My favorites are El Dorado, the Searchers, True Grit. What are your favorites?
The Searchers!
#2 The Cowboys
#3 Big Jake
#4 The Shootist
Those are some great ones! I forgot to mention, Rio Bravo, Tall in the Saddle and Hondo
Rio Bravo
The Cowboys
McLintock!
True Grit
North to Alaska
True Grit
The Shootist
The Searchers
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
The Shootist would be favorite by a nose.
Sands of Iwo Jima and John Ford's cavalry trilogy - Fort Apache, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon and Rio Grande - are all tied for second place.
The twins, El Dorado and Rio Bravo, are sentimental favorites.
That's tough... I'd say either The Shootist or Big Jake. The shootist is a better movie... but I have a soft spot for Big Jake. That was the first movie I remember watching with my dad, he let me stay up late to finish it. My mom was working the night shift (nurse).
The Searchers
She Wore A Yellow Ribbon
Rio Bravo
The Quiet Man
They're all good, but these are my favorites.
I agree. I enjoy all of the Duke's films
When I was a kid, The Cowboys was the best movie around. I still love to watch it once in a while - brings back that old excitement.
"The Shootist" is my favorite, but I'm hard pressed to think of one I didn't enjoy. Wish he was still around.......
True Grit and Sons of Katie Elder were 2 of my favorites.
The Searchers - True Grit - AND - drum roll if you please - NUMBER ONE! ! ! The Shootist
Angel & the Badman, The Good Sheapard & yes In Harm's Way! The ones you listed were all great too!
I really liked the Shootist but it just gave me a sad feeling every time I watched it. One of the last times the Duke was on the big screen.
The Searchers, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, They Were Expendable, and The Quiet Man.
Expat
The Searchers, True Grit, Red River, Stagecoach.
Like an earlier post, I appreciate the 1939 Stagecoach. It was the Duke's breakout film, and may have started a long relationship with John Ford.
The problem with picking the favorite John Wayne movie, is that he left such a hugh body of work. Dam few stinkers, but If I had to take just one, it would Be The Searchers. The Duke is still well up there on the top 10 actors list and considering that ha whole generation has been born and come of age since his passing says a lot. Then again when there were Directors like John Ford, Henry Hathaway around, its was easy, and easier still they loved the country and it showed in the movies they made. The Dukes last movie "The Shootist" is a fine film, but that was in theaters in 1976 so it was shot in 1974 - 1975 time frame, he may have gotten the script earlier than that. Its dam near 40 years ago! Old guys like me who grew up on the Dukes movies remember how it was to go to the movies and what the country was, hell I don't even recognize the country these days.
Probably John Ford's trilogy of the cavalry.
And "The Searchers", of course.
John Wayne (along with Dizzy Dean) used to hunt birds on my uncle's property in AZ. They were quite a pair I gather. Unfortunately I never met either of them.
I believe he became a better actor as he aged. Some of the earlier movies had great plots, but for good performances by the Duke I'll nominate The Shootist and True Grit.
Big Jake
El Dorado/Rio Bravo
Sands of Iwo Jima
The Cowboys
The Green Berets
Have you guys watched his really early stuff? I remember one called The Star Packer that was pretty bad...
The early John Wayne movies were "B" movies.
Quick, and cheap. Still the "Duke."
The Shootist - forever a classic
The problem with picking the favorite John Wayne movie, is that he left such a hugh body of work. Dam few stinkers, but If I had to take just one, it would Be The Searchers. The Duke is still well up there on the top 10 actors list and considering that ha whole generation has been born and come of age since his passing says a lot. Then again when there were Directors like John Ford, Henry Hathaway around, its was easy, and easier still they loved the country and it showed in the movies they made. The Dukes last movie "The Shootist" is a fine film, but that was in theaters in 1976 so it was shot in 1974 - 1975 time frame, he may have gotten the script earlier than that. Its dam near 40 years ago! Old guys like me who grew up on the Dukes movies remember how it was to go to the movies and what the country was, hell I don't even recognize the country these days.
is based on the novel of the same name by Glendon Swarthout, perhaps one of the best writers to ever pen a novel set in the West. He also wrote
They Came to Cordura, later filmed with Gary Cooper, and one of my favorites,
The Homesman which I rate right up there with his Mexican War novel,
The Tin Lizzie Troop.
So many memorable John Wayne movies. For me however, I still favor The Searchers, followed in tandem by Fort Apache and The Quiet Man.
EDIT: Around Hollywood these days, The Searchers is considered by many top flight directors and film historians to be the greatest western ever filmed.
L.W.
The Quiet Man
The Searchers
...and if you haven't read "The Searchers" do yourself a huge favor and get it. Awesome movie and even better book.
"The Horse Soldiers", with John Wayne & William Holden (ding dong, ding dong)......my other favorite is "The Cowboys"...find myself humming that tune when shooting my Ruger Vaquero.
"The Horse Soldiers", with John Wayne & William Holden (ding dong, ding dong)......my other favorite is "The Cowboys"...find myself humming that tune when shooting my Ruger Vaquero.
Two words. Constance Towers...
Big Jake
The Cowboys
The War Wagon
My top three favorites.
I would have to list at least 5
Big Jake
True Grit
The Cowboys
Rio Bravo
The Searchers
That's just westerns. He had some Great War flicks too like The Green Berets, Sands of Iwo Jima, and They Were Expendable. This country really needs another John Wayne right about now
the cowboys,i still hate bruce dern to this day .
I'll have to go with El Dorado and Rio Bravo. Dean Martin and Robert Mitchum make good partners for the Duke.
Remember the one......in Old California. Is it not the one where he orders milk in a bar in a dirty glass. Then he had the line...."I ain't a Doctor I am a Pharmacist". ? Anyways my favorites are the twisted tormented Duke a.k.a. Ethan in the Searchers, and The Colonel I believe in the Horse Soldiers.
Mclintock
searchers
hellfighters
rooster cogburn
How do you choose just one of your children as favourite from the others?
There has been many good choices listed.
A local western themed restaurant (Montana's) used to play movies. We saw "Rio Bravo" so often, it probably is our favourite. Who didn't love a young Angie Dickenson? She was hot!
While racking my brain for a choice not already selected, I remember watching a John Wayne cop drama in London. It was filmed in London and was called "Brannigan". Pretty good.
What? Nobody's mentioned The High and the Mighty. But its pretty hard to find a bad one; even the bad dramas made great comedy. Jet Pilot comes right to mind.
Without a doubt John Wayne's best movie has to be Red River.
Or maybe True Grit. Yep it's True Grit for sure.
No wait a minute. I'm absolutely certain that John Wayne's best film was Hondo. That's it, Hondo is better than all the rest.
Oh I forgot about Liberty Valance. OK I was wrong, his best movie is The Man who shot Liberty Valance.
But you know the first one that I bought for my collection was The Sands of Iwo Jima. So yes that has to be it.
Oh I don't know, they're all good.
KC
All the movies after about1960 but I kinda like Reo Lobo