Country, or Comanche Station, or Colorado Territory, or some other film by the aforementioned masters that I'm not going to be able to accommodate.
I think For a Few Dollars More is Leone's most perfectly-realised Western, although I prefer The Good, ....yadda, yadda, for its operatic excesses.
'Ride Lonesome' and, to a lesser extent, 'The Tall T' are head and shoulders over the remainder of the other two Scott-Boettichers that I've seen.
I think The Wild Bunch is a tad overrated; I prefer 'Pat Garret'; I also love 'Cable Hogue'.
Give 'Dead Man' another look
Thats my favourite Lang Western, but I luhve Henry King's 'Jesse James'domino harvey wrote:I think Lang's Jesse James film is my favorite (and the Nic Ray take is my least-favorite Ray movie by a longshot), though the director had a pretty dubious take on the flick he was contracted to sequelize (which wasn't a bad film at all, actually)
'The Assasination of....' might be the best Western of the past 20 years; admittedly a close call with 'Unforgiven' and the underrated 'Open Range'.
I've yet to see Nic Ray's take on the legend, though I have the DVD.
agree about the Fuller, which might be his best Western; I couldn't get past Chuck Bronson's stoic Indian; and, talk about 'blue-eyed soul',...is Jay C. Flippen the worst miscasting as a Red Indian,.......EVER?zedz wrote:The Assassination of Jesse James was pretty good (though that's not good enough ), but I saw it just after Fuller's film, and the whole final section suffered in comparison: Fuller got so much more out of so much less.
I was very impressed with the editing of 'Assassination', and Brad Pitt's performance.
I'm listening, but as it stands, its long been a permanent resident of my Top Ten Westernsdomino harvey wrote:And can you believe I actually think Red River's ending is just as brilliant as what came before it? I need to defend that shit, I know!