Return Of The Western?

We’ve watched every episode of Yellowstone, we enjoyed 1883, the first of the Yellowstone prequels (which apparently is returning for a second season), and we are caught up on 1923, the newest Yellowstone prequel. We figure 1903 can’t be far behind, and there are many more tales to be told of the rambunctious Dutton clan and their constant battles to hold on to their beautiful spread in the wilds of Montana. (Don’t be surprised, for example, if there is a 2063, about future generations of Duttons.) With the success of the Dutton shows, you have to wonder: will westerns finally be making their TV and movie comeback?

It’s hard to believe now, but in the early days of television, westerns dominated the network programming. Shows like Gunsmoke, Bonanza, Have Gun, Will Travel, and The Rifleman dominated the nightly programming and the ratings. Westerns were so popular for so long on television that variations on traditional westerns, like Branded, about an unjustly accused soldier, and The Wild, Wild West, with its newfangled gadgetry, were introduced. During those same decades John Wayne and other stars were churning out westerns at the cinema, producing classics like The Searchers, High Noon, Shane, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. And the movie industry also made its share of non-traditional westerns, like The Magnificent Seven, The Wild Bunch, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

It’s not hard to see why westerns dominated popular entertainment during those years. The western genre was very elastic, and accommodated simple good guy versus bad guy tales and much more nuanced and complicated stories that left you wondering about who really was the hero. Westerns were cheap to make, with the sets for most TV westerns found on a Hollywood studios back lot, and even “on location” shoots occurring within only a few hundred miles of studio headquarters. And, in America, there always has been a certain romance about the west, and a fascination with the gunslingers, sheriffs, and train robbers, the wars with native Americans, and the many hazards and rough justice of frontier days.

At some point in the late ’60s, though, westerns suddenly vanished from the TV screen, and movie westerns largely disappeared only a few years later. Perhaps Americans had just had their fill, or perhaps westerns just didn’t fit with the then-prevailing notions about the world, or perhaps science fiction films and TV shows co-opted the standard western plots and threw in some cool special effects, besides. Since the demise of the western genre, there have been predictions about its renaissance–in the wake of TV shows like Lonesome Dove and movies like Young Guns and Silverado–but those forecasts have proven inaccurate.

Could now be the time when American viewers are ready to return to the western, and an era when problems seemed less complicated and a simple showdown on a dusty street was seen as a way to actually solve a problem, once and for all? With Beth Dutton’s two-fisted approach leading the way, who knows? We may see a lot more horse operas in the future.

Arizona Gunslinger

When we were ordering breakfast yesterday at the Feedlot Cafe in Marana, our friendly waitress asked if I would like hot sauce with my meal. She rattled off five or six options, then added, with a note of doubt in her voice: “Or would you like to try some Arizona Gunslinger?”

Somewhere a clock chimed, a hot gust of wind blew, and a lonesome piece of sagebrush rolled by.

“Arizona Gunslinger?” I gulped, as a horse in the distance whinnied in alarm, the hinges on the saloon door creaked loudly, and an ominous chord of music sounded in the background. “Sure, I’ll give it a try.” The waitress left and brought back a bottle of deep green chili sauce that promised it was “smokin’ hot.” “Here you go,” she said with a note of trepidation in her voice.

As I examined the bottle, I noticed that mothers were pulling their children indoors and the shopkeeper across the street was closing his doors and shuttering his windows.

When my eggs and sausage and hash browns were delivered, I tried some of the sauce, using deliberate and judicious application rather than a quick draw technique. And I found I liked the Arizona Gunslinger sauce. In fact, I liked it quite a lot. It’s got a kick like a mustang and a nice warm finish in the throat, and definitely added a bullet-like zing to my eggs.

When I finished my food, I ambled out the front door, glad that I had survived my encounter with the Arizona Gunslinger rather than being carted off to Boot Hill.

The Magnificent Seven

On Sunday Kish and I went to see The Magnificent Seven, the Denzel Washington-led reboot of the ’60s classic.  It made me realize, again, how much I enjoy westerns — and how infrequently Hollywood produces them these days.

The original The Magnificent Seven, which itself was a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, is one of the best westerns and best ensemble movies ever made.  In that film, Yul Brunner recruits seven gunslingers who try to help some hapless Mexicans protect their village from the depredations of a ruthless gang of bandits.  In the current remake, the general storyline is the same, but the bad guy is an evil mine owner who has no problem with gunning down people in the middle of the street and setting a church on fire to try to intimidate the peaceful townspeople into selling him their land for a pittance.  (When somebody intentionally burns a church, you can be pretty sure he’s a bad guy.)

Two of the townspeople find Denzel Washington, a quick-draw bounty hunter, and convince him to help, and Washington then recruits the team.  As in the original, it features a diverse collection of western types, all of whom have split-second reflexes, can shoot with awesome precision, and have the military training from their Civil War service to develop a plan to defend the town that is worthy of Robert E. Lee.  (It being a modern movie, there’s got to be some dynamite and explosions in the plan, too.)  We learn some of the seven’s back stories during the recruitment and the training of the townspeople, but this movie, like the original and so many other westerns, is all about good versus evil.  We know that everything is pointing toward the final, inevitable showdown with the evil mine owner.

This film isn’t as good as the original Magnificent Seven — that would be holding it to an impossible standard — but it’s an enjoyable romp, and the western scenery that is a big part of the appeal of any western is gorgeous.  Washington capably fills Yul Brunner’s shoes, and the rest of the cast play their parts admirably, finding their inner heroism as they fight, and sometimes die, to free the rustics from the yoke of the evil mine owner.  It’s a fine, well-made story that strikes many of the enduring touchstones of American mythology.

So why don’t more westerns get made?  At our screening there were only three other couples in the theater.  I guess that’s why.  In a world of superheroes and CGI, maybe stories about human beings, horses, and guns just can’t compete.  That’s too bad.