THE COWBOYS
US, 1971, 127 minutes, Colour.
John Wayne, Roscoe Lee Browne, Bruce Dern, Colleen Dewhurst, Slim Pickens.
Directed by Mark Rydell.
The Cowboys, and John Wayne fans will have no complaints: a typical Western, enjoyable and certainly beautifully photographed. But John Wayne goes into the education business here, training boys to get the cattle through, to be strong and resourceful, which is good. He also bequeaths to them his personal brand of might and violence, because you are on the side of good and the villains you kill deserve to be killed - with applause from the audience. This raises the morality of the individual taking justice into his own hands, something which we shun in fact, yet enjoy on the screen. Puzzling.
1. Was this a good western? Why? How was the western atmosphere created, the cattle runs etc. and the aura of the cowboy?
2. The effect of the split-screen technique,, the colour photography on the wide screen, the importance of the music?
3. How did the film reflect the mystique about John Wayne and the West? What values did John Wayne stand for in his westerns? He is often criticised for being right wing and an upholder of the might and violence of the status quo. Do you agree? Does this film illustrate this? Where?
4. What picture of the west did this film give? The gold situation and its running out? The availability of cowboys? Cowboys rushing off to the gold? The cattlemen and their needs? The ambitions of the boys in the west to go with the cattle etc.?
5. The importance of the school-house sequence and Will Andersen's choosing the boys to go. Their response? What they were leaving when they left school?
6. The impact of the boys learning to ride and being trained for the cattle drive. Did you enjoy this? The individual boys? The atmosphere of being a man and a cowboy in the West?
7. Critics attack the film as it shows John Wayne bequeathing his might is right philosophy to the boys. Did this happen? Did Will Andersen have the right to train the boys as he did? What did the training do to them? How did they learn by their experience of the cattle drive?
8. Jebediah Nightlinger: as a person, as black, his reactions to will Andersen? What did the boys learn from him? How was he an alternative hero to Will Andersen?
9. Long Hair and the villains: Why were they pursuing Andersen? Why were they so cruel and greedy?
10. The toughness and skill needed for the cattle drive. How admirable is this? How well did the film portray this? The boys learning how to muster and drive cattle?
11. The adventure on the way: Long Hair and the villains stalking the cattle drive, the ambush; Long Hair terrorising the boy with the glasses; the shootings?
12. The death of Will Andersen. Were you surprised? Its significance for the film? The fact of John Wayne dying in a film?
13. The revenge and the plan. Did justice need to be executed? By whom? Nightlinger leading the boys? What were your impressions as the boys executed revenge on the villains? Were they just in their violence. or were they over-violent? The picture of young boys killing?
14. The return to Andersen's grave? How sentimental? How dramatically effective for the film? The hint of glorification of Will Andersen and John Wayne?
15. The incidentals of the film e.g. Will Andersen curing the boy of his stammering; the encounter with Kate and her girls etc.
16. Was this a satisfying western for popular entertainment? A family western? A valuable western? A western which raised true questions about violence?
