4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 13, 2019

Film Noir is usually synonymous with black and white. Of course, as with everything, especially something as notoriously difficult to categorize as film noir, there are notable exceptions. Obvious outliers are Niagara (1953), Bad Day at Black Rock (1955), House of Bamboo (1955), and this picture fr   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 10, 2019

Rio Grande is the final chapter in John Ford’s Cavalry Trilogy. It is less of a continuous narrative, held together instead through the maintaining of a similar spirit as well as analogous thematic elements and characters. Much of this must be attributed to Ford and Merian C. Cooper who produ   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 9, 2019

Fort Apache gives me the opportunity to consider one of John Ford’s most unlikely long-term collaborations with film critic turned screenwriter Frank S. Nugent. As with all Ford partnerships, it was oftentimes prickly but there’s no repudiating the impact. However, even the writer reali   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 8, 2019

The Horse Soldiers is the one and only teaming of John Wayne and William Holden in a story based on the raids of Colonel Benjamin Grierson during the Civil War. John Ford casts the story as a brand of folklore carried through the air by the songs sung on the...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 5, 2019

“Never apologize, it’s a sign of weakness.” ~ John Wayne as Nathan Brittles Instigated by one of the cataclysmic massacres of the West, Custer’s Last Stand, the word is sent by telegraph and pony express all across the country. Simultaneously, members of numerous tribes incl   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 4, 2019

The cultural event the whole world seems to have been waiting for has finally arrived. Avengers Endgame is finally open to the public. The secrecy can cease. The debates can begin. Disney can start raking in the billions. And I presume, on the whole, the general public can let out...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on May 2, 2019

The picture showcases a parched landscape of cactus and dusty trails — the arid terrain accentuated by purposely tinted photography. It’s aided by that bleak black & white palette courtesy of Charles Lawton Jr., just as Delmer Dave’s earlier western, Jubal (1956), was made by i   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 30, 2019

There’s no doubt about it. Jubal boasts absolutely gorgeous imagery and how can you miss with a backdrop as majestic as the Grand Tetons and Jackson Hole, Wyoming? Its looming grandeur is evident in just about every single exterior shot — a continuous hallmark of classical frontier visi   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 28, 2019

“Wagons west are rolling…” – Sons of The Pioneers Despite being a tighter film, Wagon Train still bears the irrefutable mark of John Ford. Together with producer Meridian C. Cooper, he crafts a piece of work as near to a fully realized articulation of his vision as he probab   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 26, 2019

3 Godfathers is a Christmas western if there ever was one and it’s probably the most sensitive picture that John Ford ever made. Anyone familiar with Don Siegel’s short film Star in the Night (1945) might recognize basic similarities with this picture based on the same biblical motif of   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 25, 2019

Searching is a film promoting a certain plotting device in this social media age of ours. An Up-like introduction played through old computer memories and hard drive data is surprisingly poignant. It provides the backstory for a parent-child relationship to play out, albeit with the mechanisms of a   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 23, 2019

We know the score. Two drifters ride into town. They sidle up to the bar for some shots, looking for something to do in a lazy Nevada dust-hole. Their faces are equally familiar to anyone who has ever seen even a few of the old oaters. Feisty Henry Fonda as...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 21, 2019

While the western hardly began with Stagecoach, one could go out on a very slight limb and say it became a more fully realized version of itself in the hands of John Ford; it all but grew in stature as a genre. This progression cropped out of the prevailing assumption...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 20, 2019

We lost the inimitable Milos Forman not too long ago and it was a minor embarrassment I had yet to watch one of his earlier works from his native Czechoslovakia where he was an integral member of what is now termed The Czech New Wave. He was, of course, best...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 19, 2019

THIS IS MY VERY LATE ENTRY IN THE CMBA SPRING BLOGATHON: FEMME/HOMME FATALES OF FILM NOIR!  Like any self-respecting noir, this one chooses to open in a grungy gas station bathroom with a hero (Herbert Rudley) disheveled, hobbling, and covered with grime. We can gather he’s been through hell.   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 18, 2019

“I’ve always thought the law was meant to be interpreted in a lenient manner. Sometimes I lean one way and sometimes I lean the other.” – Paul Newman as Hud Hud is up for contention for the finest film Martin Ritt ever made and it comes down to a truly...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 17, 2019

As it turns out, Paul Newman’s a real barn burner. His family name is synonymous with conflagrations and it’s a great entry point for a character, in this case, a drifter named Ben Quick who’s run out of town by the local judge. We never actually know if he was...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 16, 2019

Few figures in the West have the mystique in western lore as Billy the Kid, aside from a few prominent names like Wyatt Earp, Butch Cassidy, Jesse James, etc. Billy Joel even famously penned a tune chronicling the life of the outlaw. Part of the allure, no doubt, has to...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 15, 2019

While I might not consider it one of the finest films ever produced, Cool Hand Luke features one of the most mythic characters ever conceived for the movies. He’s one of those figures who can seemingly only exist on celluloid. Luke Jackson comes out of a certain turbulent period in...   read more

4 Star Films Posted by 4 Star Film Fan on April 12, 2019

Pleasant surprises abound in Incredibles 2. What is supremely evident is that Brad Bird still has a pulse on quality storytelling just as the overall animation is blessed by the continual technological advancements in the medium. Here we are picking up right where the previous film left off with the   read more