The classic movie John Wayne hated
When we think of the western genre, several names, such as John Ford, Clint Eastwood and John Wayne, come to mind. The latter secured his first leading role in 1930’s The Big Trail before closely collaborating with Ford on projects such as Stagecoach, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Searchers. The actor became a quintessentially American symbol, a tough cowboy traversing dusty landscapes.
Wayne also starred in movies such as True Grit, Fort Apache, Rio Grande, She Wore A Yellow Ribbon and The Quiet Man. His traditional values were apparent in the rugged, masculine characters he portrayed, and Wayne made no secret of his incredibly offensive conservative views. For example, in 1971, he told Playboy, “I believe in white supremacy” – just one of many despicable comments he made during his lifetime.
Wayne’s politics went hand in hand with his movie roles, and in 1959, he made a movie that responded to the communist fear, better known as McCarthyism, that dominated Hollywood. Rio Bravo, directed by Howard Hawks, was a direct attack on Stanley Kramer’s 1952 movie High Noon, which Wayne thought was “un-American” and fed into communist ideas. The actor was the president of the anti-communist organisation Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, and he did what he could to ensure that westerns remained distinctively American and conservative.
High Noon, starring Gary Cooper, was written by Carl Foreman, who was blacklisted by the House Unamerican Activities Committee, an organisation that investigated those believed to be communists. Wayne really didn’t like the values espoused by High Noon, believing it didn’t portray its protagonist with enough masculine strength.
He told Roger Ebert, “A whole city of people that have come across the plains and suffered all kinds of hardships are suddenly afraid to help out a sheriff because three men are coming into the town that are tough. I don’t think that ever happens in the United States.
He added that “If I’d been the marshal,” he would have “just taken my wife and saddled up and rode out of there.”
Meanwhile, Hawks disliked the film because he thought it destroyed everything that makes a western so great. According to Hawks, the fact that Cooper’s character was saved by his “Quaker wife” just wasn’t suitable enough. “That isn’t my idea of a good Western,” he explained.
Thus, he joined forces with the genre’s ultimate star to make what he deemed to be a faithful western. Rio Bravo, shot in Technicolour, was not received overwhelmingly positively – only now has it been widely considered a stellar entry to the western genre.
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