Rio Bravo- 1959

Directed by Howard Hawks, starring John Wayne as Sheriff John T. Chance, Dean Martin as Deputy Sheriff Dude, Ricky Nelson as Colorado and Angie Dickinson as Feathers.
(John Wayne, our hero and Feathers are main Heroine)



Rio Bravo was John Wayne's reaction to High Noon. In which the American people were Shown as cowardly and unwilling to help fight for their town's safety.



Mission: The sheriff of a small town in Texas must keep custody of a murderer whose brother, a powerful rancher, is trying to help him escape. He and his deputies, a drunk and an old cripple, must find a way to hold out against the rancher's hired guns until the marshal arrives.



Dreamy rat-packer Dean Martin, as the Dude.--->

Plot:

In the town of Rio Bravo, Texas, Dude (Dean Martin) the town drunk, enters a saloon wanting a drink. Joe Burdette, Brother to a local Wealthy Rancher Nathan Burdette, see's Dude eying the liquor in his hand. And proceeds to mock dude by tossing a silver dollar into a used spittoon. Just as Dude is about to go for the spittoon, John T. Chance (John Wayne) kicks the spittoon away, looking at Dude with pity and disgust. As Chance turns to face Joe Burdette, Dude grabs a small piece of lumber and hits Chance over the head, knocking him unconscious. Dude then starts toward Burdette, but two of his hired men grab Dude. Burdette proceeds to punch Dude, multiple time in the face and body area, while the two men hold him so he can't fight back. When suddenly a random man at the saloon grabs Burdette's arm so he can't punch Dude again. Burdette draws his pistol and quickly shoots the bystander in the stomach. Burdette then leaves the saloon and heads for one across the street, thinking that no lawman is man enough to arrest him, and proceeds to buy a new drink, after murdering an unarmed man.

John T. Chance shortly enters the second saloon with his Winchester to arrest him for the murder of the bystander. But one of Burdette's men draws his revolver on him creating a stalemate. Dude enters the saloon behind two of Burdette's men and takes the revolver of the man standing in front of him, and proceeds to shoot the gun out of the hand of man aiming at Chance(John Wayne). Chance then smacks Burdette across the face with his rifle knocking him unconscious. He and dude then drag Burdette to jail.

Joe Burdette's brother, a powerful rancher, Nathan Burdette, hires a number of men to watch town in preparation to breaking Burdette out of jail. The only help Chance has are his deputies Dude and Stumpy , an old cripple with a silly voice and a shotgun.

While this is going on in town. A Wagon train enters town lead by a man by the name of Pat Wheeler, an old friend of Sheriff Chance, with a load of supplies from Fort Worth. Tensions are further strained by the presence of a young gunslinger hired by Wheeler to guard his wagons, Colorado (Ricky Nelson), and the arrival of a mysterious woman, Feathers, who quickly becomes romantically involved with Chance.

Best scene in the movie: the musical stylings of Dean Martin, Ricky Nelson and Stumpy.

Class Discussion/themes:

During our class discussion we came up with the majority of the western themes seen in this film.

Themes:

The main theme of the movie was that every character in the film was willing to fight, where as in High Noon no member of the town was willing to fight.

This though has a possibility of being because of the difference of the two towns in Rio Bravo and Highnoon. Where Rio Bravo is a town with more then one saloon and a higher value for a man's morals than his religion.

Race, class and gender all come in this film as well.

Race plays a very different dynamic then in the film we saw John Wayne in (The Searchers), where in this film he seems to bridge a racial gap with his Latino-American friend, Carlos Robante.

<- Carlos Robante

Gender plays a significant role in the film also. With the relationship between John Wayne and Feathers, who although seems to be one of the stronger woman we have been presented with thus far, still relies heavily on the men around her. This though is not true for Consuela Robante, a Latino-American woman, who holds a large amount of power over her husband Carlos. Are class discussed weather or not this was racist jab at Latino culture, that Hawks might be trying to say that Latino men are weak because they can't control their woman, but that was left up to debate.

The final and most prevalent theme is the working man's hero, played by John Wayne, where yet again the bad guy (Nathan Burdette) is a rich man, who is defeated by an honest, hardworking American. And in addition to that the men hired by the are such great cowards that when five guys defeat all 40 of them, that the those remaining clear out of town by the end of the day.

Over all it seemed that the class enjoyed this film, and that John Wayne is still a badass.

THE SEARCHERS (1956) JOHN FORD

The mission of Ethan (John Wayne), is to search for his nieces who have been captured by Cherokee Indians. He also desires to kill as many Indians as possible.

We start out in Monument Valley in a home with three kids and a mother and a father. An outsider approaches the house, and this man happens to be Uncle Ethan, who has been in the war and is now finally returning. During his stay at his sisters house, a group of Comanche Indians comes and raids the house killing his family and capturing his two young nieces. Ethan is very upset by this, and his goal now is to find the group they are with and rescue them.

His family had adopted a boy named Martin, or Marty (Jeffrey Hunter), who is a 1/8^th Cherokee. Marty was fortunate enough to be with Ethan at the time of the killing, and therefore the only other family member Ethan has. Together they travel across the United States in search of their beloved family members. On the way, they run into obstacles, see friends and encounter new people, as well as Indians. Ethan discovers on their journey, that Lucy was raped and killed, driving her fiancé to suicide, in the means of him charging the Indians on his own. After much traveling and talking to other groups of Comanche, Marty finds himself a wife, who eventually gets killed, and after five years they finally catch up with Scar. Once they get to Scar, it seems to Ethan and Marty that Debbie will forever be a Comanche. Once they discover this, Ethan loses all hope and wants to return home; Marty, however, will not give up and goes after Debbie, and as it turns out after once rejecting to leave, she complies and goes home with a steady heart.

In this movie, it is the first time we see the opening shot from the inside looking out at the vast Monument Valley. A shot that keeps the viewer inside, with a sense of claustrophobia and protection. John Wayne’s character, Ethan, lifts up his niece, Debbie, and this is an important moment showing the connection of family, and the everlasting love. We see this scene again, at the end of the movie after Ethan and Marty’s tedious journey. Ethan lifts up the older Debbie (Natalie Wood) and at this moment we see that Ethan wanted Debbie to come back the whole time even though he was convinced that she was full Comanche. This the first time we see racial tension with in a family. Although they are not blood related, Marty and Ethan, Marty is still family to Ethan. Marty is 1/8^th Cherokee Indian, and since they are from the south, and the movie was made in the 1960’s, a time where racism is still a big debate, the tensions are even higher than what could normally be expected between family members. In this movie we also see more violence. Not only fights between races, but fights between men and violence towards women. Wars between races have been seen in the past western movies, yet fights between two men have now become ritualized and must follow a pattern. In The Searchers we see a fight that has guidelines such as, no biting and no kicking, as well as a ritual of walking in circles a few times before throwing the first punch. In movies to come, fighting might become more like this and have an even more ritualistic feel to it. In one scene we also see Marty kick his Indian wife down a hill. We have not seen this much aggression in violence towards women. The Searchers was a hit when it was released into theaters and some believe this movie is one of the best western movies of all time. John Ford and John Wayne, we tip our cowboy hats to you.