Shane

When Shane (Alan Ladd) rides onto the peaceful Starrett family’s ranch, he sees that the Rykers, the local ruffian cattlemen, are trying to push them off the land they have settled on and built up.  He stays to help the family around the ranch, grateful and respectful of their hospitality.  The father, Joe (Van Heflin) is thankful to have another strong man to help him with his work, and his son Joey (Brandon De Wilde) instantly idolizes Shane when he sees his gun.  The mother, Marian (Jean Arthur) is weary of all the violence around the area lately and seems mildly disturbed at her sons fascination with guns.  As the violence against the settled families in the valley rises, some men talk of abandoning their homes and others want to fight.  When one of their own is killed by the notorious Wilson (Jack Palance), Joe is determined to fight for his land and family.  But Shane knows his place is to fight and Joe’s is with his family.

Shane is an interesting character.  From the moment he just rides out of nowhere, we can tell from the start that he’s a good guy.  Without being prompted, he works hard to take out a stump that has obviously been given up on by Joe.  To the family, he shows a strong work ethic, respectful and placid attitude.  But when pushed too far by Chis Calloway (Ben Johnson) or Wilson at the saloon, he can erupt into an old fashioned cowboy fist fighting machine.  There seems to be an inner struggle for Shane, he wants to settle down on a piece of land like Joe has, but he’s got a conscience that tells him he’s the best man for a fight.

At just eleven years old, Brandon De Wilde earned an Oscar nomination for his supportive role as little Joey.  Joey seems to portray the ideal audience and role for any cowboy film.  Shane tries to protect Joey from the violence going on in the valley, but with his small stature, Joey can hide easily and watches many of Shane’s fights in the saloon.  There are so many quick shots of Joey’s big eyes soaking up all the action.  He admires Shane like he’s a gun-slinging god, but these ideas seem to be mostly Joeys, since he never sees Shane shoot until later in the film.  After that, of course, Joey is completely gaga for Shane.  It’s really endearing to hear such a little excited voice say, “Gosh all mighty that was good!”

The best way to enjoy Shane is to become fully invested in little Joey’s mindset.  Every little boy will want to grow up to be Shane but until then, they’d take Joeys place in a heartbeat, especially at the end.  Start to worship and idolize Shane from the moment he rides in and think nothing but guns and fighting.  Well, let a little room in so you can understand the reasons and implications of fighting, I’m not sure how much of that really gels into little Joey’s head.  But ah, to be a little boy who finds pure happiness in the ideas of being a gun-slinging cowboy.  That’s the perfect audience for Shane.

“You know, I like a man who watches things go on around. It means he’ll make his mark someday. ”

Unforgiven

In Unforgiven, the romantic ideas of the gun slinging cowboy are brought to a much darker light.  After a couple of cowboys cut up the face of a whore, their punishment is just to give the saloon owner a few horses.  The poor girl will be labeled hideous and useless for the rest of her life, so to seek justice, all the whores in the saloon pull their savings together and put a one thousand dollar bounty on the men who cut the girl’s face.  That sort of paid vigilante work attracts a young man who calls himself The Schofield Kid (Jaimz Woolvett) who passes the news onto Will Munny(Clint Eastwood).

Munny was once one of the most dangerous men around.  He would drink whisky and shoot a man for no real reason.  But when he married, Munny gave up that rough life for her and she bore him two children before she died of smallpox.  Now, with two growing children to feed and the farm work not paying too well, Munny decides to recruit his old friend Ned (Morgan Freeman) and catch up to The Schofeild Kid to ride out on one last job.

The film is set in 1880, where the wild west is becoming more tame.  Guns aren’t even allowed in the town of Big Whiskey.  It’s only the old timers like Munny and Ned who remember the real wild west, helped shape it and have now settled down on their own farms and under the roofs of cabins.  It is the young men, The Schofield Kid and knife-happy cowboys, who seem to want to go back and live out their father’s tales of gun slinging, lawlessness and chaos.

Problem is, I feel like the older men just let this happen, maybe for old-time’s sake.  Munny decides it’s convenient, he needs the money, time for one last run.  Sheriff Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman) is building himself a nice little cabin to settle in and yet he kicks the shit out of English Bob (Richard Harris) in the middle of town.  Later Daggett pushes Munny too far and the wild west explodes with all it’s old violence and destruction one last time.

Perhaps they let this play out to show the young men that being a wild west outlaw isn’t all whiskey, women, gun smoke and riding off into the sunset.  There are some real dangers, repercussions to your actions and pain in your soul you’ll live with all your life.

In the end, Unforgiven is a gritty western that spits on classic romantic ideas of wild west cowboys.  Do we honor Munny and The Schofield Kid as heroes for serving justice or villains for gunning down these men?

“It’s a hell of a thing killin’ a man.  Take away all he’s got, and all he’s gonna have.”

Brokeback Mountain

Around February 2006 my parents and I were just idly talking about movies and Brokeback Mountain casually entered the conversation, to which they immediately advised me, “You shouldn’t see that movie.”  I had seen it just the week before, I told them.  There was a moment where they looked at me like I had just come home from either a war zone or a whore house, as if with one film all my innocence had shattered and a piece of my soul chipped away.  I don’t think my parents are homophobic, but they sure got the wrong idea about Brokeback Mountain.

The story centers on Enus Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gylenhaal), two young men who work as sheepherders on Brokeback Mountain for a summer.  To sum them up in one word, they’re cowboys.  Enus is very quiet and more reserved than wannabe rodeo star, Jack, but Jack is better at and has a real need for communication.  Their work is hard and lonesome, so once the two finally break enough ice to talk, the summer passes too quickly.

Alright, everyone wants to know about the dreaded tent scene.  The best way I can describe it is that the scene depicts sex as a natural urge.  Prior to the scene, there are no advances or flirtations between the two and whatever attraction there is, they don’t even realize it or just write it off as friendship.  The event happens in the middle of the night, both men about half asleep and completely consensual.  They realize what happened in the morning and are immediately uncomfortable, “You know I ain’t queer.”

When the summer ends, Enus gets married and Jack plays the rodeo game a while before settling down.  Jack marries Lureen(Anne Hathaway) who’s family is rich while Enus and Alma (Michelle Williams) are struggling and live above a laundromat.  It’s years before Enus receives Jack’s first postcard proposing a fishing trip to Brokeback.  Enus drops everything, including a few jobs, to go on trips with Jack.

The first time Alma sees Jack, Enus is kissing him.  He’s obviously more excited and passionate about seeing Jack than he ever could be with Alma.  What does a Wyoming girl in the late sixties think when she sees her husband kissing another man?  Is it jealousy, fear, disgust?  Or is it worse?

At Brokeback, Jack proposes his great idea; he wants to run a ranch with Enus.  Work together.  Live together.  And they could be real successful doing so, no problem.  But Enus realizes the social implications that would have.  People would see them differently and talk about them.  He remembers what happened to two ranchers living together when he was just a boy.  They were murdered and mutilated as the killers saw fit.  Enus’s father made sure his boys saw the full extent of what can happen.

So the extent of their relationship stays a secret, but rules their lives.  It’s heartbreaking to watch.

Brokeback isn’t an easy ride, but it sure is beautiful.  Director Ang Lee has a wonderful gift bringing the natural scenery to its grandeur on the screen.  The mountains, the clear lakes, the sprawling plains are just breathtaking.  For someone who’s never been west of the Mississippi, it’s mind blowing to imagine such beauty and such silent repression in the same place.

The immature and the homophobes will still make their jokes, no doubt about that, but I imagine Brokeback Mountain to become a classic and upheld for its modest, quiet push for America’s current gay rights movement.  The film’s tagline sums it all up, “Love Is A Force of Nature.”

The Ox-Bow Incident

This is the story of what happens to cowboys stuck in a little ghost town with no available women around to alleviate their testosterone levels.

The setting is Nevada, 1885.  Two men drift into a little western town, where lately cattle thieves have been a problem.  One of the men, Carter (Henry Fonda), gets word that his girlfriend has just married a man from San Francisco.  After a few drinks, they learn that someone shot a local cattle rancher, Larry Kinkaid.  A lynch mob forms, wanting to take matters into their own hands and avoid the lengthy judicial system.  Of course, a few oppose the idea, but the mob rules.  These few who oppose, the two drifters, the general store owner, the colonel’s less than cowboy son and the Black reverend, go along hoping to keep peace.  In the night, the mob stumbles upon three men and accuse them of killing Larry.  The men say they’re innocent, but how can you reason with a mob of drunken pent up cowboys?

At the start, The Ox-Bow Incident seems like your typical western: drifters in a saloon shooting whiskey, a fist fight and everyone real excited to go ride out and string up a murderer.  By the end it’s much more.  There’s drama and morals and, well you don’t want to miss the ending.

The most fascinating theme in this film, without preaching into the morals or giving away the ending, is the role of women.  When we first enter the saloon, there’s a painting hanging over the bar of a desirable woman laying across a bed, and behind her a man is creeping towards her, looking very hungry.  More than once, the men look up at the painting and ask, “Has he got her yet?”

There’s also Rose, Carter’s old flame, who just got married.  She was the only single woman in town, except for a blind old woman, but no one will touch that.  Besides Rose, the only other female character is Jenny, a middle aged woman who joins the lynch mob and is basically one of the boys.  With so few women, this bit of the old west seems like cowboy camp. So, when things get stale, they jump at the chance to run out in the middle of the night and hang a few men.  Yeeha!

I’ve never been a fan of westerns, too bright and I was never impressed by gun slinging.  But The Ox-Bow Incident is different.  It’s a great story, with just the right amount of drama and heart that doesn’t take away the toughness of cowboys.  Watch it anytime, and it’s easy to fit in too (only an hour fifteen minutes).  If you’ve got a kid going through a cowboy phase, I recommend using some discretion, but it could be a good movie for those old enough.

“Justice? What do you care about justice? You don’t even care whether you’ve got the right men or not.”