Rio Grande

In this old classic John Wayne had not yet become the somewhat grumpy old tough guy as he is in many of his classical movies. He is somewhat younger and his character as Lt. Col. Kirby Yorke is a bit more emotional than the characters that he often played and there is a bit more romance in this movie as well. At least in my experience with John Wayne’s movies.

I was not sure if I was going to like this movie so much since it is generally put in the Romance genre as well as the Western genre. However I can without a doubt say that I did indeed like it quite a lot. It is still a good old-fa...

More artistry from the maestro.

The final piece of John Ford's cavalry trilogy is a fine portrait of the old west and the soldiers who operated at that time. Much like She Wore A Yellow Ribbon, this film continues with the central theme of human focus, getting close and real to what makes these folks tick, all laid out on Ford's wild frontier portrait.

This offering throws up a number of emotions by splicing Western staple conventions. We have a special war time romance (the excellent John Wayne & Maureen O'Hara), a fair dash of humour (hats off to Ben Johnson), and some delightful tune...

"Col. Yorke" (John Wayne) has enough on his plate fighting the marauding Apache when his son "Jeff" (Claude Jarman Jr) arrives at his post, only to be followed shortly thereafter by the man's mother "Kathleen" (Maureen O'Hara) determined to buy him out. Let's just say that marital relations are a bit strained, and that the youngster has no intentions of leaving his post and so the seeds of slightly comedic discord are sown as mother and father bicker their way back into love. The film itself is all just a bit predictable, but there's a fun dynamic between Wayne and O'Hara and a solid supportin...