Westerns Films Westerns Films Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Examples Westerns are the major defining genre of the American film industry, a nostalgic eulogy to the early days of the expansive, untamed American frontier (the borderline between civilization and the wilderness). They are one of the oldest, most enduring and flexible genres and one of the most characteristically American genres in their mythic origins. [The popularity of westerns has waxed and waned over the years. Their most prolific era was in the 1930s to the 1960s, and most recently in the 90s, there was a resurgence of the genre. They appear to be making an invigorating comeback (both on the TV screen and in theatres). Modern movie remakes, such as 3:10 To Yuma (2007) and the Coen Brothers' True Grit (2010) have also paid homage to their mid-20th century predecessors.] See all Greatest Westerns Title Screens This indigenous American art form focuses on the frontier West that existed in North America.

Westerns are often set on the American frontier during the last part of the 19th century (1865-1900) following the Civil War, in a geographically western (trans-Mississippi) setting with romantic, sweeping frontier landscapes or rugged rural terrain. However, Westerns may extend back to the time of America's colonial period or forward to the mid-20th century, or as far geographically as Mexico. A number of westerns use the Civil War, the Battle of the Alamo (1836) or the Mexican Revolution (1910) as a backdrop. The western film genre often portrays the conquest of the wilderness and the subordination of nature, in the name of civilization, or the confiscation of the territorial rights of the original inhabitants of the frontier. Specific settings include lonely isolated forts, ranch houses, the isolated homestead, the saloon, the jail, the livery stable, the small-town main street, or small frontier towns that are forming at the edges of civilization. They may even include Native American sites or villages.

Other iconic elements in westerns include the hanging tree, stetsons and spurs, saddles, lassos and Colt .45's, bandannas and buckskins, canteens, stagecoaches, gamblers, long-horned cattle and cattle drives, prostitutes (or madams) with a heart of gold, and more. Very often, the cowboy has a favored horse (or 'faithful steed'), for example, Roy Rogers' Trigger, Gene Autry's Champion, William Boyd's (Hopalong Cassidy) Topper, the Lone Ranger's Silver and Tonto's Scout. Western films have also been called the horse opera, the oater (quickly-made, short western films which became as commonplace as oats for horses), or the cowboy picture. The western film genre has portrayed much about America's past, glorifying the past-fading values and aspirations of the mythical by-gone age of the West. Over time, westerns have been re-defined, re-invented and expanded, dismissed, re-discovered, and spoofed.

In the late 60s and early 70s (and in subsequent years), 'revisionistic' Westerns that questioned the themes and elements of traditional/classic westerns appeared (such as Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch (1969) , Arthur Penn's Little Big Man (1970), Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971), and later Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven (1992) ). Westerns Film Plots: Usually, the central plot of the western film is the classic, simple goal of maintaining law and order on the frontier in a fast-paced action story. It is normally rooted in archetypal conflict - good vs. bad, virtue vs. evil, white hat vs. black hat, man vs. man, new arrivals vs. Native Americans (inhumanely portrayed as savage Indians), settlers vs. Indians, humanity vs. nature, civilization vs. wilderness or lawlessness, schoolteachers vs. saloon dance-hall girls, villains vs. heroes, lawman or sheriff vs. gunslinger, social law and order vs. anarchy, the rugged individualist vs. the community, the cultivated East vs.

West, settler vs. nomad, and farmer vs. industrialist to name a few. Often the hero of a western meets his opposite "double," a mirror of his own evil side that he has to destroy. Typical elements in westerns include hostile elements (often Native Americans), guns and gun fights (sometimes on horseback), violence and human massacres, horses, trains (and train robberies), bank robberies and holdups, runaway stagecoachs, shoot-outs and showdowns, outlaws and sheriffs, cattle drives and cattle rustling, stampedes, posses in pursuit, barroom brawls, 'search and destroy' plots, breathtaking settings and open landscapes (the Tetons and Monument Valley, to name only a few), and distinctive western clothing (denim, jeans, boots, etc.). Western heroes are often local lawmen or enforcement officers, ranchers, army officers, cowboys, territorial marshals, or a skilled, fast-draw gunfighter. They are normally masculine persons of integrity and principle - courageous, moral, tough, solid and self-sufficient, maverick characters (often with trusty sidekicks), possessing an independent and honorable attitude (but often characterized as slow-talking).

The Western hero could usually stand alone and face danger on his own, against the forces of lawlessness (outlaws or other antagonists), with an expert display of his physical skills (roping, gun-play, horse-handling, pioneering abilities, etc.).

Subgenres of Westerns: There are many subgenres of the typical or traditional western, to name a few: the epic Western (i.e., The Big Country (1958)) the 'singing cowboy' Western (films of Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, see below) the "spaghetti" Western (the "Man With No Name" trilogy of films by Sergio Leone) the "noir" Western (i.e., Pursued (1947)) the "contemporary" Western (i.e., Hud (1963)) the "revisionistic" Western (i.e., Little Big Man (1970), Dances With Wolves (1990)) the "comedy" Western (i.e., Cat Ballou (1965), Blazing Saddles (1974) ) the "post-apocalyptic" Western (i.e., Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981-2), The Postman (1997)) the "science-fiction" or "space" Western (i.e., Outland (1981)) Influences on the Western: In many ways, the cowboy of the Old West was the American version of the Japanese sam

urai warrior, or the Arthurian knight of medieval times.

[No wonder that westerns were inspired by samurai and Arthurian legends, i.e., Kurosawa's Yojimbo (1961) served as the prototype for Clint Eastwood's A Fistful of Dollars (1964), and Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai (1954) was remade as John Sturges' The Magnificent Seven (1960). Le Mort D'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory also inspired much of Shane (1953) - a film with a mythical western hero acting like a noble knight in shining leather in its tale of good vs. evil.] They were all bound by legal codes of behavior, ethics, justice, courage, honor and chivalry.

Western Film Roots: The roots of the film western are found in many disparate sources, often of literary origins: folk music of the colonial period James Fenimore Cooper's novels such as his 1826 story The Last of the Mohicans (re-made as a feature film at least three times - Clarence Brown's 1920 version, a 1932 version starring Harry Carey, and George Seitz' 1936 version with Randolph Scott, and most recently as the popular film The Last of the Mohicans (1992) starring Daniel Day Lewis as the heroic white frontiersman scout named Hawkeye, raised as a Mohican) Francis Parkman's The Oregon Trail (1849) Samuel Clemens' (Mark Twain) Roughing It (1872) Bret Harte's short stories dime novels about Western heroes Owen Wister's influential The Virginian, published in 1902, the first modern western novel prolific Zane Grey's (1875-1939) 60+ novels that inspired dozens of films, including his best-known western Riders of the Purple Sage (1918, 1925, 193

1, 1941); also The Rainbow Trail (1918, 1925), George Seitz's The Vanishing American (1925) - the first film made in Monument Valley, Rangle River (1937), The Mysterious Rider (1933, 1938), Lone Star Ranger (1942), Nevada (1927, 1936, 1944), Western Union (1941), Gunfighters (1947), and Red Canyon (1949) other mythologies (tales of Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone, Jim Bowie, Gen.

George A. Custer, Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill Cody, Calamity Jane, Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, Bat Masterson), and outlaws (such as the James Brothers, the original Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and Billy the Kid) screen cowboy Gene Autry's "Cowboy Code" (or Cowboy Commandments) written in the late 1940s - a collection of moralistic principles and values that cowboys reportedly live by, including such tenets as: the cowboy never shoots first or takes unfair advantage, always tells the truth, must help people in distress, and is a patriot The most often-portrayed western heroes on screen have been (in descending order): William Frederick Cody ("Buffalo Bill"), William Bonney ("Billy the Kid"), Jesse James, Wild Bill Hickok, Gen. George A. Custer, and Wyatt Earp. Silent Westerns: The western was among the first film genres, growing in status alongside the development of Hollywood's studio production system. There were only a few great silent westerns, although the best ones established some of the archetypes that are part of the genre even today.

The earliest westerns (silent films without the sound of gunfire, horse's hoofbeats, and the cattle trail) are gems of American history. A few of the earliest western-like films were two shorts from Thomas Edison's Manufacturing Company: the less-than 1 minute-long Cripple Creek Bar Room Scene (1899) (with its prototypical western bar-room scene, and a barmaid played by a man) Poker at Dawson City (1899) (set during the Alaska Gold Rush, about a crooked poker game with flagrant cheating that led to a fight) Edwin S. Porter's Pioneering Western: But the 'first real movie' or commercially narrative film that gave birth to the genre was Edwin S. Porter's pioneering western The Great Train Robbery (1903) . Porter (named 'the father of the story film') was responsible for the one-reel, 10-minute long film, shot - curiously - on the East Coast (New Jersey and Delaware) rather than the Western setting of Wyoming.

[The first westerns were shot, until 1906, on the East Coast.] Porter had also directed and filmed Edison's short publicity western-themed film A Romance of the Rail (1903). Almost all the essential elements or conventions of typical westerns were included: good guys vs. bad guys, a robbery or wrong-doing, a chase or pursuit, and a final showdown, all in a natural setting. The film ended (or began) with a stunning close-up (the first!) of a gunman (George Barnes) firing directly into the camera - and audience. It was the most commercially successful film of the pre-nickelodeon era. Porter's film was a milestone in film-making for its storyboarding of the script, the first use of title cards, an ellipsis, and a panning shot, and for its cross-cutting editing techniques. One of its stars with multiple roles, Gilbert M. Anderson (Max Aronson), later took the name "Broncho Billy" Anderson and became famous as the first western film hero - the genre's first cowboy. As in other genres, westerns quickly became character-driven and stars began to be developed.

Porter's other film in the same year was a non-Western, Life of An American Fireman (1903) featuring more overlapping action and cross-cut editing, and a last-minute rescue of a mother and child in a burning building. And Edison's A Race for Millions (1907) also featured typical western plot elements - a high-noon shootout, and claim-jumping. In fact, a number of major film studios were making westerns as early as 1907, and by the end of the first decade of the century, about twenty percent of all of Hollywood's films were westerns. Other Early Westerns and Their Directors/Producers: The American Mutoscope and Biograph Co. claimed to have made the first western one year before Porter's The Great Train Robbery (1903) . A few early westerns copyrighted by Biograph were the 21-minute long Kit Carson (1903) and the 15-minute The Pioneers (1903). The first western produced in the West was Biograph's A California Hold Up (1906).

Note: The first sagebrush sagas were either shot on soundstages or made on the East Coast, until the wide expanse of the West opened up for on-location shoots. D. W. Griffith dabbled in silent westerns at Biograph Studios between 1908 and 1913, producing such pictures as: In Old California (1910), Griffith's first western-filmed western, followed by The Twisted Trail (1910) with Mary Pickford The Last Drop of Water (1911), with the western's first characteristic scenes of a wagon train siege and a cavalry rescue the innovatively-filmed Fighting Blood (1911) about conflict between white settlers and Sioux Indians in the Dakota territory of 1899 and Griffith's last major Biograph western filmed in S. California, titled The Battle of Elderbush Gulch (1914), a two-reel pre-cursor to his most (in)famous landmark film, Birth of a Nation (1915) , with Lillian Gish and Mae Marsh The first feature-length western was Lawrence B. McGill's six-reel Arizona (1913).

The first film to feature an all-Native American cast was Hiawatha (1913), made by the Colonial Motion Picture Corporation and based on Longfellow's poem. Young Cecil B. De Mille's first motion picture was The Squaw Man (1914), usually credited as the first feature filmed entirely in Hollywood. [De Mille remade the film in 1918 and 1931.] Even in the early days of the film industry, some real-life cowboys and legendary western figures appeared in films: Wyatt Earp in The Half-Breed (1919) Buffalo Bill Cody in The Adventures of Buffalo Bill (1917) Thomas Ince (1882-1924), known for inventing the studio system, was the first studio executive who embraced the western in the teen years. He arrived in California in 1911, where he produced detailed scripts with new situations and characters for a vast number of classic westerns.

In 1912, his Bison Company production studios (known as Inceville) purchased the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch and the Wild West Show to use their props and performers for his assembly-line, mass-produced films. In the early 1910s, famed director John Ford's older brother Francis was directing and starring in westerns in California for producer Ince, before joining Universal and Carl Laemmle in 1913. The First Westerns Super-Star of the Silent Era: William S. Hart Ince was responsible for discovering and bringing Shakespearean actor William S. Hart (1870-1946) to prominent stardom by signing him up in his New York Motion Picture Company. Hart served as both actor and director after moving to Hollywood, and was often portrayed as a "good bad man" on the screen (with his Pinto pony named Fritz).

He emerged as one of the greatest Western heroes in the mid-1910s, until the release of his last film in 1925: The Disciple (1915) The Taking of Jim McLane (1915) Devil's Double (1916) The Return of Draw Egan (1916) Truthful Tulliver (1916) The Narrow Trail (1917), Hart's first feature production for Paramount Branding Broadway (1918), set in modern-day New York City! Riddle Gawne (1918) Sand (1920), reportedly Pres.

Woodrow Wilson's favorite Hart film The Testing Block (1920) The Toll Gate (1920), Hart's first film with his own production company The Three Word Brand (1921), with Hart playing three roles White Oak (1921) Wild Bill Hickok (1923) Singer Jim McKee (1924) Tumbleweeds (1925), Hart's best-known and greatest western, by director King Baggot and from UA - about the Cherokee Strip (Oklahoma) Gold Rush; the film's title referred to a breed of roaming cowboys Top 10 Saloon Brawls in Westerns - YouTube Top 10 Saloon Brawls in Westerns Want to watch this again later? Sign in to add this video to a playlist. Need to report the video? Sign in to report inappropriate content. The interactive transcript could not be loaded. Loading... Rating is available when the video has been rented. This feature is not available right now. Please try again later.

Published on Jun 23, 2015 There ain't no better time for an all out brawl than when you're in one of these bars of the Old West, so start flipping blackjack tables and smashing chairs over people's heads! Join as we count down our picks for the Top 10 Western Saloon Fights. Click here to subscribe: or visit our channel page here: Also, check out our interactive Suggestion Tool at :) Check us out at , and . Special thanks to our user kenn1987 for submitting the idea on our Suggestion Tool at Check out the voting page here, If you want to suggest an idea for a WatchMojo video, check out our interactive Suggestion Tool at :) Want a WatchMojo cup, mug, t-shirts, pen, sticker and even a water bottle? Get them all when you order your MojoBox gift set here: WatchMojo is a leading producer of reference online video content, covering the People, Places and Trends you care about. We update DAILY with 4-5 Top 10 lists, Origins, Biographies, Versus clips on movies, video games, music, pop culture and more!

Category 15 Fierce Female Roles: Women in Westerns by David Cranmer David Cranmer In a genre that revels in the lone male protagonist, there are few meaty roles for women beyond the standard soiled doves or window-dressing (seems more often than not, even the horse gets greater attention than the ladies). Of those who have elbowed their way into this testosterone-laden landscape, here are my picks for the fifteen most notable female roles, whether in a brief appearance or as a leading character, both in Western films and on television. 1. Amanda Blake Role: Miss Kitty Russell in Gunsmoke (1955-1975) Miss Kitty is a tough-as-nails saloon owner who carries a soft spot for Marshal Matt Dillon. Her grit is exemplified in 1969’s “Mannon” episode when she is brutally raped by Will Mannon (Steve Forrest), an amoral character hell bent on terrorizing Dodge City while he awaits Dillon’s return. When Mannon returns to Kitty with flowers and an apology, she cuts him down to size hoping to take away his edge before the final showdown. Unforgettable. 2.

Katy Jurado Role: Helen Ramírez in High Noon (1952). I could never understand all the fuss Will Kane (Gary Cooper) made over Quaker good girl Amy Fowler (Grace Kelly) in this landmark film. I would have told her thanks for nothing and settled down with Helen Ramírez (Jurado)…that is if I survived the gunfight. The lovely actress also starred in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), where she comforts her husband (Sheriff Baker played by Slim Pickens) as he sits dying by the river. The scene is gut-wrenching and memorable, accompanied by the music of Bob Dylan, “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door.” Side note: Ms. Jurado became the first Latin American actress nominated for an Academy Award for her work in 1954's Broken Lance. 3. Katherine Ross Role: Etta Place in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) Katherine Ross holds her own against acting titans Paul Newman and Robert Redford in 1969’s iconic Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

So many fine scenes, but my favorite is her riding elegantly atop Butch’s bicycle handlebars to the strains of “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head.” Her sobering line in the film comes when she tells the two-bit outlaws, “I'll do anything you ask of me except one thing. I won't watch you die. I'll miss that scene if you don't mind.” 4. Hailee Steinfeld Role: Mattie Ross in True Grit 2 (2010) In search of her father’s killer in this second adaptation of the Charles Portis novel, 14-year-old Mattie manipulates Rooster Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) and the other men around her, marking one of the strongest performances by a woman in any genre, let alone any Western. Ms. Steinfeld was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. 5. Kerry Washington Role: Broomhilda Von Shaft in Django Unchained (2012) Kerry Washington as Broomhilda (in German Brunhilda) Von Shaft.

Through the pulp lens of Quentin Tarantino, Django Unchained (2012) depicts the stark brutality of slavery in America and the depths of hell one woman endures to reach freedom. Broomhilda is intensely brought to life by Ms. Washington, who received a much-deserved Image award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture. Side note: she also played a standout role in Lincoln that same year. 6. Claudia Cardinale Assorted Roles Claudia Cardinale staked her Western roles on playing intelligent women in distress in classics like The Professionals (1966) and Once Upon a Time in the West (1968). The Legend of Frenchie King (1971), a French comedy, may have been a comedown, but it made for some great film posters, pairing her with sex goddess Brigitte Bardot. 7. Annie Galipeau Role: Gertrude Moltke Bernard, aka Anahareo, in Grey Owl (1999) Anahareo falls in love with trapper Archie Grey Owl (Pierce Brosnan) and converts him into an environmentalist with her loving care of a couple of orphaned beavers.

There's much more worth saying about this one, and I explored it in detail here. 8. Marlene Dietrich Roles: Frenchy in Destry Rides Again (1939) and Altar Keane in Rancho Notorious (1952) It doesn’t seem like it should work, taking a heavily-accented German actress—the star of Josef von Sternberg films—and plopping her down in the American West. But it does, because Dietrich’s hard-hitting persona would strip off the smirk of any gunslinger. My personal favorite Dietrich oater pits her opposite Randolph Scott and John Wayne in The Spoilers (1942). Most amusing line comes from the Duke: “I imagine that dress is supposed to have a chilling effect. Well if it is, it isn't working, 'cuz you'd look good to me, baby, in a burlap bag.” 9.

Chelo Alonso Role: Steven's Wife (uncredited) in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (1966) If you are scratching your head over who this is, she had a bit part at the movie’s beginning as the mother who hears her family being slain by Lee Van Cleef. It’s just a cameo scene for the 1960’s sex symbol, known more for her sensual dance numbers in films like 1959’s Goliath and the Barbarians. But in this Sergio Leone classic, the anguished face of a woman who’s lost everything will remain etched in your mind. 10. Julie Christie Role: Constance Miller in McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971) Julie Christie a drug-addicted, straight-talking businesswoman (“Look, Mr. McCabe, I'm a whore!”) in McCabe & Mrs. Miller, one of the many revisionist Westerns that were cropping up everywhere in the late 1960s and 70s. Best scene is the gripping ending, where Christie’s addiction leaves her unaware that her friend and partner (played by Warren Beatty) is fighting for his life against insurmountable odds.

11. Diane Lane Role: Lorena Wood in Lonesome Dove (1989) Diane Lane took the well-worn prostitute role and weaved a heartfelt performance of a woman far classier than her job provided. Her scenes with Robert Duvall are humorous, warm, and poignant… you can see these characters in another time and another place would have been an ideal couple. 13. Jane Russell Role: Rio McDonald in The Outlaw (1943) Russell’s acting is always tops, though I’m not a fan of this unfortunate Howard Hughes film (includes a head-scratching plotline with Doc Holliday liking Billy the Kid even though the young outlaw stole his horse). But there’s no doubting its cinematic importance, because Russell’s ground-breaking scenes while sporting a bra to its fullest potential made the censors of the day cry foul. A box office hit was made and a legend was born. 14. Raquel Welch Assorted Roles Raquel Welch starred in three Westerns that I discussed in here . My top pick is the underrated 100 Rifles where she plays one bad-ass revolutionary with dutiful support from Jim Brown and Burt Reynolds. 14.

Molly Parker Role: Alma Garrett in Deadwood (2004-2006) Alma is a cultured socialite, stranded in a lawless town in South Dakota after her new husband is murdered over a supposedly worthless mine. Instead of tucking tail and running, she decides to stay on and brave the hostile territory. Ms. Parker gives a commanding and versatile performance in this modern classic. 15. Barbara Stanwyck Role: Victoria Barkley in The Big Valley (1965-1969) Barbara Stanwyck was one of the few women to head a TV Western's cast. And she pulled out all the stops becoming Victoria Barkley, the matron of the rich clan from The Big Valley. Sometimes, her acting went a bit over the top for my tastes, but there’s no doubting her strong matriarchal performance was a reason for the show's success, and this at a time Westerns were on their way out on the small screen. So there you have it, my picks for strong performances by women in Westerns. Who are some of your favorites? What is a Western Saloon? (with pictures) What is a Western Saloon?

Last Modified Date: 04 December 2016 Copyright Protected: Top 10 amazing movie makeup transformations Particular to the American Old West, a western saloon was a business establishment that primarily served liquor. Today, it might be called a bar, beer joint, pub or tavern. During their heyday in the 19th century, western saloons mainly served such customers as gamblers, cowboys, fur trappers, soldiers, gold prospectors and miners. According to historians and archaeologists, the first establishment to be called a saloon was opened in 1822 in Brown’s Hole, Wyoming. It was opened to serve fur trappers who were traveling through the region. The earliest saloons were not like those usually depicted in films of the Wild West . As people made their way west, liquor might be sold from wagons, and saloons might be built from whatever materials were at hand. Early saloons, usually crudely built, might be dug into the side of a hill, be in a sod hut or be little more than a tent or shack. Either distilled spirits such as bourbon and rye might be served or a homemade whiskey concocted from burnt sugar, raw alcohol and chewing tobacco.

Ad As towns and populations grew, the western saloon became more refined and, eventually, took on the iconic appearance made famous in movies. A pair of batwing doors at the entrance was a distinctive feature of the typical western saloon. These doors extended from knee to chest level and swung on double-action hinges. The interior usually held a long, wooden counter with a brass rail running along the bottom where patrons rested their feet and a large mirror that hung behind the bar. In new towns or settlements, saloons often were the largest and first buildings erected. At its height of popularity, the western saloon fell into one of three broad categories: premier saloons, working-class saloons and dives. Premier saloons were full-service businesses offering private gambling rooms, entertainment and a full list of commercial-quality wines and whiskeys. The working-class western saloon served a limited selection of liquor of uncertain quality and usually was a one-room facility with a few tables and chairs, a bar and perhaps a billiard table in the back. Dives sold homemade whiskey called rotgut, sold tobacco and usually lacked ventilation or toilets. The coming of prohibition in the United States in 1920 put western saloons out of business.

For the next several years, speakeasies took the place of saloons. By the time prohibition ended in 1933, the word “saloon” had so many negative connotations that new business establishments came to be called bars and nightclubs, among other monikers. Ad anon275165 Post 9 I've been to several real saloons, like the Palace on Whiskey Row in Prescott Arizona, the Crystal Palace in Tombstone Arizona and the Buckhorn in Denver, Colorado. All were in business back in the old days, but the Crystal Palace is the only one that has really stayed true to it's roots (the other two are really more restaurants nowadays, although they still have the original bars). The Crystal Palace still has the original bar and even bullet holes in the copper plated ceiling. But they are really no different than bars nowadays. There are plenty of rough dives in almost every town in the country that have as many fights, shootings and stabbings as those old West saloons. If you want to get a good idea of what a really rough old west saloon was like, go to a biker bar that's the watering hole for an outlaw motorcycle club.

Apart from the difference in dress and transportation, I bet there's not enough difference to spit at. SkyWhisperer Post 8 @Charred - I have often wondered how realistic the Western saloon scenes were in the movies that depicted them. I am not talking about the sets; I think they are picture perfect and true to the real saloons. I am talking about the stuff that happened in the saloons, like the bar room brawls and stuff like that. I am prone to believe that most of that was mere drama. Of course the places served strong liquor so I figure there would be the occasional altercation, but I don’t think it was a common sight. Charred Post 7 I’m not a big fan of Westerns myself, but I have been to a Western set. Believe it or not, it was not in Hollywood, but in Oklahoma. I attend a mega church that used to do its own movie productions, and it built a completely realistic Western set out in the middle of Oklahoma, complete with western décor, saloons and a fully functioning steam engine train. They use the set not only for productions but also for their holiday presentations.

The saloon of course, does not sell liquor, but rather hot chocolate, warm meals and offers up family friendly entertainment. It’s a fun place to hang out actually. Apart from this set that’s probably as close as I’ll ever get to a Western saloon. kylee07drg Post 6 @wavy58 – I think it's neat when people try to replicate the old western saloon atmosphere. My cousin has an old shack in his back yard that he throws parties in, and everything from the décor to the liquor is designed to bring to life the feeling of an old saloon. He accomplished what he set out to do. What is disgusting is that he even makes that old whiskey that contains chewing tobacco. I tried some of it unknowingly once, and I spit it out right away. How anyone could ever drink that without promptly vomiting is beyond me. I do love the unique atmosphere of the shack, though. It provides a quick escape from reality for a few hours on weekend nights. shell4life Post 5 I love the sound of western saloon pianos. They just had a richer, more self-contained sound than pianos today.

My musical keyboard has a western saloon piano sound option, and I like to use this to play old folk and country songs. It just creates an atmosphere of the days long ago, and I can almost see the dust in the air and smell the strong liquor as I play. This type of piano usually sounded slightly off-key. I don't know whether this was intentional or if no one bothered to tune them, but it contributed to the rustic aura of the saloon. wavy58 Post 4 My cousin decided to have a birthday party with a western theme, and she chose to make it look really authentic. She rented an old wooden cabin and decked it out to resemble the saloons in old western movies. She even made the guests wear cowboy hats and chaps. The girls had the option of either dressing like prostitutes from that time or wearing fake mustaches and going as dudes. There was even some moonshine on hand, and we ended up with quite a few altercations and temper tantrums. It was a bit too wild for my taste, and I left after the first fight. I think she got more than she bargained for, and it probably resembled a western saloon in more ways than one.

OeKc05 Post 3 If I had lived back in the days of old, I would have been terrified to enter a western saloon. People were not like they are nowadays, and everyone seemed always ready to fight to the death over every little argument. Also, it was totally acceptable for anyone to carry a gun into a saloon. Combine this with strong whiskey and clashing, strong personalities, and you have an unavoidable disaster. Bar fights these days often end with the people involved getting thrown out, and that's the end of it. It is less common for fights to end in death. tigers88 Post 2 I have been to a few bars that are made to look like old time western salons. It is kind of a cool novelty, but we all realize that its nothing close to the real ting. No mater how much parlor piano and sawdust they fill a bar with, it would never really feel like a western saloon without the sights and smells of the real thing. You need the smell of the horses outside, the stench of the men, the fragrance of whiskey rising out of a glass broken on the floor.

You need a pile of broken lumber leftover from the latest bar fight to erupt after a poker game. You need the cheap perfume of the ladies. They can try to imitate it all they want but it's pretty clear how far from real it is. Post your comments Westerns Films Westerns Films Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Examples Sam Peckinpah: Targeted marketing strategies succeeded in highlighting certain special features or sub-genres of western films. In the 1960s, two very different filmmakers refashioned the western in new ways - Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone. In only his second feature film, director Sam Peckinpah brought together two aging and admired iconic western stars, Randolph Scott (in his last movie) and Joel McCrea as two ex-lawmen transporting a gold shipment in the simply-told classic Ride the High Country (1962), an evocative film about the passing of the old West and the difficulty of adapting to changing times at the turn of the century.

The movies most quoted line was paraphrased from the Book of Luke: "All I want is to enter my house justified." The friendship of the older heroes was sorely tested by a younger hotshot gunslinger Heck Longtree (Ron Starr) during their 4-day trip to a mining camp in the high Sierras. This was Peckinpah's transition film from TV to big screen westerns. Peckinpah made his biggest impact on the evolution of the Western with his Hollywood production of The Wild Bunch (1969) , one of the best Westerns ever made - and filmed during the height of the Vietnam War. It was an end-of-the-frontier western set in Mexico in 1913 that followed the exploits of a band of outlaws whose past way of life was slowly being overtaken by mechanization and urbanization (symbolized by the technological inventions flaunted by a brutal Mexican guerrilla leader). Peckinpah's masterpiece was marked with bloody, slow-motion, ultra-violent choreographed ballets of death in its opening and in its finale when the group decides to die.

The revolutionary film was a precursor to urban crime thrillers and inner-city gunfighting of the 1970s and later, and was often interpreted as an allegory about the Vietnam War. [Since then, it has inspired dozens of film-makers, including Quentin Tarantino and John Woo.] Peckinpah's revisionist Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973) starred James Coburn as sheriff Garrett who tracked down and killed ex-partner/outlaw Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson). Sergio Leone's 'Spaghetti' Westerns: Italian director Sergio Leone brought many profound changes with his trio of low-budget "spaghetti" western films made in Europe (Spain and Italy) in the mid-60s, but not released in the US until 1967. They were representative of a sub-genre of foreign-made films featuring American stars (i.e., Clint Eastwood, Henry Fonda). The changes included a new European, larger-than-life visual style, a harsher, more violent and rough depiction of frontier life, revenge-seeking bandits and bounty hunters, haunting and jarring music from Ennio Morricone, choreographed gunfights, and wide-screen closeups.

TV's Rawhide (Rowdy Yates) star Clint Eastwood was portrayed as the mysterious, detached, amoral, fearless and cynical gunfighter and bounty hunter (dusty, serape-clad, stubbly-faced, and cigar-chewing) - 'The Man With No Name.' [There were resemblances between Eastwood's characterization and Alan Ladd's gunslinger in Shane (1953) .] The trio of films that demythologized the Old West actually resulted in a revival of the genre in the mid-to-late 1960s: A Fistful of Dollars (1964), with a plot borrowed from Akira Kurosawa's samurai warrior classic Yojimbo (1961) and from Dashiell Hammett's crime novel Red Harvest; the film inspired Walter Hill's gangster film remake Last Man Standing (1996) starring Bruce Willis For a Few Dollars More (1965) The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966) - the best and most ambitious film in the trilogy - the story of a quest for a cache of hidden Confederate gold by three uneasily allied, gritty characters: Clint Eastwood (the good

), Lee Van Cleef (the bad), and Eli Wallach (the ugly) The director's true western epic masterpiece was Once Upon a Time in the West (1968, It.), filmed in John Ford's favored location, Monument Valley.

It starred American icon-actor Henry Fonda as its black, villainous murderer, and brought together all the themes, characterizations, and experimental visuals from his previous three films. [The only other film that featured Henry Fonda in a rare villainous role was in Vincent McEveety's Firecreek (1968).] Clint Eastwood: During John Wayne's closing years, his popularity in westerns was matched only by Clint Eastwood, who had graduated from CBS-TV's Rawhide (from 1959-1966 playing the character of Rowdy Yates) to Italian "spaghetti" westerns and was brought to Hollywood to star in American westerns, first as an actor and then as director (or actor/director). Eastwood developed and broadened his range by appearing in director Ted Post's violent revenge western Hang 'Em High (1968), Eastwood's first American film as the star - a film co-produced with his own production company Malpaso.

Also, in the late 60's, he began his collaborative association with producer/director Don Siegel by appearing in the action cop film Coogan's Bluff (1968) - a foreshadowing of his performances as Dirty Harry. High Plains Drifter (1973) was Eastwood's second film as a director (and his first western as director), where he reprised his "The Man with No Name" character from the "spaghetti" Western sub-genre. He also directed and starred in the excellent revisionistic western epic The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976), (Eastwood's fifth as a director and eighth true Western) - one of his best films in which he portrayed a vengeful hero in pursuit of a villainous Unionist Red Leg soldier. He went on to star as a Wild West Show impresario in Broncho Billy (1980) (often not counted as a western), and as a mysterious Preacher in Pale Rider (1985) - a film that was inspired by his earlier High Plains Drifter (1973).

Although it was thought that Westerns were experiencing their swan song in the late 1970s and 1980s, Eastwood's award-winning and compelling film Unforgiven (1992) became the third western ever to win the Best Picture award. Starring in his 10th western (in addition to producing and directing), Eastwood played the part of William Munny - a retired, once-ruthless outlaw forced to return to harsh violence in a bounty hunt against corrupt sheriff Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman) in the town of Big Whiskey. The film de-mythologized elements in the Western genre. Big Stars in Westerns: Title roles for big box-office stars in westerns that rewrote the genre were often among the greatest box-office successes. Kirk Douglas starred in the modern cult western Lonely Are The Brave (1962), as "Jack" Burns - a rugged, individualistic 'last cowboy' who rides through contemporary-day New Mexico, cuts down fences, and is later pursued on his horse Whiskey by police cars and helicopters led by conflicted lawman Walter Matthau.

Its adapted screenplay by blacklisted award-winning Dalton Trumbo was taken from Edward Abbey's novel The Brave Cowboy: An Old Tale in a New Time. And aging actor Clark Gable and a burned-out Marilyn Monroe starred together in director John Huston's haunting, modern-day western The Misfits (1961) - the last film for the two stars. Paul Newman starred in the anti-western Hud (1963) and Hombre (1967), and with Robert Redford in George Roy Hill's revisionistic and mildly entertaining Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) as two light-hearted, amiable bank robbers - glamorous members of the legendary 'Hole-in-the-Wall' Gang, who were sought by a relentless posse and fled to Bolivia with an adventurous schoolteacher to become 'Yanqui banditos.' The entertaining film was enhanced by Burt Bacharach's musical score. Like The Wild Bunch (1969) , the two are threatened by encroaching civilization - here symbolized by a bicycle, and both meet their destined fate when massacred by a Bolivian army - in freeze-frame.

From its seven nominations, the popular film won four Academy Awards and was the highest-grossing western in film history up to that time. Charlton Heston played the title role in director Tom Gries' Will Penny (1968) of a fading and aging Western saddle tramp - an exceptional film about the passing of the West. One of the few attempts to portray Native-American life in a more sympathetic light was found in the realistic depiction of Sioux Indians in the Dakotas in A Man Called Horse (1970) with Richard Harris. The British-financed western Hannie Caulder (1971), starring Raquel Welch and Robert Culp, was both a rape-vengeance Western and a comedy. Sexual frankness and gritty authenticity brought audiences to Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971) with Warren Beatty and Julie Christie partnering as an entrepreneurial hustler and a opium-addicted brothel madam respectively.

Altman also debunked western myths in his ironic and politically-subversive Buffalo Bill and The Indians (or Sitting Bull's History Lesson) (1976) released in the Bi-Centennial year, with Paul Newman as the deconstructed, star-worshipped, mythical figure of show-biz huckster and entrepreneur William F. Cody. By the end of the 70s decade, John Wayne and many of the master Western film directors of all time had passed away, including John Ford, Howard Hawks, Henry Hathaway, Henry King, Raoul Walsh, and Delmer Daves. The Decline of Westerns in the 80s: In the early 1980s, westerns began to seriously decline and disappear from cinema screens with changes in public taste and as memories of the trail-blazing past receded. The tiring, familiar presence of westerns on television and the recognition that the way of life of native Americans was practically annihilated in our past caused the downturn. Oscar-winner Michael Cimino's multi-million dollar failure for United Artists, a detailed, over-long epic western Heaven's Gate (1980), contributed to the genre's weakening.

However, in the mid 1980s and into the 90s, western films experienced something of a comeback, due in part to the boost and the recognition received by two revisionistic, Best Picture westerns: Dances with Wolves (1990), Kevin Costner's politically-correct three-hour epic with twelve nominations and seven awards Unforgiven (1992) with nine nominations and four awards Producer/actor Kevin Costner's box-office and critical success Dances with Wolves (1990), his directorial debut, was noted as one of the few westerns that cast Indians in acting roles, used Lakota Sioux sub-titles, and viewed Native Americans in a sympathetic way and not as blood-thirsty savages. Although the film was officially sanctioned by the Sioux, not all Native American groups were sympathetic to its portrayals. Revisionist Westerns: Questioning and Rewriting the Western The genre had been reinvented, debunked, redefined and ridiculed, beginning in the late 60s and early 70s. So-called 'revisionist' Westerns questioned the themes and elements of traditional classics.

Director Sam Fuller's revisionist, low-budget B-film Run of the Arrow (1957), often noted as similar to Costner's Dances With Wolves (1990) many years later, starred Rod Steiger as a disheartened ex-Confederate soldier who journeyed west, endured a torturous 'run of the arrow' challenge, joined a Sioux Indian tribe, and fell in love with an Indian maiden named Yellow Moccasin (Sarita Montiel, with her voice dubbed by Angie Dickinson). John Ford's redemptive last western, Cheyenne Autumn (1964) with Richard Widmark and Carroll Baker, dealt with the destruction of the Native-Americans, by portraying the forced, late 1880s westward exodus of Cheyenne Indians from Oklahoma to their tribal lands in Wyoming. Dustin Hoffman portrayed Jack Crabb - the sole, white, 121 year-old survivor of Custer's Last Stand and the Battle of Little Big Horn in Arthur Penn's Little Big Man (1970), a fable about the expansion of the Old West from an adaptation of Thomas Berger's novel.

[According to Guinness World Records, the greatest age span portrayed by a movie actor, from 17 to 121, was by 33-year old Hoffman for this role.] Paralleling the Vietnam tragedy, the film demythologized the past and revealed the genocidal atrocities visited upon ethnic Indians by US forces. A variety of other westerns re-fashioned western themes with greater realism and less romantic and glamorous notions, such as: The Culpepper Cattle Co.

(1972) two films about the James-Younger outlaw gang: Philip Kaufman's The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid (1972) and maverick writer/director Walter Hill's The Long Riders (1980) with actual siblings acting as clan members Robert Aldrich's Vietnam allegory Ulzana's Raid (1972), in which Burt Lancaster starred as crusty Indian scout McIntosh involved in a search for escaped Chiracahua Apache leader Ulzana (Joaquin Martinez) with a small band of braves from the San Carlos Reservation that were terrorizing white settlers Lawrence Kasdan's big-budget Silverado (1985), featuring a future all-star cast of then-unlikely Western actors including Kevin Kline, Scott Glenn, Kevin Costner, Danny Glove, and John Cleese; a massive 1999 audience-participation Blockbuster Video poll named it "Most Deserving of a Sequel" the contemporary western Young Guns (1988), with a modern version of the Brat Pack in the lead roles Hill's Geronimo: An American Legend (1993), a new look at native American Apache leader Geronimo and his conflict

 with the US cavalry in the mid 1880s Tombstone (1993) (with Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp and Val Kilmer as the dying Doc Holliday) Wyatt Earp (1994) (with Kevin Costner in the title role) and Walter Hill's Wild Bill (1995) with Jeff Bridges as the legendary western frontier character, revealed in dreamy flashback [The exploits of Earp had already appeared in many previous Hollywood films including Ford's My Darling Clementine (1946) (with Henry Fonda) and John Sturges' Gunfight at the OK Corral (1957) (with Burt Lancaster).] Other post-classical, revisionist westerns in the mid-90s featured the West from a feminist or African-American perspective such as The Ballad of Little Jo (1993) about an ostracized Eastern woman (Suzy Amis) who moved west and disguised herself as a man, Bad Girls (1994) about four saloon prostitutes (Madeleine Stowe, Andie MacDowell, Mary Stuart Masterson, and Drew Barrymore), "a star-studded gang of beauties" who bonded together

 as gunslingers, and director Sam Raimi's 'spaghetti' western The Quick and the Dead (1995) that starred Sharon Stone as a vengeful lady gunslinger - a female Clint Eastwood.

Mario Van Peebles' exploitative, exciting adventure-western Posse (1993) featured black cowboys and revisionist, politically-correct western history. Western Spoofs and Comedies: Western parodies and comedies that mocked the genre include director Elliot Silverstein's very successful spoof hit Cat Ballou (1965) (with Jane Fonda in the title role, and with Lee Marvin in a dual, Best Actor-winning role), and Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles (1974) . James Garner (of TV's Maverick fame of the late 1950s) starred in two western-spoofs in the period: director Burt Kennedy's Support Your Local Sheriff! (1969) (that paid homage to previous versions of Wyatt Earp's legendary 'Gunfight at the OK Corral' and My Darling Clementine) and its lesser parody sequel Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971). John Wayne appeared in the western comedy McLintock!

(1963), featuring a battle-of-the-sexes "Taming of the Shrew" relationship between Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, and including a serious, often-mentioned scene of McLintock breaking up a Native-American lynching. Another 'western' comedy - City Slickers (1991) followed a group of middle-aged buddies embarking on a two-week western cattle drive led by a tough trail cowpoke named Curly (Jack Palance won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for the role). A big-screen, commercially-successful comedy-western, Maverick (1994), a spin-off from a late 50s and early 60s TV series, starred Mel Gibson in the title role as card sharp Bret Maverick, and the original Maverick character (James Garner) as Marshal Zane Cooper. Barry Sonnenfeld's The Wild Wild West (1999) was a spin-off from the popular mid-60's TV spy show with Men in Black's Will Smith as James T. West and Kevin Kline as Artemus Gordon.

Tom Dey's old West spin-off Shanghai Noon (2000) featured kung-fu superstar Jackie Chan as Chon Wang - an obvious take-off on John Wayne. Other Variations on Westerns: A superb television miniseries, adapted from Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, was the classic western saga Lonesome Dove (1989). The eight-hour, four-part miniseries by director Simon Wincer starred Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Duvall as Gus McCrae and Woodrow Call, two aging, cussing ex-Texas Rangers who engage in an adventurous cattle drive over the 2,500 miles from Texas to Montana. [It produced further mini-series sequels, Return to Lonesome Dove, Streets of Laredo, and Dead Man's Walk.] Westerns from a science-fiction point of view included a western-style Back to the Future, Part III (1990) . The low-budget Grim Prairie Tales (1990) was a supernatural horror-western - an anthology of four scary, unbelievable tales told around an open prairie campfire.

Jim Jarmusch's metaphoric, unique, mystical black and white western Dead Man (1996) starred Johnny Depp as an 1875 western wanderer (the ghost of poet William Blake?) pursued by bounty-hunters. Kathryn Bigelow's western-noir vampire-horror film Near Dark (1987) featured Bill Paxton and Lance Henricksen as members of a ghoulish motorcycle gang in America's Southwest. The Coen Brothers put their own spin on the role made famous by Oscar-winning John Wayne's 'Rooster' Cogburn, in the PG-13 adventure remake True Grit (2010), starring Jeff Bridges. It soon became the director duo's biggest hit, and the highest-grossing western since Wild Wild West (1999). Old West Saloon - The Wild West Old West Saloon Wild West Western Facts Old West Saloon The Old West saloon conjures up images of gunfights, heavy drinking, dancing girls and brawling cowboys and gunfighters. It was also popular with miners and soldiers.

The saloon was often depicted having duel wooden doors that swung open, a wide wooden boardwalk in front and a step higher than the dusty streets, a long hitching’ post in front. Inside, a long oak or mahogany wooden bar, barstools and sets of tables and chairs completed the look along with a brass foot rail encircling the base of the bar and a row of spittoons spaced along the floor. The first of the western saloons, however, didn’t look anything like what we had seen in all those cowboy and western movies. Rather, they were tents or lean-tos that were quickly thrown together so that a traveler might stop to quench his thirst or strike up a conversation or a cowboy or miner might come to relax a spell during their off hours. Card playing, too, was a popular activity. As the town or settlement grew, the establishment took on the traditional features of the Old Western saloon that we’ve all come to expect. Saloons of the American Wild West generally cropped up wherever pioneers established a settlement or where trails crossed. The first establishment to actually be called a "saloon" was the Brown’s Saloon at Brown's Hole near the Wyoming-Colorado-Utah border.

It was established in 1822 and catered heavily to the many fur trappers who traded during the old days. One of the Old West's first saloons that catered to soldiers was at Bent’s Fort, Colorado in the late 1820s. The gold rush caused another increase in the construction and popularity of saloons. In 1848 when gold was discovered near Santa Barbara, California, the settlement only had a single cantina (Mexican for bar). Just a few years later, more than thirty saloons had cropped up. Whiskey & Firewater Served The whiskey served in many of the early saloons was strong stuff, a combination of raw alcohol, burnt sugar and chewing tobacco. Cactus Wine, made from a mix of tequila and peyote tea was popular as was something called a Mule Skinner made with whiskey and blackberry liquor. Rye or bourbon were also popular drinks and beer was served in high volume too, but it wasn’t served ice cold as it is today. If a barkeeper was ever going to water down his liquor, he did it with some really odd ingredients like turpentine, ammonia, gun powder or cayenne pepper.

It packed a wallop either way. Firewater was a term originated when early traders were selling whiskey to Indians. They’d pour some of the whiskey on a fire to convince the Indians of the high alcohol content. Card Playing & Deadly Gun Action Faro was the most popular game played in western saloons, closely followed by poker and some dice games. Mixing alcohol and gambling could result in some deadly gun play. Professional gamblers quickly learned to protect their assets by honing their six-shooter skills at the same time as their gambling abilities. The Expansion of the the Saloon As saloons increased in popularity and townships prospered the saloon itself changed into many different forms, moving from the early plain drinking saloons to gambling saloons, hotel saloons, restaurant saloons and dance hall saloons. In the more populated settlements, these saloons catered to patrons 24 hours a day, every day of the week. Generally all were welcome with the exception of Chinese workers, soldiers who were blamed for infecting parlor house girls with diseases and respectable women. Unless they were saloon girls or shady ladies as some women gamblers were considered, ladies did not enter saloons. This tradition lasted until World War I.

The ladies got their revenge when they initiated the temperance (prohibition) movement. From Drink & Gambling to Public Meetings Because the saloon was usually one of the first and bigger buildings within many new settlements, it became common to use it as a public meeting place before the real town halls entered the scene. For example, Judge Roy Bean had a combination saloon and courtroom from which he ran his business and ordered hangings. Downieville, California had a popular saloon which also served as the office of the local Justice of the Peace. Famous Barkeeps & Violence Some noted gunmen and lawmen of the wild west owned saloons too: Wild Bill Hickok, Bill Tighman, Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, Ben Thompson, Doc Holliday, to name a few, tended bar or dealt cards. Wild Bill Hickok, you’ll remember, ended up being killed by Jack McCall while playing poker in the No. 10 Saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota. Saloons were great brawling places too and fights would end up careening onto the streets.

If you happen to visit Tombstone, Arizona today you’ll get to see some authentic western saloons, replete with authentic furnishings and get a good feel of what life was like in the rugged old west. Copyright © 1999-2016 thewildwest.org.

Question: In Western films, what is a "saloon"?
Answer: Bar