by Adam Ritchie, Contributing Writer
Welcome again, one and all, for another trip down memory lane, or for me, a completely new memory. Since my reign of terror began again on 20th Century Flicks a few months back, I have only been writing about classic films I have recently seen for the first time, and to give an outsider’s perspective as it were.
My mission, and I chose to accept it, is to see if a film of note holds up to the test of time, and to investigate what all the fuss is about. So… for this month, let me tell you how I saw The Searchers, John Ford’s much beloved 1956 western starring John Wayne as Ethan Edwards, Jeffrey Hunter as Martin Pawley, and Vera Miles as Laurie Jorgensen, to name but a few.
Set in post American Civil War 1868, the basic premise is from the point of view of the Edwards family. During a nighttime raid, a group of Comanches massacre the family, except for the girls — Debbie (Lana Wood) and her older sister Lucy (Pippa Scott) — who they kidnap. Ethan (Wayne), a former Confederate soldier, embarks on an arduous journey with Pawley to find the girls, and enlists the help of others along the way.
Full disclosure, this was my first Ford and Wayne film. Now that you have finished internally gasping at this revelation, westerns were never my bag. I used to see my dad watching them sometimes on a Sunday afternoon if they were on TV, and they never looked appealing to me in the slightest. Wayne films and westerns were something I actively avoided. Now, of course, that has changed as I have grown to appreciate, and at times adore, westerns as my movie watching experience matures.
If you watch The Searchers in the eyes of someone living in 2023, there are more than a few troublesome moments. At the very start, Ethan gives the 12-year-old boy a sword about the boy’s own height as a gift. This is a frankly weird thing to witness in the often overly-sanitized 21st century. The film could be construed as fairly racist too, (as was the style at the time), as there are some blatant anti-Indigenous American sentiments throughout. There is no doubt that films like this helped drive the bigoted and misinformed opinions that have lasted for generations.
Ethan Edwards is a (say it in a John Wayne voice with me) no-nonsense, gruff, rough-and-tumble sorta fella, so don’t be surprised to find The Searchers full of toxic masculinity. Men are men, and the only emotion we have is anger. Anger is a multi-purpose emotion; it also means we are sad, upset, forlorn, hungry, annoyed, and whatever else you can muster. Gladly, though, we are blessed with some real emotion toward the film’s latter half.
I think if you can put yourself in the era and see this through 1950s, ending of the Hays code era eyes, you can definitely get a lot of enjoyment out of it. Firstly, the Monument Valley setting is glorious and beautifully shot. Ford sweeps the camera and paints some stunning imagery, sending us back in time to the mid-1800s. There is a decent amount of sly humor in some key scenes that took me by surprise as well. The fight over Laurie between Pawley and Charlie McCorry (Ken Curtis) is, rightly or wrongly, hilarious, and we also get some pretty tense and suspenseful moments throughout.
I’m not sure I enjoyed this as much as a should have; however, I still found it to be better than average. The story beats are great, and one scene in particular cleverly drives the story along. Laurie reading Pawley’s letter effectively fast forwards the timeline with acceptable exposition.
The characters are built well enough for you to care about them, and become immersed in their story and the overarching plot is engaging. What I did find was that, despite there being a couple of surprises along the way, mainly with Debbie, the story really doesn’t go anywhere you don’t expect it to. But that is judged on almost 70 years worth of film that comes after it. For its time, I can absolutely understand why this is considered in such high regard, and carries its legacy forward as an influential piece on so many great directors we have today.
Initially, I thought I would probably never watch this again, but as I write this piece, I am beginning to convince myself it deserves a rewatch at some point. So if you have never seen The Searchers, definitely do.
You can read more from Adam Ritchie, and follow him on Twitter and Letterboxd