> > The Searchers was not representative of the genre -- rather it
> stood at its end.
>
> THE SEARCHERS was in fact representative of
> its genre and stood in the thick of the Westerns
> of the 1950's.
>
> Anthony Mann had made a dark Western as
> early as 1950 with DEVIL'S DOORWAY. He
> would continue in this vein with the series of
> Western's he made with James Stewart, the first
> being WINCHESTER '73 in 1950. Mann completes
> his cylce of Westerns in 1960 with MAN OF THE
> WEST and CIMARRON.
>
> Ford himself would make significant Westerns
> after THE SEARCHERS including SERGEANT
> RUTLEDGE (1960); THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY
> VALANCE (1962) and CHEYENNE AUTUMN (1964).
>
> For his part, two of Howard Hawks greatest
> Westerns come late in the cycle: RIO BRAVO (1959)
> and EL DORADO (1966). In fact 1959 is a banner
> year for Westerns with release of Budd Boetticher's
> RIDE LONESOME; Delmer Daves THE HANGING TREE
> and John Ford's THE HORSE SOLDIERS.
>
> The work of all these directors reflects the Western
> as a problem genre. The rise of the revisionist Western
> begins in 1962 with Sam Peckinpah's RIDE THE HIGH
> COUNTRY. He takes the work of Mann, Ford, Hawks,
> etc. and carries it further. The Western dies out (for the
> second time) about 1973 with his PAT GARRETT & BILLY
> THE KID.
I'd say then that The Searchers was the beginning of the end. Thriller, Film Noir, Sci-fi, Horror, Action, etc. have survived the civil rights movement and the sexual revolution better than the Western did. There have been attempts to do the Western from a perspective other than the white guy's: Posse (cf. <http:// www.imdb.com/title/tt0107863/? fr=c2l0ZT1kZnx0dD0xfGZiPXV8cG49MHxrdz0xfHE9cG9zc2V8ZnQ9MXxteD0yMHxsbT01M DB8Y289MXxodG1sPTF8bm09MQ__;fc=2;ft=45;fm=1>), The Ballad of Little Jo (cf. <http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106350/>), etc. But they remain on the edge of the genre (or at odds with its narrative conventions), rather than revitalizing it by spawning more Black Westerns, more feminist Westerns, etc. I'll be interested in seeing Brokeback Mountain -- the first (and last?) gay Western (where same-sex love won't be the subtext but the text)?
Yoshie Furuhashi <http://montages.blogspot.com> <http://monthlyreview.org> <http://mrzine.org>