Posts from itdo in thread „Films You Wish John Wayne Hadn't Made“

I was kinda surprised to see some of you put THE COWBOYS on a list of films he shouldn't have done. Whereas everybody has his own taste of course, I still find it difficult to believe that some of you hate that movie because Wayne is killed off 20 minutes from the finale. It seems you completely miss the point when you dislike it for that reason and I would like to explain.

The parallels of this film seem to be quite obvious and were pointed out even at his first release (critics sometimes need a couple of years to fully appreciate what a film has to give, but THE COWBOYS wasn't one of those sleepers). "Like a Christus of the Frontier" one critic wrote, and nailed it. Look:

The obvious number of 11 (!) boys following their teacher who is eventually taken by night. The Last Supper, western style: Wayne even delivers the line "take a piece and pass it on" - with a pouch of dry meat.

"Carrying his cross" stoically and "going down" three times.

Even the little Judas is forgiven.

His followers carry out the testament of the Old West - Wayne-style.

The resurrection: When they are looking for his dead body - it's not there anymore. But his followers will carry on his gospel: "Saddle up - We're burnin' daylight" is the last line of the picture, and "saddle up" of course is a Wayne trademark line.

Apart from that, The Cowboys stands out as one of the few productions late in his life NOT made by Batjac, and it had a much bigger budget and better production values. Of course, we all love what those Batjac films give us, but to be honest, they were economically made (that's the way Wayne liked it, very much like Eastwood does his Malpaso films, in a stark style, and Wayne even complained at one point of "over-spending" at The Cowboys) but they often just used Wayne as Wayne, not giving him much to do as an actor, just using the image. Like Allen Eyles pointed out in the case of TRAIN ROBBERS: "just using Wayne for what he stands for". As every book about the genre testifies, "The Cowboys", along with "The Shootist", stands out as one of the great and last "old-fashioned" westerns in the final decade of the western.

Just for the record: Brando, who should have played Khan, writes in his biography: that he always thought it ironic that the man who stood very much for "Nuke-em" politics became victim to that very same weapon himself.

Every time I watch DUEL IN THE SUN (and I confess, it's often) I imagine Wayne playing the part of Lewt McCanles - which eventually went to Gregory Peck. I think Wayne could have been terrific in this good boy/bad boy kind of part. Lusting for Jennifer Jones, breaking in the horse, wrecking the train and shooting poor old Charles Bickford, and then biting the dust full of bullet-holes in a final embrace - and all in Technicolor and with Tiomkin's music. What a part! They talked Wayne about it but for some reason or another that never came about.