OK - It's supposed to rain more this weekend (jeez!) so I thought I'd give you all one of my favorite movies to watch. John Wayne is very appealing in this movie, but let's not forget what a cool dude is Harry Carey. He's also wonderful in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, in which you may remember him as the sympathetic but stern presiding officer of the Senate who sits up front with a gavel. He was a leading man himself in several cowboy movies during the early silent years of film and John Wayne really admired him. He's right up there on my short list of skinny old men that I love and would gladly marry. [The other people on this list include: Fred Astaire (dead), Pete Seeger (beautifully alive) and Leonard Everett Fisher (alive & well and living happily in my town with his lovely wife, so shhhhh!]
John Wayne produced this film himself and I think he did a pretty good job. He chose a nice simple story (innocent but clever Quaker girl falls in love with wild but good-hearted outlaw and reforms him), a beautiful and sweet leading lady and a good supporting cast (the doctor bugs me a bit, but I love Penny's family...and did I mention Harry Carey?) The opening scenes are filmed in Monument Valley (probably the Duke's little tribute to his friend, director John Ford) but then we switch to Sedona, Arizona. Now THAT'S a little town that has changed...nobody could go to Sedona to film a wide-open-spaces movie like this now.
The quality of the recording is fuzzy in the beginning and you have to wait a bit patiently for the movie to begin - hope it improves.
9 years ago
2 comments:
You didn't mention that you've been to John Wayne's birthplace and that you've been in one of his mud cabins!
Wow, just think. I've walked in the Duke's footsteps in both Iowa and Utah/Arizona!
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