Rent El Dorado (1966)

Nothing to prove - El Dorado review by RJ

Yet again I find myself sitting down to try and review a film whilst lacking the contextual framework to do so properly. At the age of 38, this is the first John Wayne film I have ever seen. Even though for the last twenty years I would easily have been able to rattle off the names of films like The Searchers, Stagecoach, True Grit, Rio Bravo etc, I've somehow never actually got around to seeing any of them. Maybe because there were always other films I was more interested in seeing, maybe because a vague awareness of Wayne's political views put me off, maybe because my exposure to the Western genre was through revisionist/spaghetti westerns and I thought that Hollywood Westerns would be too safe and conservative - for whatever reason I just never seemed to get around to them.

My overall impression of El Dorado was that it was a film made by old hands with nothing to prove - and I mean that as a compliment. I think Hawks was about 70 at the time of directing this, his penultimate film, whilst Wayne was about 60 and had been starring in films for more than three decades. The film kind of ambles along at a pace befitting men of their ages - it's slow, but not at all in the sense of being boring, just in the sense of being unhurried, knowing exactly where it is going and seeing no need to rush in getting there. It's a film that is not interested in being original (I understand that it is more or less a remake/thematic variation of Rio Bravo, and was basically remade again a few years later as Rio Lobo), instead preferring to indulge in the pleasures of a simple story told in an engaging manner.

It's actually much harder to review a simple film than a complex one. What else can I really say about this? It's an engaging story, directed and acted with such confidence and assurance as to seem effortless. To quote Roger Ebert's 1967 review: "For people who like well-made, entertaining movies with suspense, violence, horses, colorful characters, lots of shooting and a few pretty girls, "El Dorado" is about the most entertaining Western to turn up this year." I must be one of those people because I enjoyed this.

There is one cringeworthy bit of racism towards the end when Mississippi (brilliantly played by James Caan) pretends to be Chinese in order to distract a guard by putting a bowl on his head, turning up the corners of his eyes and spouting some 'Chinese sounding' gibberish. This was 1966 and American New Wave cinema was just around the corner, not that you would know it from this defiantly old-fashioned film - and it's ironic that this little bit of regressive racism is performed by Caan who is the only clue in this film to the imminent changing of the landscape (and changing of the guard) in American cinema.

A Pure Cinematic Western - El Dorado review by GI

Similarities with Howard Hawks Rio Bravo (1959) are inevitable especially as both films were scripted by Leigh Bracket who admitted the films had the same narrative structure. Whilst the earlier film is a classic of the genre El Dorado is a film that is a star vehicle for John Wayne, who at 59 years of age when this was released is too old to convince as a famous and lightening draw gunfighter. Perhaps this is all the reason why this film is played more for laughs and in a Fordian way the comedy is what makes it very watchable. The mid 60s was the time when Wayne is starting to look overweight and less the classic western hero and more of the curmudgeonly father figure. It's consequently quite daft to have him as the love interest to Charlene Holt's widow and Wayne plays the lothario very reluctantly. It's still a film that worships the law of the gun and despite deaths this is a bloodless film that lacks Hawks previous eye for the majestic side of the western. This is a western that has no truck with the usual legends and myths of the genre, there's no frontier to discover, no Indians to fight and no wilderness to survive in, this is a pure cinematic western with a theme park style town and standard gunfights, punch ups and stock characters. Wayne here is Thornton who gets embroiled in a small range war to help his old pal, Harrah (Robert Mitchum who steals the film), an alcoholic sheriff, to deal with the bad guys. Like Rio Bravo the central story has the good guys holed up and besieged in the jailhouse but the climax here pales in comparison to the earlier film's fantastic ending. This has its entertainment value and if you grew up on a diet of westerns this is a nostalgic revisit to the time before the classic western disappeared, indeed it came out right in the middle of the spaghetti western boom although El Dorado was still a huge hit. The added bonus is James Caan in a breakout role as a young, naïve guy who joins Wayne and Mitchum. There's loads to enjoy here and a fair bit that will annoy too and it's a western that would struggle to find a modern audience and yet it is a also a fine example of a major star doing what he does best.

Like slipping into a warm bath - El Dorado review by NP

There's an embarrassing and baffling racist joke towards the end which sadly mars the experience, but otherwise this is like slipping into a warm bath. Hawks is in complete command of his material – yes, it feels like a 50s movie made in the 60s, but why innovate when you've already achieved perfection? – and Wayne and Mitchum play their roles with the kind of ease and poignancy that can only come from a lifetime in front of the camera. Sublime.