I watched "The Searchers" on cable last night and...

Cafe Society
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As I mentioned in the OP, I saw this movie (maybe) when I was in my teens, but managed to forget most of it, If not all. I can’t even swear that I did see it then. But that’s when it was released. It is true that a majority of movies relied on sound stages and phony sets for Westerns. That style dominated TV Westerns, too. But there were also plenty of “on location” movies by then that didn’t rely on cardboard sets and totally unbelievable action sequences.

I accept that it took advancements in technology for movies (and TV) to grow into the realism we accept as normal today. I also accept the Peckinpah era’s establishing of what’s to be expected in action sequences, explosions, gunshot wounds, and on down the list.

But to suggest that anyone watching new movies in the 50’s (and even earlier) was conditioned to phony sets, cheesy acting and ho-hum directing techniques is just playing fast and loose with history. I would urge others in my age group to vouch for that fact and not allow this version of history to continue to stand. Movies and TV didn’t just suddenly become “realistic” any more than society hasn’t suddenly become apathetic and overweight. These things take time and their organic evolution is constantly in flux. I wager that the current generation will look back in 10 or 15 years and see how hokey the current crop of movies and TV shows are, and I’d also wager there are even some in the current audience who see how ridiculous some of the current crop is already.

I thought The Searchers was a so-so movie whenever I saw it the first time, and no manner of hype from TCM, Martin Scorsese, Roger Ebert or other authorities will change my mind or tastes. I feel I have beaten this horse enough.

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Film is a visual language. Over the years, it’s vocabulary has changed and evolved and we “understand” things a bit differently. For example, the jump cut used to be considered a mistake and would be quite jarring for the audience and pull them out of the story. Now it’s become a standard piece of vocabulary that is used all the time. It’s entered the film lexicon and we’ve all seen it enough times to know what it means without thinking.

All cinema is to some degree “fake” looking, amateurish and disconcerting. But we don’t see it in the modern films we watch because we are fluent in the current language. We naturally and automatically understand the shorthand and stylization used. Back then, the language was a little different. So it looks odd to us- just like how reading Shakespeare can be a bit of a challenge because so much vocab has changed.

Anyway, The Searchers is a film about film and film history. And it specifically uses and abuses the cinematic vocabulary of the time and of past eras to create meaning. A lot of it’s “fakeness” is actually a very conscious effort. Which means while it’s not always “realistic”, it’s style is incredibly rich and meaningful. A modern analog would be Kill Bill, which explores the cinematic vocab of different times, eras and places in order to comment on film history.

No problem if you don’t like it. Not everyone wants to ruminate on the history of the Western- some people just want to watch an entertaining movie. But there is a purpose behind it.

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Thanks again, even sven, for a thoughtful post. Your points are persuasive enough that if I were to jettison my basic reaction to this movie and look (dispassionately) at the commentary from others, including those in this thread, I might be swayed to accept it as a monumental film. Maybe it deserves another viewing with these things in mind. But there are a few points discussed here that I wish to address further, without going back for specific quotes and cites.

First, I refuse to read reviews before seeing a movie. I want my first impression to be mine and not some critic’s or another (perhaps better informed) viewer’s. I want the movie to work or not for me before deciding to get input from others. I feel the reviews I like are those that make me think more about what I saw and point out things I missed or cause me to rethink things I did and didn’t like.

I find the commentary on DVD’s to be quite helpful in “getting” some movies. But I have learned through experience with those things that at least half the time if the director, producer, writer, whoever, had spent the energy to put on screen some of the things they claim to be alluding to or paying homage to, the movie would be much better for it. For this reason I tend to reject the supplementary commentary of what was left out and why. Things left on the cutting room floor are just that. Excess that can’t be used to broaden the meaning of the movie as shown. Similarly, the way the movie differs from some other source material (book, magazine story, comic strip, name it) is of no real value to me. If it’s not on the screen at the time I see it, all the additional “meaning” that that other material might supply is of little or no value.

I appreciate the “behind the scenes” features on DVD’s and in commentary from TCM spokespersons and the like. Those trivia usually affect my appreciation for things I already liked when I saw them. They even make me appreciate the craft, art, and technical prowess of the movie makers, but only to the extent that I appreciate the movie as a movie. I can’t remember a single movie that I disliked on first viewing that I turned around and liked because of additional details provide after the fact.

I will confess to the fact that after letting a movie sit for a few years and giving it a second chance some time later, that I have grown to appreciate some of them just by way of my changing tastes and attitudes. But I suspect that if I began a list of those things that fell in the “now I like it” group, there’d be an equal or greater number in the “what the fuck was I thinking” category. In short, my tastes and appreciations change over time and that’s okay by me.

While I admire people like Tarantino who can find things of substantial value in movies that I thought (and think) are nothing more than popcorn (at best), I just can’t put myself into that group. My love of the lore of movies stops where my tastes do, and I just don’t have the patience to try to find the value in things like 50’s sci-fi bug movies, teenager slasher “horror” movies, toys fighting cartoons movies, and so on. I’m one of those movie viewers who have a fairly limited range of things they want to see, and within that range only a certain amount of things that rank as “good.”

As for The Searchers I’m comfortable accepting that many people find it to be a great movie. I also accept that many people like Kung Fu and martial arts movies and the Lord of the Rings phenomenon. That’s fine. I just don’t happen to be in the group. And that’s also fine – by me.

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There’s no contradiction in (a) recognizing a work of art as being an excellent and important creation, a significant milestone, with enormous influence on what followed, and (b) not liking it very much. Indeed, the ability to hold these two varying views simultaneously is a sign of critical maturity.

For example, Potemkin is revered for its groundbreaking camerawork and montage, but that aside, it’s actually kind of boring. Birth of a Nation is a giant of a film, standing over the cinematic landscape like a colossus, and to deny that would be sheer ignorance; and yet the actual story and politics on display in the film are completely repugnant. Triumph of the Will is the most important propaganda movie ever made; just because it’s about Nazis doesn’t remove it from the list of works that are required viewing for anyone who wants to understand the art of visual persuasion.

Basically, there’s a big difference between enjoyment and appreciation.

For me, The Searchers is a movie I deeply, deeply appreciate. However, I can’t really say I “enjoy” it, exactly. The experience of watching it is valuable, and I do say I enjoy that experience, while I may not enjoy the film itself, per se.

Not sure if that makes sense. But that’s how I look at it.

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Cervaise, what you say is helpful in that I do draw the distinction between liking a movie (or a painting, a piece of music, a poem, or work of literature) and appreciating its value to the artform of which it is a member. In my case, it’s more likely to be the other extreme of that range of considerations in that I will wind up liking those things generally regarded as crap or nearly worthless from a critical standpoint. I don’t mind that all that much and write it off as a matter of taste (or lack thereof) on my part.

I would add Citizen Kane to the list of classics you cited as another example of one I can see for its place in cinema history as a major milestone and yet barely stay awake through. I believe it may have been my fourth attempt to watch it all the way through before I was finally able to.

I can even see the value in Stagecoach as a trendsetter in Westerns, even though it’s even less enjoyable to me than The Searchers. I value Shane and High Noon as much better models for the meaningful Western.

It just struck me as very odd that shortly after seeing the PBS 90-minute special on the works of John Ford and John Wayne, with the praise heaped on The Searchers by the critics and experts, that I was able to see for the first time in many years the movie itself. It just left me totally cold and confused about why it is so favorably received.

This thread has helped me see some of that, but I still wouldn’t want to add it to my collection of favorite movies. For somebody who spent virtually every Saturday afternoon in the early 50’s seeing Westerns of all sorts in the B category, and who had seen Shane and High Noon and Red River, when it came time for me to be impressed with The Searchers, I just wasn’t. I was more impressed with The Durango Kid or Rocky Lane. My age at the time can account for some of that. But I believe some of my lack of appreciation for The Searchers is that it reminds me more of the quality of a B Western than the masterpiece it’s supposed to be.

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Art is a two way street; writing needs to be read, paintings need to be seen, movies need to taken in and experienced. With most great art, effort and reward are proportional.

John Ford was a great artist. I think he’s among the very greatest of the tellers of the American Story: up there with Hawthorne and Copland and Twain. He had great stories to tell, but he told them in his own way. His way of storytelling made a bit more immediate sense to its audience in a different time. It’s unfortunate that we’ve since become accustomed to movies telling us stories OUR way, and that we see deviations from our expectations as faults in the artist.