The Cowboys (1972)

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  • The Cowboys.


    I going to unleash the wrath of the forum with this but I still don't really 'get' this film! It's a good Duke film, don't get me wrong, but not one I want to go back to over and over again.

    "Pour yourself some backbone and shut up!"

  • No wrath from me at all my friend, and this is a great film for Wayne, but I think the individual scenes are better than the sum total of the movie. I agree with some critics that turning a bunch of teenage boys into avenging angels of death is not the life lesson that should have been imparted.
    Granted, Anderson did instill in them that the job had to be done, but nowhere did he teach them tactics, revenge and ambushing. They seem to have been born with those qualities and, to me anyway, that's the weakness of the story.




    We deal in lead, friend.

  • Oh, dear....got mine there Peter. Cowboys is one of my very favorites. It warms me through and through watching the relationships develop between all involved, (except for Dern's group, of course). Maybe I am still a "kid", albeit a very old one, at heart and you are a sure to heck grown up......maybe that is the difference. But watching those kids punching those cows, the two men teaching them, the love and respect developing......just awesome to me.

    As for my other friend down there...........would you rather Duke have "gone out" with a go get 'em type movie? Kills me too, every time I watch it.....cry through most of it.....crying right now thinking about it. But, it should "kill" us and make us cry.......it was his last performance for us. How else would you have liked Duke to end? Sorry, I believe he really KNEW deep down in his heart. He made a movie that showed his fans his true spirit.....fighting until the end. KPKEITH Don't be mad, guys.

    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE

  • Hi Larry, thanks again over and over for all these wonderful pictures.


    Just wondered, this last one says Cowboys. It isn't really clear, but it looks like the Train Robbers to me. Is that possible?


    Thanks so much again, Keith

    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE

  • Hi Larry, thanks again over and over for all these wonderful pictures.

    Just wondered, this last one says Cowboys. It isn't really clear, but it looks like the Train Robbers to me. Is that possible?

    Thanks so much again, Keith




    I actually changed the picture space.

  • I've decided to bite the bullet and get The Cowboys on blu ray.
    Everyone seems to hold it in high regard so you can't all be wrong, lol!
    I know the transfer is a corker so ill do my duty and watch it again and see what I get out of it.

    "Pour yourself some backbone and shut up!"

  • I've decided to bite the bullet and get The Cowboys on blu ray.
    Everyone seems to hold it in high regard so you can't all be wrong, lol!
    I know the transfer is a corker so ill do my duty and watch it again and see what I get out of it.



    Oh, I am so happy for you Peter! OPEN your mind. Be the man you are, and you will love it. Oh sure, I cry just thinking about it. So what? You can cry if you want to......only men who are not sure they ARE men can't cry! And we already know you are a man....you DID put the Island in the Sky Poster in your Man's Room didn't you......should have asked for a photo of it there!


    Just pay attention to the development of those boys into semi-men and the change in Will's attitude, oh, and the help that Roscoe gave him to change.


    I once took a cattle drive three days with friends of friends from Louisiana. First, they had to make sure I could stay aboard a cutting horse......NOT like normal horses, LOL although I am a DANG good rider. If a cow takes off at a right angle direction....so does the horse....no cue from you! Can't tell you how many times I ALMOST got left sitting on the ground! Never had saddle sores after many hours of riding............thought I would DIE the next day and we had two more days of driving, LOL! Don't know how, but the next two days were like magic to me. I had learned to anticipate what my horse would do, I was whooping and waving my lariat like all the others......I thought just WHO the HECK I was! Give me a chance...just a chance to go on a REAL drive like that one....not one of these fakey things....and I will be there.


    Anyway, the kids in the movie had to learn all of that. The acting kids had to learn what the rodeo kids could teach them, and the rodeo kids had to learn to act! Hope your blue-ray has the extras on it....explains the making of the movie. All of the kids admitted crying when Will lay dying. Some of them said they had finished though by the time the shooting got around to them.


    Wish you had told me this yesterday. Spent about an hour and a half doing screen shots of the old drab Cowboy film I had in case someone wants a composite like The Shootist. I am for SURE going to do one of all the boys, some of them when Will took special attention to them.


    If you REALLY watch and pay attention and don't love every one of those kids and Roscoe, and Will...........something is WRONG with you Peter Dooley! KP

    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE


  • Wow Keith. Doing the real thing must have been amazing!
    It's the one thing us UK guys can never duplicate. I ride horses but its nothing compared to that! I'm very envious!
    I only bought The Cowboys when I posted on the forum, didn't know beforehand, impulse buy as it was starring at me and cheap! P:wink_smile:

    "Pour yourself some backbone and shut up!"

  • I may have over looked it. but this my intrest some one that Clay O Brien is now and has been most of his adult life a professional team roper on professional rodeo's all over the united states, if i can find a photo I will pass it on to all

    That'll Be the Day!

  • Wow Keith. Doing the real thing must have been amazing!
    It's the one thing us UK guys can never duplicate. I ride horses but its nothing compared to that! I'm very envious!
    I only bought The Cowboys when I posted on the forum, didn't know beforehand, impulse buy as it was starring at me and cheap! P:wink_smile:



    One of the neatest things in my life. But, I sure do know how those boys felt after the first day. The owner and trail boss said he wouldn't cut me any slack because I was a woman, and he sure didn't. I also roped a calf I couldn't get out of a draw. Yep, my cousin's husband was a rodeo guy...specialty was calf roping. I visited a few days and besides the horses, he had the cattle horns that moved, and the back leg contraption of the calves....you rope them that way if you want to turn them over for competition. You have to BOUNCE the noose off the ground and have it come up over their back feet......then close the noose before it can get down to the ground again. I got it FIRST time and he couldn't beLIEVE it. Took me a whole 'nother day to do it again, LOL! Beginner's luck.
    But, the one on the drive was just a throw around his head so I could make him follow me out of the draw.


    Riding horses is great. I now ride Carat only bareback, and he has never even seen a bit. But, having all that gear on the trail and actually moving cows...can get dangerous as you will see in The Cowboys....that is the real thing. Our rides had always been out in the country over my uncle's huge farm and those of his neighbors. Lots of banks to slide down into rivers and swim across, open pastures, woods to get through without getting scraped off or getting your leg pinned, wild gallops over even terrain, hills that went almost straight up.....and then back down again! I rode on a "made up" trail once.....never again. Most boring thing I have ever done, LOL. We usually camped out from Friday after school until early Sunday morning. We would gallop back to the stable, walk the horses for about a half hour, groom them really well, feed them and then put the western gear away and tack them up with English gear for my uncle and his friends. They got there right about the time we finished, LOL....and off they went on their Sunday ride. But, just because Uncle Floyd rode English most of the time, didn't mean he wasn't one heck of a rider. Once, when he was 78, he was racing another younger fellah and his horse mistepped and penned him.....broke his hip and thank goodness, did not hurt the horse. Two months later, he was back on Joe, the same horse, racing the same young fellah......won too, LOL! Keith

    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE

  • I may have over looked it. but this my intrest some one that Clay O Brien is now and has been most of his adult life a professional team roper on professional rodeo's all over the united states, if i can find a photo I will pass it on to all


    For those of you who don't know, Clay was the tiniest of the Cowboys. And he was already a little rodeo champ. His saddle has extra stirrups up really high over the other ones...and he was NOT riding a small horse! When Will was teaching the boys what they would need to know on the drive, little Clay roped his own calf, almost a big as him, and pulled it down on top of him for branding......Will said, "You'll do". And, when they were looking for a young boy to play in Cahill US Marshall, Duke remembered Clay and asked about getting him to play his young son, Billy Jo. He was very good in that as he was in The Cowboys. He went on to make more movies but, as Big Duke said, he ended up being a real Rodeo champ in more than one event.
    Here is his website....7 times World Champion.....bet Duke would have been proud. Lots of pics on the site: http://clayocooper.com/rodeo.html but here is one showing how I told about roping the calves back legs by bouncing the rope off the ground. See how close he is to that animal..no long runs for him......one reason why he was such a champion! Great HORSE never hurts either....that horse knew JUST what he was supposed to do! Little Clay....who would have known!
    Thanks for reminding me Big Duke! Keith


    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE

    Edited once, last by Hawkswill: Mistake on name ().

  • Couple more pics of Clay. One when he was young and roping. One with the cast of the Cowboys....you can tell he was one of Duke's favorites as he was standing to one side of him and Duke had his arm on his shoulder. He started roping when he was FIVE, LOL!




    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE

  • One of the neatest things in my life. But, I sure do know how those boys felt after the first day. The owner and trail boss said he wouldn't cut me any slack because I was a woman, and he sure didn't. I also roped a calf I couldn't get out of a draw. Yep, my cousin's husband was a rodeo guy...specialty was calf roping. I visited a few days and besides the horses, he had the cattle horns that moved, and the back leg contraption of the calves....you rope them that way if you want to turn them over for competition. You have to BOUNCE the noose off the ground and have it come up over their back feet......then close the noose before it can get down to the ground again. I got it FIRST time and he couldn't beLIEVE it. Took me a whole 'nother day to do it again, LOL! Beginner's luck.
    But, the one on the drive was just a throw around his head so I could make him follow me out of the draw.


    Riding horses is great. I now ride Carat only bareback, and he has never even seen a bit. But, having all that gear on the trail and actually moving cows...can get dangerous as you will see in The Cowboys....that is the real thing. Our rides had always been out in the country over my uncle's huge farm and those of his neighbors. Lots of banks to slide down into rivers and swim across, open pastures, woods to get through without getting scraped off or getting your leg pinned, wild gallops over even terrain, hills that went almost straight up.....and then back down again! I rode on a "made up" trail once.....never again. Most boring thing I have ever done, LOL. We usually camped out from Friday after school until early Sunday morning. We would gallop back to the stable, walk the horses for about a half hour, groom them really well, feed them and then put the western gear away and tack them up with English gear for my uncle and his friends. They got there right about the time we finished, LOL....and off they went on their Sunday ride. But, just because Uncle Floyd rode English most of the time, didn't mean he wasn't one heck of a rider. Once, when he was 78, he was racing another younger fellah and his horse mistepped and penned him.....broke his hip and thank goodness, did not hurt the horse. Two months later, he was back on Joe, the same horse, racing the same young fellah......won too, LOL! Keith


    Interesting you mention the English and western styles. It was quite interesting riding through monument valley 'western style' compared to the 'formality' of the English style. I'm really lazy so enjoyed the relaxed western style, lol!

    "Pour yourself some backbone and shut up!"

  • Boy that little Clay and the rest of them were really something. You know, this movie almost RUINED Bruce Dern's career! He was EXCELLENT as a man about as despicable as possible. Try as I did, I could never think of him the same as I did before I saw The Cowboys! I actually cheered when the horse took off dragging him.....shame on me! Keith

    God, she reminds me of me! DUKE