Marathon #1: The Western

I have recently discovered a film podcast (Filmspotting) that has revived my interest in film, bringing me back to the days of film school and criticism. The podcast started in 2005 and while I am a fan of chronology, there is no way i will go back and listen to 10 years of weekly podcasts. Rather, I will focus on one of their segments, namely the Marathon.

They pick a theme, director, type of cinema, genre, etc and select several representative films. Their inaugural Marathon focused on the Western, so that is where I begin as well.

The Western is a genre with stories set in the American Old West, featuring cowboys, Indians, outlaws, parlor women, frontier folks and their trusty steads. The settings were often an isolated homestead on the outskirts of a small town, with saloons, churches, general store and stables as iconic landmarks. The themes explored include man’s expansion into the west, conquering both nature and native inhabitants and replacing with “civilization,” and a strict moral code that draws black and white lines between good and evil. The stunning landscape of the American southwest plays an essential role in the visual language, along with the vision of an lone man fighting against forces larger than himself.

The Western genre was explored in great depth during the Hollywood studio system, heavily defined by auteur directors John Ford and Howard Hawks and by larger than life actor John Wayne.

During the 1960s and 70s, the contemporary Western began to subvert the genre, incorporating a more modern view of white europeans displacing the native Indians, questioning or glorifying the use of violence, and inserting a grey, muddied morality in place of the strict moral code enforced by the Hayes Code.

In general, Westerns are not my favorite genre of film, but I recognize that it is a foundation in the fabric of cinema and therefore deserves a fresh look. With a clear view and an open mind, here are the films to consider in the first Marathon, Western style:

1. High Noon, Fred Zinnemann, 1952

2. The Searchers, John Ford, 1956

3. Stagecoach, John Ford, 1939

4. My Darling Clementine, John Ford, 1946

5. Rio Bravo, Howard Hawks, 1959

6. A Fistful of Dollars, Sergio Leone, 1964

7. Winchester ‘73, Anthony Mann, 1950

8. The Wild Bunch, Sam Peckinpah, 1969