Film Genres: Westerns

When the earliest filmgoers watched 'The Great Train Robbery' in 1903, many of them shrieked in terror at the very last clip when one of the outlaws turns directly toward the camera and fires a gun, seemingly, directly at the audience. The puff of smoke was sudden and it was hand colored so that it looked real. Today, we can look back at that primitive movie and see all the elements of what would evolve into the Western genre. Perhaps it is the Western's early origins--'The Great Train Robbery' was the first narrative, commercial movie--or its formulaic yet entertaining structure that has made the Western so popular. Whatever the case may be, with the recent success of films like '3:10 to Yuma' and 'The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,' the Western appears to be in no danger of disappearing. The story of the western is told in the Historical Dictionary of Westerns in Cinema through a chronology, a bibliography, and an introductory essay.

The true story of the American West on film, through its shooting stars and the directors who shot them Howard Hughes explores the Western, running from John Ford's 'Stagecoach' to the revisionary 'Tombstone'. Writing with panache and fresh insight, he explores 27 key films, and draws on production notes, cast and crew biographies, and the films' box-office success, to reveal their place in western history. He shows how through reinvention and resurrection, this genre continually postpones the big adios and avoids ending up in Boot Hill permanently.

This work is a reference on the history of the Western movie, from The Great Train Robbery in 1902 to the most recent Hollywood hits. Each of the 3500 entries include the film's vital statistics - title, year released, director, writers and screenwriters, cast, and running time. A summary of the film is included and a critical analysis of the more significant stars and films.

This work compares the reality of the Old West to its portrayal in movies, taking an historical approach to its consideration of the cowboys, Indians, gunmen, lawmen and others who populated the Old West in real life and on the silver screen. Starting with the Westerns of the early 1900s, it follows the evolution in look, style, and content as the films matured from short vignettes of good-versus-bad into modern plots.

The political, historical, and cultural forces that shaped the development of the Western film genre—especially the 30 years after World War II—are explored in this book. Addressing the treatment of Native Americans, African Americans, women, and children, the role of violence, the landscape, and poker playing, this cultural analysis advances the theory that most Westerns of those years can be put into four principal categories that reflect the styles and ideologies of the four leading politicians of that era: John F. Kennedy, Barry Goldwater, Lyndon Johnson, and William F. Buckley.

Most film critics point to classic conflicts--good versus evil, right versus wrong, civilization versus savagery--as defining themes of the American Western. In this provocative examination of Westerns from Tumbleweeds (1925) to Rango (2011), Robin L. Murray and Joseph K. Heumann argue for a more expansive view that moves beyond traditional conflicts to encompass environmental themes and struggles. The environment, after all, is the fundamental stage for most western stories, from land rush dramas that pit "sod busters" against ranchers to conflicts between mining-town communities and corporations. Because environmental issues lie at the forefront of so many conflicts today, Murray and Heumann believe that the Western is ripe for such new examination.

We live near the edge--whether in a settlement at the core of the Rockies, a gated community tucked into the wilds of the Santa Monica Mountains, a silicon culture emerging in the suburbs, or, in the future, homesteading on a terraformed Mars.

This illustrated filmography analyzes the plots and players of the more than forty motion pictures about the legendary Missouri outlaw Jesse James (1847-1882), from the silent era to the 21st century. Among the films and actors covered are 'Jesse James' (1939) with Tyrone Power, 'Kansas Raiders' (1950) with Audie Murphy, 'The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid' (1972) with Robert Duvall, and 'The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford' (2007) with Brad Pitt. Each evaluation compares Hollywood's version of history to the hard facts. A brief biography of the outlaw provides an overview of his life and career. Also examined are European films, made-for-television movies and continuing TV series that have featured episodes involving Jesse James.

The western is arguably the most iconic and influential genre in American cinema. The solitude of the lone rider, the loyalty of his horse, and the unspoken code of the West render the genre popular yet lead it to offer a view of America's history that is sometimes inaccurate. For many, the western embodies America and its values. In recent years, scholars had declared the western genre dead, but a steady resurgence of western themes in literature, film, and television has reestablished the genre as one of the most important. The Philosophy of the Western examines philosophical themes in the western genre. Investigating subjects of nature, ethics, identity, gender, environmentalism, and animal rights, the essays draw from a wide range of westerns including the recent popular and critical successes 'Unforgiven' (1992), 'All the Pretty Horses' (2000), '3:10 to Yuma' (2007), and 'No Country for Old Men' (2007), as well as literature and television serials such as 'Deadwood.'

If you want to know what glorious contributions the western made to mid-century American culture, this is the year-by-year book for you. Beginning in 1929 with the advent of talkies ('In Old Arizona' fascinated its audiences), the author discusses the cultural and industry trends, the directors, producers, studios and especially the stars, and how their personalities (and financial ups and downs) affected the way westerns were shot. The improvements in technology through the years, the trick horses, the fistfight choreography, the evolution of plotlines - these are fascinating indicators of the way Americans themselves were changing.

Use this index to find articles about this genre.

Arizona in the late 1800s. Infamous outlaw Ben Wade and his vicious gang of thieves and murderers have plagued the Southern Railroad. When Wade is captured, Civil War veteran Dan Evans, struggling to survive on his drought-plagued ranch, volunteers to deliver him alive to the train that will take the killer to trial. On the trail, Evans and Wade, each from very different worlds, begin to earn each other's respect. But with Wade's outfit on their trail, and dangers at every turn, the mission soon becomes a violent, impossible journey toward each man's destiny.

A traveling magician bringing his potions and mystical items with him is challenged by the Minister of Health, who believes the magician to be a charlatan.

The film takes place in 1740. While the French colonists are using the Hurons to fulfill their war purposes, the Delaware are fighting on the side of the English troops. Only Chingachgook, a young Delaware, and his fair-skinned friend Deerslayer realize that the whites intend to expel and exterminate Indians altogether.

Three friends go on a cattle drive in order to quench their mid-life crises.

In this Shakespearean tale of jealousy and betrayal, a man who is an honorable itinerant cattleman, befriended and hired by a bighearted ranch owner despite his unwillingness to talk about his past. When the new hand becomes the target of the flirtatious attentions of the owner's bored wife and is entrusted by the boss with a foreman's responsibilities, his presence at the ranch starts to rankle his shifty fellow cowhand.

Rango is a lizard who imagines himself an actor who literally breaks the fourth wall of his terrarium when the hatchback car in which he is riding swerves and sends him careening. Abandoned in the desert amid the shards of his former home, Rango makes his way to the nearby town of Dirt, which is experiencing a mysterious water shortage. The actor in Rango seizes the opportunity to invent a grandiloquent new image for himself, and as in many a Western, the stranger in town is suddenly promoted to the rank of sheriff. Along the way to solving the mystery of the vanishing water supply, he must survive highway crossings, giant hawks, an army of bat-riding prairie dogs, and a gun slinging rattlesnake.

A modern western classic based on the true story of a Pauite Indian named Willie Boy and his bride who become the objects of the last great Western manhunt after he kills her father in a "marriage by capture." As the pressure builds, the events explode in the tragic deaths of Lola and Willie and a turning point for Sheriff Cooper.

His name: William Bonney. His legend: Billy the Kid, the fabled gunslinger. The West had never before seen the likes of this Brooklyn-born desperado, a troubled teen who wrote his name in blood on history's pages.

Under the spell of a wandering charlatan named Starbuck, a lonely ranch girl blossoms into full womanhood.