The Good, The Bad, and The Official Western Thread

[Piper Maru]

What did you guys think about the spaghetti western The Mercenary? I saw it awhile back and really enjoyed it.

 

[SirAconite]

Speaking of Westerns, they need to make Red Dead Redemption into a live action, with Karl Urban filling the role of John Marston.

 

[Tao43]

Watched Fistfull of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More this morning. Those two never get old. Funny fact about Lee Van Cleef. He was a faster draw than Eastwood. He could draw, cock the hammer, and fire in three frames of film. Approximately an eighth of a second.

 

[gwynplaine]

^

Speaking of Westerns, they need to make Red Dead Redemption into a live action, with Karl Urban filling the role of John Marston.

Good choice for Marston.

 

[Tao43]

Once Upon a Time in the West...seeing Henry Fonda as a villain still blows my mind.

 

[Eddie Dean]

Keep your lovin' brother happy.

 

[nite-owl]

People scare better when they're dying.

 

[C. Lee]

Some good news for western fans.

This isn't a movie, but it's a western, so figured some of you would be interested.

HOW THE WEST WAS WON (1978) TV series. Starring James Arness and Bruce Boxleitner.

This is considered by many (on western movie sites) as one of the best western series made, but it was so rarely rerun that most general audience people have never heard of it. After 20 years on GUNSMOKE....James Arness came back as Zeb MacCahan....a grizzled old mountain man who has to deal with his brother and his family moving out west to get away from the civil war back home in Virginia. It was serialized, generally three storylines concerning different parts of the family going on at the same time (example; Zeb would go off and get involved with Indians wars or some such thing, Luke {aka Seth* I'll explain later} played by Bruce Boxleitner was a wrongly wanted man and was always avoiding the law and bounty hunters, and the rest of the family back on the new farm would get into some type of trouble or another that usually needed Zeb to come back and shoot a few folk to straighten things out) and the stories would entertwine and stretch out over many episodes, making a huge epic story.

I watched this back in the day, and have waited decades to see it again. Two years ago, the ENCORE Western channel ran the series, and I got it recorded. Now the thing is...when watching serialized things, I really like to watch them in order. The series HOW THE WEST WAS WON was greenlit after the 3hr TV movie THE MacCAHANS (1976) that introduced everyone, was aired and was a huge hit. The ENCORE Western channel unfortuantlly......did not air this pilot movie. From what I have been able to look up, it's probably because of different production companies working on the pilot and the series. So I have not watched the series again yet.

Now the good news.

Today, at WalMart I picked up in the same package the pilot movie and what they call the first season of the series. In actuallity....it is the miniseries that came after the pilot. Plus it was very reasonably priced at only $14.95.

The MacCahan story encompassed....

The MacCahans (pilot movie) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0074834/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1
How the West was Won (3 movie miniseries) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0146379/?ref_=fn_al_tt_3
How the West was Won (2 seasons, 1 hour per episode series) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077027/?ref_=sr_2


I already had the mini series and 2 season series recorded off of Western channel.....but now I have the complete series. If you like an epic story, with great guest stars (from dozens of recognizable faces from the western genre to people like Christopher Lee and Horst Buchholz playing some Russian noblemen mixing it up with plains indians) this is a great starer set to get you going.

Earlier I said I would explain Bruce Boxleitner being called Luke and Seth. In the original pilot he had the good down home Christian name of Seth. After he became big from the pilot movie, they changed his name in the rest of the series to Luke....guess Seth just didn't sound right for a gunslinging tough guy being chased by the law and every eligiable young lady in the west.


One strange thing with the DVDs to note....it comes on 2 discs....with the first 2 movies of the miniseries on disc one, and the 3rd miniseries movie and then the MacCahans pilot on the second disc. If you do pick this up, make sure you watch in the correct order.

 

[C. Lee]

A couple I have seen the last week....

The WAR WAGON (1967) John Wayne and Kirk Douglas.

Fun old western.....Taw Jackson (Wayne) who was framed for a crime by bad guy Pierce (Bruce Cabot) comes home for revenge. Pierce has a big gold mine on Wayne's ex-ranch and transports the gold by his armored stagecoach the "war wagon". Wayne plans on robbing it and enlists a motley crew of partners. There is gunslinger Lomax (Kirk Douglas) who openly tells Wayne that he is still contemplating Cabot's offer to pay for Wayne's death, Native American Levi Walking Bear (Howard Keel) who brokers a deal with an Indian tribe to be part of the heist, drunken explosive expert Billy Hyatt (Robert Walker jr), and disreputable lowlife Wes Fletcher (Keenan Wynn).

A lot of humor and running gags in here, nice fights and shootouts, and some impressive action from the war wagon with a Gatling gun on top fighting off attackers. Look for a bunch of Wayne movie and westerns in general character actors throughout.

**Trivia time** The bad guy is Bruce Cabot, a character actor who appeared in at least 10 John Wayne movies....and those of you love the old sci fi fantasy movies will hopefully remember him as the hero from the original KING KONG movie. What is interesting to note is...another long time Wayne friend who appeared numerous of his movies, Ben Johnson, was the hero in the original MIGHTY JOE YOUNG movie.


Heathens and Thieves (2012) Don Swayze, Gwendoline Yeo, and Andrew Simpson.

Interesting low budget effort. In Northern California, a Chinese family buys a ranch...rumors start that they used stolen gold to pay for it. A pair of thieves plan to go there and find it, a railroad "detective" and his henchmen come to retrieve it, and some crooked lawmen also get involved. A suspense drama with some shootouts, double crosses, triple crosses, commentary on women and Chinese treatment in the old west, and a man trying to live by a code of honor. It's on Netflix for an easy find.

 

[gwynplaine]

Thanks for the infos, C. Lee

 

[gwynplaine]

As much as I loved Johnny Depp in The Lone Ranger, the great Will Sampson did it first in one of my favorite Westerns: "The Outlaw Josey wales."t:

 

[gwynplaine]

Appaloosa is a better Western than all of the other more recent Westerns.

 

[NosfeRomas]

That's Ten Bears :P Great film ! Not one of my favourites but still very awesome.

I rewatched Gunfight at OK Corral with Burt Lancaster and the phenomenal Kirk Douglas as Doc Holiday and i got to say i didn't remember it to be that good. Jon Struges directed the ***** out of it !!

 

[gwynplaine]

That's Ten Bears :P Great film ! Not one of my favourites but still very awesome.

I rewatched Gunfight at OK Corral with Burt Lancaster and the phenomenal Kirk Douglas as Doc Holiday and i got to say i didn't remember it to be that good. Jon Struges directed the ***** out of it !!

My favorite Doc Holliday.

 

[gwynplaine]

 

[DarkKnight]

As much as I loved Johnny Depp in The Lone Ranger, the great Will Sampson did it first in one of my favorite Westerns: "The Outlaw Josey wales."t:

Agreed one of my favorite films. But most of Eastwoods westerns are some of my favorites. t:

 

[gwynplaine]

Great Western. Cool Poster.

 

[StarLord]

What did you guys think about the spaghetti western The Mercenary? I saw it awhile back and really enjoyed it.

Corbucci's 'Compañeros' is being released on Blu ray next year, so hopefully that means 'The Mercenary' isn't too far behind. It's one of my favourite Westerns.

 

[gwynplaine]

 

[gwynplaine]

Tuco.

 

[NosfeRomas]

My second favourite western after The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

 

[Piper Maru]

Corbucci's 'Compañeros' is being released on Blu ray next year, so hopefully that means 'The Mercenary' isn't too far behind. It's one of my favourite Westerns.

I hope it get's released!

 

[gwynplaine]

My second favourite western after The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

If you haven't seen it, I recommend "Ride the High Country"
Peckinpah's First Western. Also one of the best Westerns ever.

 

[Piper Maru]

What are your guys thoughts on High Plains Drifter?

 

[gwynplaine]

Love it. Also love the Beastie Boys Song.

http://youtu.be/xhlX1Piko1o