‘The Conqueror’: The movie that made John Wayne “visibly shudder”
Some of the best movies of American cinema boasted having John Wayne front and centre. From the movies of John Ford, such as the seminal western flick The Searchers, to Howard Hawks’ stylish drama Rio Bravo, Wayne long dominated the patriotic genre alongside the likes of Clint Eastwood, James Stewart and Gary Cooper, making it far more mythical and wondrous than it ever had been before.
Making his debut in the genre in 1930’s The Big Trail, Wayne steadily climbed the ranks of Hollywood to become one of the most integral leading men in the business. Following success in his debut, he would later make the fateful collaboration with Ford for Stagecoach, which brought him unprecedented success, setting him up for a career under the bright lights of cinema.
Yet, Wayne’s career wasn’t steady sailing, with the actor making a number of critical and financial failures amongst his great successes. For example, Wayne surprisingly “really hated” his western debut, The Big Trail, later stating: “Those westerns I made at Warner Bros were remakes of old Ken Maynard films…I had to dress up to look like Ken Maynard because a lot of the old footage they inserted had shots of Maynard in the distance”.
Few films compare to the one that made the actor “visibly shudder”, however, with this unfortunate accolade going to the 1956 film The Conqueror.
Directed by Dick Powell, The Conqueror is one of Wayne’s most notorious movies, telling the story of Genghis Khan, the former Khagan of the Mongol Empire, in a film that twisted and toyed with history. Cast in the lead role, Wayne not being East Asian is just one of the movie’s many major issues, with the script for the half-hearted drama being utterly awful and the on-set safety issues proving to be fatal later down the line.
Speaking about what the experience taught him and his career, Wayne once stated: “Don’t make an ass of yourself trying to play parts you are not suited for”.
The film was, indeed, far more than a career mistake, however, with the production having a catastrophic effect on Wayne’s health. Without the safety procedures of the modern-day industry, Dick Powell chose to shoot The Conqueror in the deserts of Utah, just years after the army had conducted nuclear bomb testing in the very same place. While the effects weren’t felt right away, in the years that followed the film’s release, 91 of the cast and crew who worked on the movie passed away due to complications with cancer.
Take a look at the trailer for The Conqueror below.
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