The Legend of John Ford-II
Continuing from my previous series on John Ford, this section would look at Ford’s career with an emphasis on Westerns, the genre that made Ford a household name.
After his back to back Oscars for Grapes of Wrath and How Green was my Valley, Ford again turned back to the Western in 1946 with My Darling Clementine starring Henry Fonda as the legendary Wyatt Earp, of the OK Corral fame, a role that would be later made famous by Burt Lancaster( Gunfight at OK Corral), Kurt Russel( Tombstone) and Kevin Costner( Wyatt Earp). The movie basically deals with the rivalry between the Earps and the Clanton family. But in a way the movie also symbolizes the struggle between the old Frontier West and the new civilized one. The focus here however is more on Wyatt Earp’s life, his evolution from an illiterate cow poke to a civilized, educated Marshal. Ford ’s choice of Tombstone was incidental, it was located at a conflict point between wilderness, the rugged countryside, contrasting with the signs of civilization in the town.
The Earp family is civilized and educated, while the Clantons are a brutish, oafish family who terrorize the townsfolk. This clash between the old time, Wild West and modern civilization was also explored in later day movies like Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch and Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West. The opening scene where the Earp and Clanton families face off, also shows Ford making use of the low angled close ups to good effect. Leone in fact adopted some of John Ford’s trademarks, the slow and measured pace, the wide angle tracking shots.
1948 saw John Ford come up with the first of his famous cavalry trilogy, Fort Apache. It was basically Ford’s tribute to the US Cavalry’s efforts in settling the Wild West. One reason why Ford is rated so highly is the fact that his movies in many aspects were way ahead of their times, not just in technique but even in content. Fort Apache was the first Western to actually show the Indians in a fair manner, contrary to the standard depiction of them as savages. If actually one looks at the evolution of Ford’s Westerns , each of them has a significance. Stagecoach elevated the Western from a B Movie genre to mainstream art, not just because of the action scenes, but also because of the way Ford actually sketched out a group of characters and wonderfully set up the tensions between them. My Darling Clementine was a landmark Western for its technique, as well as it poetic storytelling. And with Fort Apache, Ford broke further ground with his sympathetic treatment of Indians.
Fort Apache starred, John Wayne and Henry Fonda in lead roles. Wayne playing a Civil war veteran Kirby York, who is superseded as the commander of Fort Apache, by Lt. Col Owen Thursday, played by Henry Fonda. Though Thursday has acquitted himself well in the Civil War, he lacks York’s experience and has an arrogant attitude towards the Indians. The contention comes to the fore when during an Indian uprising, he ignores York’s request to treat the natives properly, and causes an insurrection amongst them. If Ford explored the clash between the Old West and Civilization in My Darling Clementine, here he takes a look at the attitude of the settlers towards Native Americans. He explored the same theme much more deeply in The Searchers, where Wayne plays a racist, Indian loving gunslinger.
Ford came up with the second part of his Cavalry trilogy in 1949 with She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, again casting John Wayne in the lead role of Capt. Nathan Brittles, a US cavalry officer who needs to deal with an insurrection by Cheyennes following the death of Gen George Custer. He also needs to deliver his commanding officer’s wife and niece to another safe location, and is accompanied by a patrol. Wayne again plays a war weary officer who tries to make peace with the Indian chief to avoid bloodshed, but fails. For me again not a really great movie, just good.
Rio Grande the final instalment in the cavalry trilogy released in 1950, again saw Wayne reprising his role as Kirby Yorke, now a Lt. Colonel. Wayne here plays the embattled veteran, defending a frontier outpost in Texas against Apaches. The focus here however is more on Yorke’s family which is split up. His own son Jeff is now working under him as a trooper, and his estranged wife Kathleen( Maureen O Hara) returns to take Jeff away from the Army. Kathleen had fallen out with Yorke, after he had been forced to burn down her plantation estate, during the Civil War. A major part of the movie is devoted to the emotional friction between, Kirby, Jeff and Kathleen. Kirby’s biggest challenge comes when his commanding officer asks him to go into Mexico, to capture the Apaches, an act that could trigger tensions between the two nations.
Ford’s Cavalry trilogy would forever be a valuable part of American movie history. The US Cavalry played a major role in winning and securing the West for the White settlers. But while paying tribute to the Cavalry’s heroism, Ford does not shy away from taking a sympathetic look at the Indians and larger issues involved. Fort Apache pitted Henry Fonda’s arrogant, Indian hating lieutenant against John Wayne’s more wise, more tolerant Kirby Yorke’s character. The denoument is given in the movie’s ending, when the Indian chief spares Kirby’s regiment, because he knows York to be a man, who respects the Indians. The folly of Thursday’s arrogant, short sighted ways is shown up, when he leads a regiment against the Indians in spite of Yorke’s warnings and is totally defeated.
Again in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, Ford explores the protagonists war weary attitude, not wanting to deal with another uprising, while Rio Grande explored the dilemma of the US atacking another sovereign nation. It was this that set the tone for more revisionist westerns like Dances With Wolves, Outlaw Josey Wales, that showed the Indians in a more positive light. Ford however would do a more detailed study of the relation between the White Settlers and the Indians in his landmark 1956 movie The Searchers, a movie that is a masterpiece at all levels.
The last part would cover in detail, two of John Ford’s finest westerns, The Searchers and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence.
Tags: Cavalry Trilogy, Henry Fonda, John Ford, John Wayne, Westerns, Wyatt Earp
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Great stuff Ratnakar.
Scene in ‘Raiders of the Lost arch’ (my favorite) where Indiana Jones crawl below the truck is inspired by scene in Stagecoach film.
Bit off topic:
Ratnakar, I wish you write a Lavish Article on “Raiders of the Lost Arch”.
We need that kind of Adventure movie in India.
Action Adventure genre is missing
kya bol raha hai shekhar, we had naksha ;)
“We need that kind of Adventure movie in India.”
agree we need adventure film and no naksha and no kaal, original and realistic (at least believable) adventure film.
Raiders of Lost Ark, is one of my all time favorites, already blogged it about elsewhere. Will see if i can add some more.
Naksha in comparison to Raiders???? Lets not waste time on such silly things please.