John Wayne Day on TCM (1 Viewer)
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Go for Broke
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I know I mentioned this before, but when I saw the thread title it reminded me of a Giligan's Island episode. A WWII Japanese sailor wandered onto the island and captured everyone except Giligan and the the Skipper. The Professor marveled at the cage the sailor had made with grenades wired to the bamboo pole walls. The Professor asked where did the sailor learn to make such an ingenious device and the sailor replied in a corny Japanese accent, "John Wayne movie". One of my favorite episodes.
Combat
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I caught some of "The Searchers" last night. That's a beautiful looking film in HDTV. Wayne plays a darker Ahab-like character which give the movie more depth than most of his films. It's unfortunate that they had a german actor playing one of the main Indians though. It always detracts to see some white actor covered in bronzer pretending to be an Indian, but otherwise a great movie.
It is a great movie and John Ford really knew how to shoot the landscape. It was John Wayne's best part and finest acting job. Henry Brandon played the indian chief Scar. It was SOP back then to cast non-indian actors as indians (at least in the main speaking parts) although Ford did his best to use real native Americans in his films. Another example of this type of casting is in Ford's Cheyenne Autumn where Gilbert Roland, Ricardo Montalban, Sal Mineo, and Victor Jory were all cast in the main indian parts. It is rather jarring to watch. -- Al
Terp152
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One of my favorite films. Watched it at least half a dozen times and never noticed the truck driving in the background of one scene until pointed out by Bob/UKReb. :redface2: Chris
mikemiller1955
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Al...thanks for the heads up...I recorded and watched both McQ and McClintock...John Wayne makes a much better cowboy than a Seattle cop...^&grin...both were entertaining...McClintock was pretty hokey though...
UKReb
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Adding to Al's post, the artistic compromises Warner Bros forced on Ford in Cheyenne Autumn are most evident in the casting of the principal Native American roles. In fact Ford demanded "Honest to God Indians to play Little Wolf and Dull Knife." But that was deemed totally impractical by the film's money men. Ford didn't leave it there by further suggesting three actors with Native American ancestry-Richard Boone, Anthony Quinn and Woody Strode. But the studio exercised its leverage and Ford wound up with three Mexicans, Roland, Montalban and Del Rio, a kid from the Bronx and a Canadian for the main Native American roles. Yukon born Victor Jory- who had played Injun Joe way back in the 1938 movie Tom Sawyer- with his Roman nose and gaunt leathery appearance I always thought was the most convincing Indian out of all the other actors in this movie. Although one must give it credit as an ostensible project of counteracting Hollywood clichés about Indian life I would have to agree with Al that the film is seriously damaged by its lack of ethnic verisimilitude.
Back to Henry Brandon as Scar in The Searchers although a classic German Shakespearean actor he had being playing Indian roles ever since Bob Hope's 1948 movie The Paleface. He prepared for his role as Scar by working on his physique, shaving all the hair from his body and then spent three weeks sunning himself on the rocks of Monument Valley in order to darken his body for the part. Consequently, he never wore any body make-up what you see on the screen is one great looking sun-tan. Now that's a serious actor even though the Navajo considered him completely crazy to lie in the sun for days on end.
I love this movie but I had always tended to smile when Brandon first appears as a Comanche chief with "piercing blue eyes" but then I thought for Ford exception, dramatically speaking, was always more exciting than the rule. A few years later he used Brandon again in Two Rode Together where he played Comanche chief Quanah Parker who historically had a white mother with "blue eyes" and I thought to myself "Well, I'll be" My admiration for Ford never faltered after that.
Bob
johnnybach
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I agree - for me, the Cowboy films are the best role for "The Duke". My favourite - is STILL the one that made him - Stagecoach.
I can't really watch him in a "war film" role anymore, after reading about what many real 'vets' thought about him, and his lack of war service - and he just went on doing it for too long anyway, in my opinion. His later war films showed him as an "Old boy" - just dressed up in a uniform - and for me, were less than convincing. He wasn't alone in this, by the way - just look at some of the films featuring many other aged actors - trying to look tough and usually wearing a uniform very badly! (The Dogs of War, for example!).
For me - Cowboy films -especially when Wayne was younger - were, and still are his forte. jb
It is worth remembering that Wayne was 34 at the time of Pearl Harbor, with a wife and 4 children. That is enough responsibility to cause hesitation to anyone considering joining the armed services. -- Al
johnnybach
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Okay - so how about a load of others like James Stewart, Clark Gable, Henry Fonda, Gene Autrey, Robert Montgomery, Robert Raegan..... etc,etc
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ne-Dietrich-best-lay-ve-new-book-reveals.html
ewartRe: John Wayne Day on TCM
I wouldn't pay too much attention to that Daily Mail article. Wayne did not dodge the draft. He had a legal exemption. All of those actors mentioned, like Wayne, made their own decisions based on their own circumstances. Jimmy Stewart was a single man; Autry was married but had no children; Fonda was married with 2 kids, Montgomery married with 2 kids, and Reagan married with 1 child. Wayne made a decision not to volunteer and had to live with it. It can't have been an easy decision but it's what he did. Even had he gone into the service the chances are he would have been in Ford's Naval film crew or in the OSS, which he attenpted to get into. -- Al
UKReb
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Re: ewartRe: John Wayne Day on TCM
There have been reams written about Wayne "the warless war hero" most of it derogatory. But Al is correct he most certainly was not a draft dodger due to his marital status (albeit his marriage was disintegrating at the time of Pearl Harbor) he was still technically married and responsible for four young kids therefore not a prime candidate for the draft. FDR had announced that Hollywood had a very important role to play in the war effort and as an example stated that Gary Cooper as Sergeant York would serve America more than Sergeant Cooper would. Nevertheless hundreds of people from the film industry- much like millions of Americans-enlisted. Some like Fonda, Stewart and Jack Ford enlisted quietly and without any fanfare. Whilst others like Reagan, Gable, Zanuck and Tyrone Power made the process of enlistment an act of public theatre (much like Presley did some 20 years later). But they did all serve.
Wayne was on the cusp of stardom by mid 1942 and stony broke due to his separation and the alimony he had to pay his soon to be ex-wife and upkeep of his kids. Although he flirted many times with the idea of enlisting he finally decided that FDR was right- he could serve America better onscreen and at the same time line his pockets especially as most of Hollywood's leading men were now in the service. But by doing so he was particularly concerned about his stature seen through the eyes of his mentor, John Ford. And he suspected correctly that the director had no time whatsoever for "celluloid soldiers" during wartime.
Ford's anger with his protégé came to a head when Ford made his first film after the war had ended and Ford had returned from his navy service. They Were Expendable starred Robert Montgomery (who had active service as a PT Boat commander at both Guadalcanal and Normandy) and Wayne. Ford ridiculed Wayne in front of the film crew at every opportunity with comments such as "Duke, can't you manage a salute that at least looks like you've been in the service".
Probably the cruellest comment about Wayne's non-enlistment I've read that came from Ford was during location shooting on The Searchers. The liquor fuelled poker game at the end of each shooting day was de rigueur on any Ford movie with a number of actors/technicians gathered to watch the game. A drunken Ford said "Duke tell the boys what you did during the war" Wayne remained silent so Ford continued "Well if you're too embarrassed I'll tell them. Duke and Bond here (Ward Bond was an epileptic and was exempt from serving) sat up every night on a mountaintop listening through earphones for signs that the Japanese were attacking California-such heroics shall not go unrewarded and shall live forever in the annals of history". Both Wayne and Bond left the card game with Wayne threatening to leave the location and fly back to LA.
As illustrated above the guilt Wayne suffered over his failure to enlist endured long after the war ended in fact he never shook it off. I've always believed that this guilt drove him to portray himself as the great American patriot and icon that he became onscreen and often to his detriment.
Bob
There have been reams written about Wayne "the warless war hero" most of it derogatory. But Al is correct he most certainly was not a draft dodger due to his marital status (albeit his marriage was disintegrating at the time of Pearl Harbor) he was still technically married and responsible for four young kids therefore not a prime candidate for the draft. FDR had announced that Hollywood had a very important role to play in the war effort and as an example stated that Gary Cooper as Sergeant York would serve America more than Sergeant Cooper would. Nevertheless hundreds of people from the film industry- much like millions of Americans-enlisted. Some like Fonda, Stewart and Jack Ford enlisted quietly and without any fanfare. Whilst others like Reagan, Gable, Zanuck and Tyrone Power made the process of enlistment an act of public theatre (much like Presley did some 20 years later). But they did all serve.
Wayne was on the cusp of stardom by mid 1942 and stony broke due to his separation and the alimony he had to pay his soon to be ex-wife and upkeep of his kids. Although he flirted many times with the idea of enlisting he finally decided that FDR was right- he could serve America better onscreen and at the same time line his pockets especially as most of Hollywood's leading men were now in the service. But by doing so he was particularly concerned about his stature seen through the eyes of his mentor, John Ford. And he suspected correctly that the director had no time whatsoever for "celluloid soldiers" during wartime.
Ford's anger with his protégé came to a head when Ford made his first film after the war had ended and Ford had returned from his navy service. They Were Expendable starred Robert Montgomery (who had active service as a PT Boat commander at both Guadalcanal and Normandy) and Wayne. Ford ridiculed Wayne in front of the film crew at every opportunity with comments such as "Duke, can't you manage a salute that at least looks like you've been in the service".
Probably the cruellest comment about Wayne's non-enlistment I've read that came from Ford was during location shooting on The Searchers. The liquor fuelled poker game at the end of each shooting day was de rigueur on any Ford movie with a number of actors/technicians gathered to watch the game. A drunken Ford said "Duke tell the boys what you did during the war" Wayne remained silent so Ford continued "Well if you're too embarrassed I'll tell them. Duke and Bond here (Ward Bond was an epileptic and was exempt from serving) sat up every night on a mountaintop listening through earphones for signs that the Japanese were attacking California-such heroics shall not go unrewarded and shall live forever in the annals of history". Both Wayne and Bond left the card game with Wayne threatening to leave the location and fly back to LA.
As illustrated above the guilt Wayne suffered over his failure to enlist endured long after the war ended in fact he never shook it off. I've always believed that this guilt drove him to portray himself as the great American patriot and icon that he became onscreen and often to his detriment.
Bob
UKReb
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Hi Damian
Thanks for your post and you are absolutely correct. However, I only referred to Presley "20 years later" in my OP in an attempt to align the similarities of the media circus surrounding Presley's peacetime draft with the same type of publicity pantomime when Reagan, Gable & Co enlisted during the war. And as a comparator with the very private and quiet enlistment executed by both Fonda and Stewart.
I promise to try harder next time ^&grin
Bob