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The American Film Institute’s Top 10 Western Films of All Time Ranking .

The American Film Institute decided the top 10 Westerns of all time and we’ve got the 411 on the ones that ranked. People have always loved Westerns, and we’ve listed 8 of the most popular according to AFI. First up, Cat Ballou, the 1965 Western comedy from Elliot Silverstein. It starred Jane Fonda as Cat and Lee Marvin in a dual role as both the man who killed Cat’s father and the gunslinger who helps her get revenge. Narrated through song by Nat King Cole and Stubby Kaye, what made “Cat Ballou” so special was the female lead, which was rare for a Western.

Next, John Ford’s turning-point 1939 film, Stagecoach. It starred John Wayne and Claire Trevor. The film follows a group of interesting characters as they travel in a stagecoach together, which paved the way for the road trip trope. The passengers have to contend with the Ringo Kid, an outlaw, and the threat of Apache attack as they travel to New Mexico in the 1880s.

McCabe & Mrs. Miller, Robert Altman’s 1971 film, was a Revisionist Western piece starring Warren Beatty and Julie Christie. The film follows gambler John McCabe as he upstarts a successful brothel in a Washington town with Constance Miller’s help. The two strike up a romance, but when a mining company offers to buy his property, McCabe refuses.

No list of Westerns would be complete without Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The 1969 film from George Roy Hill starred Paul Newman as Butch Cassidy and Robert Redford as the Sundance Kid. The two got into all sorts of trouble, fleeing from the law after train robbing. The pair escape to Bolivia, but find they must fight the urge to commit crimes.

Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch comes up next. The 1969 Western starred William Holden, with Ernest Borgnine, Warren Oates, and Ben Johnson as his gang. The outlaws prepare to go through with a heist, only to find out the whole thing is a setup. The film is full of gratuitous violence and bloody shootouts; sure to satisfy fans of more gory Westerns.

Up next on the list, Red River. This 1948 Howard Hawks film follows John Wayne as Thomas Dunson, who aims to drive his cattle to Missouri for a better price. Montgomery Clift stars as Matt Garth, an orphaned youth whom Thomas takes under his wing. The film was shot on a grand scale, with sweeping landscapes and plenty of cattle. This is a must-watch for those who love big Westerns.

Then, Western star Clint Eastwood took a stab at directing his own with 1992’s Unforgiven. Starring Eastwood and co-starring Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, and Richard Harris, the film follows Eastwood’s William Munny as he comes to town to catch a group of bandits. Harris’ English Bob comes to town as well, for the same reason, and the two outlaws clash with the local sheriff.

Additionally, the 1953 film Shane takes the American cowboy and turns him on his head; the cowboy retires to a ranch in Wyoming, but while working there falls in love with the ranch owner’s wife. He realizes that to save the ranch he has to fight the big cattle baron threatening to take the land. There’s something about watching a kid shout “Shane! Come back!” over an echoing, barren wasteland that tugs on the heartstrings.

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John Wayne

‘True Grit’ Star Robert Duvall Spoke Highly of John Wayne

One of Robert Duvall’s early breakout roles was in True Grit. You remember Ned Pepper, don’t you?

Folks ask Duvall about his other work, like his performances in Lonesome Dove, The Godfather or Tender Mercies, which won him an Academy Award.

But Duvall also was brilliant in True Grit. John Wayne’s character Rooster Cogburn didn’t like Ned Pepper one bit. And sometimes The Duke didn’t like Duvall, off-screen, either.

“The director and I didn’t get along — I don’t get along with a lot of directors, but I do OK! ,” Duvall told a Virginia TV station in 2016. “But John Wayne was great working with. He was a good man and a very good natural actor, a lot better than a lot of people gave him credit for.

“He was an institution unto himself,” Duvall said of The Duke. “And that final film he did, The Shootist, it was wonderful what he did. So he was a good guy to work with, absolutely.”

We probably should offer a bit more history. Wayne didn’t like Duvall arguing with the True Grit director Henry Hathaway. He threatened to punch the younger Duvall if he didn’t shut up and do as the director told. Wayne also didn’t like some of the other casting choices, namely Kim Darby.

Remember That ‘One-Eyed Fat Man’ Scene?

However, there’s at least one famous scene, one famous line from True Grit that everyone remembers decades after the movie first hit the screens. Ned Pepper was an infamous outlaw. He added Tom Chaney, who killed Mattie’s father, to his gang of criminals. Mattie (Kim Darby) went to Fort Smith, Arkansas and hired Cogburn, the aging U.S. Marshal, to capture Chaney. Pepper, along with Chaney and the rest of the thugs, were hanging out in Indian Territory in what is now in Oklahoma, just west of Arkansas.

Now, about that True Grit scene and dialogue. Let’s refresh the memory:

Ned Pepper : “What’s your intention? Do you think one on four is a dogfall?”

Rooster Cogburn : “I mean to kill you in one minute, Ned. Or see you hanged in Fort Smith at Judge Parker’s convenience. Which’ll it be?”

Ned Pepper : “I call that bold talk for a one-eyed fat man.”

Rooster Cogburn : “Fill your hand, you son of a bitch!”

Pepper ends up killing Cogburn’s horse. But Cogburn wounds Pepper and shoots most of his men. Glen Campbell’s La Boeuf ends up killing Pepper.

The Duke earned an Academy Award for Best Actor for Rooster Cogburn. In his acceptance speech, he told the crowd “Wow. If I’d have known that, I’d have put that patch on 35 years earlier.” Cogburn’s eye patch was very much part of his character, which is my Pepper described him as a “one-eyed fat man.”

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John Wayne

John Wayne Let ‘Liberty Valance’ Director John Ford Bully Him for 1 Reason

In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, John Wayne helps James Stewart stand up to the title outlaw. Wayne was the ultimate tough guy in movies but in real life, there was one man who always kept him in his place. It just so happened that Wayne made 14 movies with that man, director John Ford. Their last was the classic Liberty Valance, and Wayne was still taking Ford’s bullying then.

Paramount Home Entertainment released The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance on 4K UHD on May 17. The 4K edition of the film is so clear you would think the world was really black and white in 1962 and they just captured it on film. The home video release also includes a new interview with Leonard Maltin explaining Wayne’s relationship with Ford, and some archival material with his co-star James Stewart backing it up.

John Wayne was in good company taking John Ford’s abuse in ‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’ or any film

Maltin explained that Wayne was hardly singled out by Ford. It was Ford’s reputation. 

“John Ford is the only filmmaker to have four Academy Awards for Best Director so he was held in the highest esteem by critics, pundits, and the audience too because he made films for the people,” Maltin said. “John Wayne’s eldest son Michael once told me he thought John Ford was a great director between action and cut. Aside from that, he was an absolutely quixotic, cantankerous, sometimes outright mean-spirited guy. He teased and goaded everyone on the set and he was especially nasty to his protege, John Wayne.”

According to Maltin, Wayne just took it because he credited his whole career to Ford. Wayne became the king of westerns after that.

“But Wayne was eternally grateful to Ford for giving him his first great opportunity in this film Stagecoach so he never talked back,” Maltin said

Bullying might have gotten the best performance out of John Wayne in ‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’

Ford’s grandson, Dan Ford, is also in the bonus features. He explained how his grandfather’s bullying behind the scenes may have helped Wayne’s performance in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

“Ford would use anything he could to get what he wanted out of an actor,” Dan said. “If he wanted to put him down, which is basically where John Wayne is in this movie the whole way through, he’s put down. He’s the guy who doesn’t get the girl, he’s the guy that plays the drunk, he’s the guy who only has one function. That’s to kill Liberty Valance. He’s an action hero but he’s not really the lead. Jimmy Stewart’s the hero. Ford would probably work on Wayne to keep him in that frame of mind.”

The late director and film historian Peter Bogdanovich is also included on the Man Who Shot Liberty Valance 4K UHD. Bogdanovich reminds fans that Ford would have wanted to take Wayne down a peg.

“People wonder why he was so tough on John Wayne,” Bogdanovich said. “Well, John Wayne was a huge star so it was Ford’s way of showing his control by attacking him and by minimizing him.”

Jimmy Stewart finally got it on ‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’

Stewart tells this story of working on The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Wayne marveled that Stewart had made it through most of the shoot without getting on Ford’s bad side. 

“Remember in Liberty Valance, Duke came up to me and said, ‘Jesus, here we are, we’ve got three more days on the picture and you’ve never been in the barrel. Everybody else gets it and everything and you come out of it clear. What are you doing? Are you bucking for something?’” Stewart said. “I said, ‘I don’t know.’”

Stewart’s tenure as golden boy on the set of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance was about to come to an end anyway. 

Well, that very day, he came up and Woody Strode, at the end with the funeral, Woody Strode had on a blue overalls. He came up to me and said, ‘What do you think of Woody’s outfit?” For some reason, I’ll never know why. I said, ‘It looks a little like Uncle Remus, doesn’t it?’ That’s all. He said, ‘Oh?’ He called everybody together, called the whole company together, and said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, what do you think of Woody’s outfit?’ They all said fine, fine. He said, ‘Well, there’s an actor in the company that doesn’t like it. I wanted to point him out to you. Now that you know this actor doesn’t approve of Woody’s costume, now we can all go back to work, thank you very much.’ This lasted until the end of the picture with me. 

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John Wayne

A John Wayne Movie Classic Actually Reduced His Role From the Story It’s Based On

The John Wayne movie classic The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance has many memorable moments. The most noteworthy is the whole theme of “print the legend.” Wayne makes an impression as Shinbone cowboy Tom Doniphon, who played a pivotal role in the life of Senator Ransom (James Stewart). It turns out the adaptation of Dorothy M. Johnson’s short story gave Doniphon even less to do in the movie, but Wayne still made those moments count.

[Warning: This article contains spoilers for The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.]

Paramount Home Entertainment is releasing The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance on 4K UHD on May 19. The 4K edition makes the black and white movie so sharp that the shadows in the title shooting scene are extra dark and moody. In the bonus features, historian Scott Eyman explains how the adaptation reduced Wayne’s role. 

‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’ story became a John Wayne’s movie

Adapting a short story into a two hour film often requires embellishing the source material. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance actually streamlined it. Scott Eyman wrote a biography of director John Ford, so he knew all about the differences between the story and the film. 

“The point of the story is basically the same point as the film,” Eyman said. “The execution is quite different. Ford and his writers altered one crucial aspect. In the story, the John Wayne character is kind of the fairy godfather to the Jimmy Stewart character, keeps nudging him along on the road from frontier lawyer to United States senator, constantly showing him the way and helping him out.”

‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’ isn’t completely a John Wayne movie

The western begins with Ransom attending the funeral of Doniphon. When reporters ask how he knew Doniphon, the story flashes back to Ransom’s arrival in Shinbone. Outlaw Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin) roughed him up and terrorized the town. 

When Doniphon was around, that was enough to keep Valance in line. Doniphon tried to convince Ransom to pick up a gun to defend himself, but Ransom wanted to use the law to address Valance. Finally, Valance confronted Ransom in the street. Ransom pulled the trigger of his gun and shot Valance dead, or so it seemed.

At the end of the film, Doniphon reveals he was standing in the shadows and fired his gun at the same time. Now, it makes much more sense that experienced gunslinger Doniphon hit his target than amateur shooter Ransom. But, Doniphon let Ransom have the credit, and the heroic act set him on a course for political success. When the reporters heard the truth, they killed the story, stating, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is both a Wayne movie and a Stewart movie. Both have equal parts, though the story centers around Stewart’s character with Wayne’s coming in for backup.

‘The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance’ made its point 

The film adaptation made its point without making Doniphon directly involved in every aspect of Ransom’s life. It proved to be a signature role for Wayne, too.

“That doesn’t happen in the film,” Eyman said. “Basically, the John Wayne character in the film commits two acts that alter Ransom Stoddard’s life and that’s all and that’s enough. So it made the Wayne character a little less proactive in the film as opposed to the story.”

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