This year’s truth-in-advertising award ought to be given to VCI for its DVD series of “Darn Good Westerns.” You’ll find no shouting and no lurid...
Darn Good Westerns, Vol. II
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Western Movies
The Wild Bunch: Forty Years Later
In November, the 40th anniversary of 1969’s The Wild Bunch was celebrated in grand fashion at the Million Dollar Theater in downtown Los Angeles....
Bonanza Classic Revived
Bonanza is so much a part of our cultural history and our TV past that its familiarity disguises the fact that the show is genuinely odd. Of all the...
“Everyone Stayed Home to Watch Gus Die”
The triumph of the TV miniseries Lonesome Dove is such that to once again name the awards and repeat the ratings and draw quotes from the universal...
Ken Burns’s Best Work Ever
Ken Burns is more than a chronicler of American history and culture. As early as 1981, when Burns presented his film on the history of the Brooklyn...
The Mythic West That Matters Now
In his famous 1893 frontier thesis, Frederick Jackson Turner argued that the juncture between the civilization of East and the savagery of the...
Jonah Hex’s Gunspinner Extraordinaire
“Rocketshoes!” says Josh Brolin with a huge grin, as soon as I mention Joey Dillon’s name. “He’s unbelievable. He’s the fastest thing I’ve ever...
“Draw, Old Chap”
At this moment, on Clerkenwell Green in London, England, a lean cowboy with steel-blue eyes loosens his Colt’s revolver in its holster and pushes...
The Life and Legend of Hugh O’Brian
Hugh O’Brian is Wyatt Earp. By that I mean that in talking with O’Brian, one gets the sense that the actor is in many ways as contradictory as the...
Western Writers Pick Top 100 Westerns
Last year, a line was drawn in the sane when, as part of their annual summer convention, the Western Writers of America (WWA) decided that they...
Standing Up for Liberty Valance
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) is the last truly important movie in the career of director John Ford. As Liberty Valance begins, the period...
The Adventures of a Wagon Train
Robert Fuller was the perfect TV cowboy. He loved to ride, loved acting, he had the looks and, as the child of professional dancers, he had the...