The Old Man and the Gun Moview Review New York Times

Great Movie John Ford and John Wayne together created much of the mythology of the Sometime West nosotros carry in our minds. Beginning with "Stagecoach" (1939), standing from 1948 through 1950 with the Cavalry Trilogy ("Fort Apache," "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and "Rio Grande"), and finally to 1962 and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," together in 10 features they largely formed the templates of the Hollywood Western. Of these "Liberty Valance" was the near pensive and thoughtful.

The motion picture takes place at that turning betoken in the Due west when the rule of force gave mode to the dominion of police force, and when literacy began to proceeds a foothold. It asks the question: Does a man need to behave a gun in guild to disagree or state an stance? It takes identify in the boondocks of Shinbone, in an unnamed territory that is moving toward a vote on statehood. Farmers desire statehood. Cattlemen practise non. In a few characters and a gripping story, Ford dramatizes the contend about guns that yet continues in many Western states. That he does this by mixing in history, humorous supporting characters and a poignant romance is typical; his films were complete and self-independent in a way that approaches perfection. Without ever seeming to hurry, he doesn't include a single complimentary shot.

3 men stand at the center of the story: Stoddard, Doniphon, and Valance. Every bit the film opens, U. S. Senator Ransom Stoddard (James Stewart) arrives in Shinbone past the new railroad with his married woman Hallie (Vera Miles) to attend the funeral of a human being named Tom Doniphon (John Wayne). The corpse is being held in a plain pine box, and when he views it Stoddard is angered to come across the boots have been stolen. An one-time black cowboy named Pompey (Woody Strode) takes Hallie on a buckboard ride into the countryside where they regard the burned-out remains of Doniphon's cottage. It's clear they loved him.

In a long flashback involving virtually of the picture, Ford recalls the events leading upwardly to that day. Years ago Shinbone was held in a grip of terror past the sadistic Liberty Valance (played by Lee Marvin in a functioning evoking savage cruelty). He had many murders on his conscience, and much enjoyed using a leather bullwhip. Tom Doniphon is a local farmer, who observes, "Liberty Valance'south the toughest man south of the Picketwire--next to me." Valance and his 2 sidekicks hold up a stagecoach on the way to town, and when one of the passengers, Ransom, stands upwards to him Liberty nearly whips him to decease.

In boondocks, he's nursed back to health by Nora and Peter Ericson, ii recent Swedish immigrants who run the local chowhouse. Nosotros also meet Link Appleyard (Andy Devine), the drunken town align; Medico Willoughby (Ken Murray), the drunken town md, and Dutton Peabody (Edmond O'Brien), the editor of the paper. All 3 spend much of their time hanging out in the eatery kitchen. Working in the restaurant is young Hallie.

Stoddard has come to town with a satchel total of law books, and hangs out his shingle at the newspaper function. Freedom Valance cannot abide anyone standing up to him, and the shingle is an barb. Valance gives him a option: Leave boondocks, or face him in a shootout on Main Street. Keeping to one side, Tom Doniphon observes everything but is slow to act; his strength is silently coiled. Too, there is a complexity. Tom has long considered Hallie "my daughter," and is adding a room to his farmhouse that has a nice porch with a rocking chair, in preparation for the twenty-four hour period he has no doubt she will marry him. Now Hallie has started to like this lawyer-man from the Eastward, who starts upwards a one-room schoolhouse to teach people how to read. His illiterate students include Hallie.

As a showdown between Stoddard and Valance Ford begins to seem inevitable, Ford creates considerable tension. I will non go into details because the suspense should not be spoiled. Look instead at a debate that continues betwixt the lawyer and the farmer nearly guns. Ransom Stoddard believes in the U. South. Constitution, the dominion by law, the trust in government. Tom Doniphon tells him that without a gun in his hand and the experience to utilize it, he will sooner or subsequently certainly exist killed past Valance. Stoddard believes so firmly in the constabulary that he is willing to lose his life for his principles. The drunken marshal won't protect him. The newspaper editor prints the truth about Valance, and for his pains has his office trashed and is whipped most expressionless.

This is fascism against democracy: the tyranny of the strongman over the ordinary people. Everyone in Shinbone hates Liberty Valance, only they're powerless against him and his ii sidekicks, one of them a giggling fool. Tom could stand upwards to Valance, but it would suit him to take Stoddard out of the way and so that he could bring Hallie abode to that porch with its rocking chair.

At that place is a purity to the John Ford style. His composition is classical. He arranges his characters within the frame to reflect power dynamics--or sometimes to propose a balance is irresolute. His magnificent Western landscapes are ever there, merely as environment, not travelogue. He films mostly on sets, but we're not particularly aware. In a film with Lee Marvin's snarl, Andy Devine's squeaky phonation and the emphasis of the Swedes, John Wayne as usual provides the calm center, never trying for an consequence. (One stylistic bear on: In this film, he habitually calls Stoddard "Pilgrim," which expresses an insight into the lawyer's character.)

Ford'south view of women is interesting. Shinbone is the only Western town I've seen in a movie with no prostitutes. Indeed Hallie and Nora Ericson (Jeanette Nolan) are the only 2 noticeable women in town; fiddling wonder Tom'south beloved for Hallie is intense. As played by Jimmy Stewart, Stoddard spends much of the flick wearing an apron and washing dishes in the eating place, sending a hardly ambiguous message about a human being who doesn't wearable a gun.

The mode Ford employs the African-American Pompey is observant. The tall, confident Woody Strode appeared in 5 Ford pictures, all the style from "Stagecoach" to Ford'south final film, "7 Women" (1966). Information technology is fabricated clear in "Liberty Valance" that segregation was the practise in the territory. When a meeting is held to vote on statehood, Pompey sits exterior on the porch. When he walks into a bar to fetch Tom, the bartender won't serve him, and Tom slams hard on the bar: "Give him a drink." But Pompey won't drink. He is Tom'due south farmhand and seems to be his only confidant, a protective presence; he e'er has Tom'southward dorsum. Ford isn't making an anachronistic statement on racism, but he's existence certain we observe it.

There's a lot in the picture show if we care to notice. "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance," the New Yorker'due south Richard Brody writes, "is the greatest American political movie." He explains: "The Western is intrinsically the most political movie genre, because, like Plato'south 'Democracy,' it is concerned with the founding of cities, and because it depicts the diverse abstract functions of authorities as straight, concrete deportment." This is all to exist seen: The office of a free press, the part of a town coming together, the contend nigh statehood, the civilizing influence of instruction.

It'southward non proverb too much to note that Ransom Stoddard is elected to the U. S. Senate because he is "The Homo Who Shot Liberty Valance." Yes, but there'south more to it than that, and in John Ford's mind, gun buying is very much an open question. The screenplay by James Warner Bellah and Willis Goldbeck contains one of the best-known lines of dialogue in any Ford movie, spoken to Stoddard years later past the town'due south new newspaper editor: "This is the Due west, sir. When the fable becomes fact, print the legend."

Likewise online in my Great Movies Drove: John Ford's "The Grapes of Wrath," "Stagecoach," "The Searchers," "Rio Bravo" and "My Darling Clementine," and John Wayne in Howard Hawk's "Red River."