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.