PERHAPS MORE THAN ANY OTHER genre, the Western belongs to cinema. We had war stories before we had movies, superheroes came from comic books, and musicals from the stage. Meanwhile cowboys, gunslingers, lawmen, the cavalry — well, they may have begun in nineteenth-century dime novels, but they were made great on the silver screen.
And for decades, Westerns were the way filmmakers explored ideas and storytelling. Stagecoach remains the model for strangers forced to work together in the face of external threat, and Shane for a man trying escape his past.
They were political: Soldier Blue, just re-released in a high-definition restoration, was a furious Vietnam allegory, showing the US Cavalry as murderous thugs rather than heroes. High Noon reflected McCarthyism, as Gary Cooper’s sheriff found his friends abandoning him.…
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The Critic (Digital) - 1 Issue, August/September 2024