I need to watch that movie again.

Of my least favorite Wayne movies.

I thought it was a great movie. It was one of John Wayne's classics and I liked Robert Duvall as well.

I like it.

It was much better than the remake, but it doesn't crack my top 10 list of the Duke's best movies.

Ditto..

JW movies I can do without:
True Grit
The Shootist
The Cowboys
Sons Of Katie Elder
McQ
Brannigan
Rooster Cogburn
Train Roberts (Never mind it has Ann Margret so its automatically a favorite)
War Wagon
The Undefeated

The new version is many times better. Just watched it again recently.

As JW aged, and the popularity of Westerns began to fade, there just wasn't as good a material there to make good movies anymore.

JB doesn’t match up to JW at all.

I pretty much am on board with that list except I do like Son of Katie Elder. I think they could have done so much more with McQ and Brannigan. I mean, how can you have John Wayne and Richard Attenboro and make a dude?

Whatever became of the horses, and how was Tom's "Wanted" status ever resolved?

Maybe so, but Chisum and Big Jake are pretty good and they came around the same time as a few of these..same for the Green Berets

"The Comancheros" was actually the first in the "Back to the Future" series. Considerations for running time caused the part where they took the DeLorean into the future and brought back the firearms to be cut. There is also speculation that Merlin the Magician from "The Once and Future King" was somehow involved in that lives appear to be lived backwards as the Civil War figures into the story as well.

A lot of what we don’t like about those films wasn’t the movie itself as much as how our taste for acting and writing changed. Don’t forget that John Wayne movies were about being entertained in a theater, where “Star Wars” changed the whole dynamic in the industry to special effects and John Wayne movies weren’t about special effects...

Like or dislike his acting, same for some or all of his movies, I can't think of another actor that has had near the long term popularity and die-hard fans, their movies replayed on TV, collected and watched over and over again, more than John Wayne. has.

100 times better than the new version.

I always liked True Grit.

Yes, 100 times better than the new version.

They didn't do a good job of of either developing the character of Katie, explaining the prodigal nature of John Wayne and Dean Martin's characters, or timing up the loose ends. I still watch it when it's on.

This.

Yep, movies try to entertain with special effects, not acting.

That is likely not to change because of the money made in the international release. Dialog must be dubbed into different languages. Action needs no translation.

New version is much better.

Yep. I have to assume that those who say the opposite are joking.

I always liked the original and was surprised when some time ago this was discussed on the fire and was surprised to see the majority of folks preferred the latest version.

PS. Jim Ed Browns version of "Pop a Top Again" was best also.

Whenever something really pisses me off I say, Fill her hands, you sonofabitch!

The new one was much better and much closer to the book. Lots of little things in the first one that were just stupid. First, it was set in Arkansas and Oklahoma, but filmed in the Rockies? The new one was filmed in New Mexico and those low hills really look a lot like the hills around McAlister, particularly since it was set in the winter. The courtroom scene in the first one. Look at the jury box. It’s empty. The new one had one of the best and most realistic courtroom criminal examinations that you’ll ever see in film. The objections were realistic and consistent with the rules of evidence, the responses were dead on, and the defense attorney really played it up to the jury just like he was in the book.

The little details from the costumes, to the accents, to the dialogue, to the weapons, and the setting were first rate in the remake. The first one was just another John Way e film in which he dressed more or less the same as ever and carried around a 92 Winchester in 1882 while chasing outlaws in Indian Territory magically transported 500 miles west.

That's the difference between then and now. Folks back in 69 weren't hung up on everything being realistic and recreated perfectly as they are now. Back then, it was good enough to be entertained. Everything didn't get rehashed over and over on the internet. Joe Bob, you are correct, I believe, in everything you say. The second movie was much more true to the book and area and there are a ton of "unbelievables" in the first movie. However, I don't think the second one holds a candle to the first one with John Wayne. There is a reason he won his only Oscar for that film (not counting honorary Oscar). Plus, the scenery and photography is spectacular. I just took my boys this spring to see it in the theater on the big screen for the 50th anniversary of the film and it was great. Wish they would do that with more film classics.

Two things I appreciate about the older movies:

The actors were (or at least had the reputations of) decent, America loving folk, and

I could hear and understand the dialog.

It seems that ever since the late 80s, movie soundtracks are made to be "realistic" with tons of background sound (NOISE!) and music that drowns out the speech. Drives me crazy to watch a movie and only catch about half of what is said.

agreed,, I mean come on. John Wayne, Glen Campbell, Duvall.... for Pete's sake!!

Better than the new (nearly always the case) although kudos to Bridges for making Cogburn his own after Wayne made it such an icon.

Come on, now. I’m a Glenn Campbell fan, but I believe one would have to search long and hard for a worse actor who ever had a major part in a big Hollywood production.

Yeah, in my opinion the new version isn't just better than the old, but it's better than John Wayne movies in general. lol

I think you could cut all of John Wayne's movies into 1" strips of tape, shuffle, divide evenly, retape together, and nobody could tell the difference, lol!

I better go now...

i enjoyed all of John Wayne`s cowboy movies. i do feel the best cowboy movie of all time was Lonesome Dove. now this new time type cowboy TV show /movie Yellowstone is good too ! but the best cowboy seen of all time for me is when old Rooster Cogborn in True Grit rides out to face those four bad cowboys with no fear blaze`n guns and shows True Grit.

I was 11 years old when it first came out and never saw it on the big screen until 2 months ago. They re-released it in theaters to commemorate the 50th anniversary. I was real treat to see it in a theater.

The new version is much truer to the book, is better filmed with better music and better acted. Neither Campbell now Wayne were particularly good actors and the girl who played Mattie Ross did a much better job in the 2nd movie. But Wayne didn't have to act, as long as he was cast into a role where he could just be himself the movie was a success. True Grit was one just his iconic role. If you want to watch John Wayne being John Wayne watch the original. Want to watch the better movie the 2010 version is a much better made movie. Love'em both.

John had True Fat. Glen only had True Chubby.

I think Kim Darby was about 28 when she was in True Grit instead of 14 like in the book and apparently, she and John Wayne took an instant and very pronounced dislike for each other.m

Edit, apparently it was Darby and the director who hated each other intensely.

McLintock! never did much for me. The mudslide fight was too cartoonish.



P

Yeah, I couldn’t ever like that one either.

My favorites used to be The Cowboys but they show it about five times a weekend now. My favorite these days is Big Jake.

The Quiet Man sucked too.

I like the remake better. Perhaps a better portrayal of characters and life in the period. Jeff Bridges nailed the character!

You nailed it! Plus Bridges was MUCH better in the role than Wayne. Ditto for Hailee Steinfeld vs Kim Darby, and so on down the line.

Duvall gave the best performance in the early version.

He was the only first rate actor in the movie.

First movie would have been far better had Wayne summoned his Searchers or Hondo performance.

^^^This^^^

But it was ugly, like Star Wars in B and W.

Yep.

And “The Searchers” is the greatest JW movie and greatest Western of all time!!!

Train Robbers?

In my opinion Haliee Steinfeld's performance not only 'outshines' all the other's in True Grit redux, including that of Bridges, it is also what made it worth watching more than once.

You should watch the later version of True Grit, they did find a worse actor with Matt Damon as LaBoeuf...

Yep.

Matt Damon did just fine.

Boy, are you in for a treat when you watch The Man who shot Liberty Valance. Liberty Valance might be the best movie of all time.

Another of my favorites. But then it’s more of a Jimmy Stewart movie. 😜

Seen it several times since I was a kid in the 1960s. Good movie.

Since I was a kid, I've always liked High Noon, but apparently John Wayne said it seemed like communist propaganda to him. He didn't figure there was a town in the Old West where the sheriff or marshal couldn't have gotten whatever size posse he thought he'd need for such a situation, and to suggest otherwise was communist propaganda.

I think this was one of his best.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibey8D4IzcU

Can't do Jeff Bridges anymore


The Big Lebowski was like 20 years ago...fugg I'm so old it really sucks.

+3
LaBoeuf is a great character and neither one of those actors did the part justice.

This is a good list of John Wayne movies I ain't about to do without.

The first and second are as good as it gets

I need some of whatever the hell it is you're smoking. Bridges is a piss poor substitute for John Wayne and that sir is a fact.

The first three are damn good movies. Anybody who thinks otherwise is obviously a liberal snowflake type.

Tied with "To Kill a Mockingbird".

And there is also the overload of gratuitous cruelty in the newer movies.

Ha. None of those would even make my top 50.

True Grit is good movie material and a good movie in either version. Wayne nailed the character as did some others but Kim Darby and Glen Campbell were weak, very. This movie was and is great but could have been so much better with better actors in those two roles. Wayne's dialogue is impeccable. Over and over again, he just nails it. "By God, she reminds me of me." "I ain't never met no Texican I couldn't shade." "Fill your hand, you sonovabitch!" The whole drunken "rat writ" bit. All first rate acting. Finally, John Wayne hasn't made a move in 43 years. Has been dead for 40 years. And is still a Top Ten movie star

The screenplay for High Noon was written by Carl Foreman, a screenwriter who was blacklisted in Hollywood for being a communist. He wrote the screenplay as an allegory of the fact that some Hollywood actors and writers did not support the various communists in show business during the House UnAmerica Committee Hearings. Go to ....

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0286025/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1

... and click on Foreman's biography.

I was never a fan of High Noon because even when I first saw it on big screen when it was released, I never believed the premise, either. In real life, when Marshal Will Kane went to the church and asked for help, about a dozen of the male citizens would have stood up, gone home and got their rifles and shotguns, and when the train arrived at "high noon," would have greeted Frank Miller and his thugs with a warning that if they so much as lifted a finger, they'd all be "eatin' hot lead!" But Hollywood isn't about "real life." It's about "reel life."

FWIW.

L.W.

myself a just enjoy a good cowboy movie and now even this new type version cowboy movie YELLOWSTONE is fun to watch. in the YELLOWSTONE show when those cowboys put that big nasty black Angus bull in the bar was wild.

Exactly !

The short scene with Strother Martin as the horse trader was great. "I heard a small child fell in a well".

Yep. Great scene and a great character actor too.

I loved the original, I've watched it at least a dozen times.
I could barely sit through the remake.

Wayne didn’t really nail the dialogue. In both movies, the dialogue was pretty much word for word from the book.

The reason people went to see John Wayne movies, was to see John Wayne in a movie. All the criticism of John Wayne is wasted on his acting. Like his acting or not, Wayne was iconic and his last roles were probably his best as he was playing John Wayne being John Wayne. If you didn't like "True Grit" or the "Shootist" you have little appreciation for just how good John Wayne was...

I didn’t and haven’t criticized his acting at all. I just pointed out that the dialogue was straight from the book.

Yes, I am that way as well.

No reason not to like both versions. Enjoy the movie for a movie. It ya sit there and look for every detail to be right you better just read the book. You can then use your imagination to make everything perfect to your standards. Ed k

The only thing better in the new version to me was the actress who played the little girl. She was much better than Kim Darby. And the actress who played her as a older lady was good too.
Matt Damon absolutely sucked and his fake accent was down right stupid.

Yep.

I liked it a lot