If the Western is the vehicle with which contemporary filmmakers investigate the past to understand the present, then Liberty Valance illuminates how unrest in the 20th century reached back to the 19th century to uncover the lies America has been telling itself ever since. Continue reading THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE
Change your mind. For once in your life, change your mind. Those are the words Fen hurls at Thomas Dunson, a hardheaded man with money on his mind. Fourteen years later, another woman will say something similar to Dunson, only this … Continue reading RED RIVER
Reporting from the Denver Film Festival. When it comes to cinematic landscapes, few are as iconic—or at least as mined—as Monument Valley. Located in northern Arizona, home to the Navajo Nation, Monument Valley was placed in the geography of cinema … Continue reading THE TAKING
It’s 1950, and John Ford wants to make a movie: The Quiet Man, from a story by Maurice Walsh, about a retired boxer who returns to his birthplace in Ireland and falls for a vivacious redhead. The movie will star John Wayne … Continue reading RIO GRANDE
Marion Michael Robinson, aka John Wayne, aka The Duke, was born in Winterset, Iowa on May 26, 1907. If he were alive today, he would be 113. But he’s not. Wayne died on June 11, 1979, at the age of … Continue reading THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE
If you’ll ever listen to some people who are talking, especially in a scene of any excitement, they all talk at the same time. All it needs is a little extra work on the dialog. You put a few words … Continue reading In Their Words — Friday, May 24, 2013
Michael J. Cinema 