The Sons of Katie Elder (1965)

Seen a good Western lately? It's tough these days. They just don't make `em anymore. Frequent readers already know of my love affair with Roy Rogers movies. Well, I'm afraid I have to admit that it extends to all Westerns. I'm just a sucker for them. But, as I say, they don't make very many of them these days. Fortunately, Hollywood has a rich history of Western movie making and a plethora of Westerns worth watching. And The Sons of Katie Elder is one of the best. Directed by Henry Hathaway, it tells the story of four brothers who come back to their home town of Sweetwater, Texas, for their mother's funeral. John Wayne plays John, the eldest, a gunslinger wanted in several states. Dean Martin plays Tom, the next in line, who went off and became a gambler. Earl Holliman plays number three son Matt, and Michael Anderson, Jr., plays the youngest brother, Bud, who their mother was intent on sending to college. Once there, they discover to their shame that their mother was destitute the last years of her life, living on the kindness of strangers. The brothers set out to determine who murdered their father 6 months prior to Katie's death, and they uncover a trail of deceit and treachery that leads back to a shifty gun-smith who cheated their father out of his ranch. The sheriff is murdered and the brothers are arrested. As they're being sent to Laredo for trial, they're ambushed. Much gun play ensues. Some dynamite is employed. Matt gets himself skewered. Bud gets shot. So does Tom. But in true Western fashion, the weaselly-eyed varmint what caused all the commotion gets his come-uppance in the end.

I first saw this movie when I was about five years old, and it's one of those films that has formed a part of my world view. In late-era Westerns like The Sons of Katie Elder, there's good and there's bad like in all of the best Westerns (movies not motels), and then there's the bad that sometimes does good for all of the right reasons. The Sons of Katie Elder is, at heart, a redemption movie, a story about how a bunch of boys who all went South can turn their lives around and do something good, even if it is just getting one of them through college and into a decent life. In this film, the Duke plays - well - the Duke. That's all there is to it. And Dean Martin pretty much plays the same character he always played, only this time he's wearing a cowboy hat instead of a tuxedo. Earl Holliman - several years away from Police Woman fame but several years beyond Forbidden Planet, puts in a serviceable portrayal of Matt. The weak link is Michael Anderson, Jr. - he overacts to the point of inanity. The rest of the cast is pretty incredible: George Kennedy as the evil gunslinger Curly; James Gregory as the bad guy, Morgan Hastings; Denis Hopper as Hastings' whiny son, Dave; even the squeaky-voiced Percy Helton as the local store owner. The film was shot on location in Mexico and Colorado, and the scenery is breath-taking - first clue that we're not in Texas. "Those are my favorite mountains in Texas," I said to my wife. But who cares. The geography of the cowboy movie has never been faithful to the true American west. Roy Rogers fought North Dakota bad guys on the same SoCal rock formations that James Kirk fought space aliens on decades later. It doesn't matter. If you're making a movie about cowboys and gunslingers and such, you've gotta have craggy rocks and mountains looming in the distance, even if you are in North Dakota. Or Texas. Or wherever. If you're in the mood for a good shoot-em-up Western, check this one out.

The Sons of Katie Elder is rated G. It's filmed in widescreen Technicolor and has a running time of 122 minutes.

Hatari (1962)

I think I was five years old when I first saw Howard Hawks' Hatari!. It was seared into my brain. Can't help it. That's what happens when you view things during your "formative years." They become a part of the pattern of your life, part of the lens through which you see the entire world for the rest of your life. There's a fancy epistemological term for that, but I can't recall what it is right now, and you probably don't care anyway. But it's tough to be a fan of this movie, because it's so un-PC today. After all, you got a bunch of white men charging around Africa capturing animals and shipping them back to zoos in Europe and America. That rankles a lot of peoples' knickers. I can't tell you how many scathing reviews I've read of Hatari!, one of which used the words "disgusting" and "gross" so many times that I simply stopped counting after a while. And you know what? They were right. It is disgusting to see these people capturing these animals, almost - but not quite - as disgusting as if they'd been shooting them. And then there are those 1950's attitudes toward women, who were all meant to be brainless little housewives. And of course, there is the overriding spectre of colonialization. What are all these white folks doing there anyway? They own the place, that's what. Why do they own it? Because they took it away form it's previous owners. How did they do that? They had bigger guns, duh!

But none of this makes me hate this movie. I still love it. It still retains the same fascination it held for me as a small boy. Because, once you get through all of the that stuff I just mentioned above (not an easy task, I realize) Hatari! is a funny, romantic adventure film. The plot is rather loose. Sean Mercer (John Wayne) and an international group of adventurers spend their days running around the African bush capturing wild animals and selling them to zoos and circuses in Europe and America. At the start of the film, the Indian (Bruce Cabot - the man who rescued Fay Wray from King Kong) is gored by a rhino. At the hospital, a young man named Chips (Gerard Blaine) gives the Indian a blood transfusion and is later hired to replace the Indian while he recovers. Then a female photographer, Anna Maria "Dallas" d'Allasandro (Elsa Martinelli), shows up to photograph the animal captures for the zoo that's buying them. What follows is lots of high-speed chases across the Savannah, evenings spent socializing around the campfire or back at the ranch house, a couple of romances, three baby elephants and a rocket. More than that I won't say; you'll just have to see for yourself.

Hatari! was shot largely on location in: Arusha National Park in what was then Tanganyika (now Tanzania); on Ngongongare Farm, a hunting ranch owned by Hardy Kruger who plays Kurt Muller in the film; and in Nairobi, Kenya. Hawks didn't have a completed script when he began shooting, and it shows. There's not much of a coherent story line. There's the photographer whose there to document the captures; there's the push to collect all of the animals on their shopping list; there's the fear of catching rhinos; and there are a couple of love stories. But all of it just seems loosely joined together. Still it all fits given the setting, which is breathtaking to say the least. One interesting side note is that all of the scenes of the group chasing and capturing the animals were filmed using the real actors. No animal handlers were substitute. When the rhino escaped from them, it was real, and the actors had to recapture the rhino. Hawks felt it would be more realistic that way. Another piece of trivia is that all of the capture scenes had to be dubbed over, because John Wayne kept swearing. I'll just bet he did. All of this goes together, though, to make one fun movie. If you can drop your early 21st century proprieties for a while, you might find that you actually enjoy it.

Hatari! is rated G and is filmed in Technicolor.

True Grit (2010)

There's always a danger when you try to remake an iconic movie. Take King Kong for example. Every attempt to remake that classic landmark film has resulted in a colossal yawn fest. And the TV remake of Dr. Zhivago that came out a few years back? It lacked all of the romance and the sweeping vistas of the original David Lean film. But in True Grit, Joel and Ethan Coen have managed to pull it off. That's due in large part to the fact that they didn't just remake the film, they retold the story and re-imagined the characters. The original version with John Wayne was centered on John Wayne, as was any movie that he was in. The Duke had a larger than life persona, and he dominated every scene, towering over his co-stars, upstaging them even when he stood behind them. That original film was all about Wayne's character, Rooster Cogburn - the other characters were there simply to give him a reason to move.

In the new True Grit, the Coen brothers center the story on Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld), who is seeking revenge on Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), the man who murdered her father. In this version, Mattie is no shrinking violet who's just along for the ride; instead, she's the driving force behind the action, pushing everyone on to the ultimate conclusion. She's smart, tough and resourceful. She wants Chaney killed, she wants Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) to help her, and she wants to be there to see that it gets done. The Rooster Cogburn of the Coen brothers' film bears no resemblance to the Duke's character. The earlier Rooster was a man of supposed vices (we never see them), a man of honor who always does the right thing. The Coens' Rooster is a filthy, foul-mouthed drunk, who'd just as soon kill a man than bring him in. Throughout most of the film, he's drunk, and he talks in a slurring growl, like he's less than half-awake. He only agrees to go after Chaney when Mattie promises to pay him. By the end of their adventure, though, these two form a bond that will last beyond the grave.

True Grit is a powerful film, shot against a stunning landscape, with a cast of incredible actors. Matt Damon was great as the arrogant Texas Ranger who wants to arrest Chaney and take him back to Texas to stand trial. Brolin is appropriately menacing as the vile Tom Chaney. And Hailee Steinfeld is magnificent as Mattie, a young girl trying to heard a bunch of caustic lawmen in the direction she needs them to go. The Coen Brothers paid close attention to period details right down to the way the characters speak - a very proper English with few contractions and little slang. You might call it Bible English for its formality. There is violence in the film, but it's never gratuitous; it's appropriate to the story of lawmen who practice their trade on the edge of the law and are often not much better than the criminals they are pursuing. In the end, once the bad guys have been dispatched and the violence has died down, True Grit shows itself to be a touching film about how a trying ordeal can bring disparate people together in everlasting bonds of love and respect.

True Grit is rated PG-13 and is available on DVD and Blu-ray.