Rent The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

of historical interest - The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance review by AW

1962 b&w film - interesting because I'd never seen it. Classic John Wayne role, and classic Jimmy Stewart role - the man of honour who gets the girl. Rather violent. Did NOT endear me to Lee Marvin.

A Masterpiece - Film As Art - The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance review by GI

A tremendously important film and John Ford's last masterpiece. A film about the dying of the old west, about equality, freedom of the press, of law and order and the passing of the old ways. James Stewart plays Senator Ransom Stoddard, who arrives unexpectedly in the small western town of Shinbone with his wife to attend the funeral of an old man that few in the town even knew existed. His arrival sparks the interest of the local newspaper editor who demands a story. The town is now a civilised one but thirty years earlier it was a lawless frontier town. Stoddard recounts the story from his arrival as a greenhorn lawyer, his relationship with the deceased man, Tom and his immediate run-ins with the sadistic gunfighter Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin), a story that culminates in Valance's death and the legendary circumstances behind it. Shot in black & white at a time when westerns were being made in glorious technicolour and normally filmed using the huge vistas of the American West this was also mostly filmed on a sound stage. As a result this film was considered a minor work but it's brilliance has subsequently been recognised. And rightly so, this is a film that highlights the containment of the west as civilisation takes a firm grasp. It should really be Ford's swansong in that it effectively deconstructs the western mythologies he had spent a career making film about. John Wayne plays Tom, a true westerner who's role is to ignite the new west by his own destruction. It's a fine performance from Wayne, full of ambiguity and restrained anger - one of his best. The film also boasts the magnificent Edmond O'Brien in a scene stealing performance as a drunken journalist. This is one of the finest American films you could ever wish to see so if it's passed you by try and get a copy and enjoy this masterpiece. It deserves a modern audience.

Elegiac Western (spoiler). - The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance review by Steve

Sentimental old school western which met with a critical shrug on release, but has since gathered considerable acclaim. Maybe in 1962 this looked old fashioned; the over-lit b&w photography and the studio interiors make it feel an awful lot like television. After all, this was the year Sam Peckinpah reinvigorated the big screen western with Ride the High Country.

 Now, this hardly matters; it's a John Ford film, with his usual obsessions. James Stewart plays an attorney from back east who (symbolically) brings law to the west when he shoots the outlaw Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Only he was really felled by the gun of a settler (John Wayne). Because it was the firearm- and the pioneer- not liberal legislators, who brought peace to the frontier...

Which doesn't stand much scrutiny. But heck, it's Ford's picture, and his politics. There's the usual knockabout comedy (a stuttering Swede is particularly vexatious). And if after two hours you're not exhausted by Duke calling Jimmy 'pilgrim' about a hundred times, try watching it again... Andy Devine's comic turn as a cowardly sheriff, will be very much to taste.

Each performance is a caricature and everything takes its time getting there. The moment weariness settles in, John Carradine stands up to deliver a long oration on behalf of the cattle barons... Still, the ending is distinctly good, which leaves a decent impression. It's now rated a genre masterpiece, but there's nothing that Ford hasn't already done, sometimes better.