John Ford

[Askew]

> Ford's essence as an artist is found in the relaxed, digressive portraits of small communities
> (like Young Mr. Lincoln, and The Sun Shines Bright).

Four Sons, also -- even though in a German setting.

And don't forget How Green Was My Valley.

Nor The Quiet Man and The Long Grey Line (my two favourite Ford's along with How Green Was My Valley).

[kingofthejungle]

I think The Long Gray Line might be Ford's most underrated film. It's so rich and evocative - and has a much more nuanced and ambiguous view of the military than one might think at first glance. The broad comedy bits turn some people off, but they seem to be an important part of Ford's tonal strategy; The comedy has to be as big as the tragedy is deep. Whenever I watch the film, it keeps me on an emotional razor's edge between laughter and tears.

[FrauBlucher]

> Ford's essence as an artist is found in the relaxed, digressive portraits of small communities
> (like Young Mr. Lincoln, and The Sun Shines Bright).

Four Sons, also -- even though in a German setting.

I would put Pilgrimage (1933) in this group as well. It starts out in small town America and then moves to Paris. If you haven't seen it, I will not give the reason for the geographical shift. But I totally recommend it.

For me, this is one of the most devastatingly heartfelt films I've seen by anyone. I'm usually not a fan of sentimentality, but Ford brings this emotion from a very dark place, which is acceptable for me when it's nurtured and allowed to grow out of a very real human tragedy. Clearly a Ford strong suit in many of his films.

[Michael Kerpan]

Watched Steamboat Round the Bend (which I enjoyed) -- but have a technical question. Was rear screen projection already being used by 1935? Some of the shots on the steamboat, with Rogers and Shirley in the foreground, and the river bank moving in the background looked like they could have been projecting the background -- but other times it wasn't as clear...

[Tommaso]

It was almost certainly available. I remember some early talkies with people sitting in a car and driving through the countryside where the latter was clearly projected. Just don't ask me about those films' titles.

[Roger Ryan]

KING KONG (1933) is full of rear-projection (among other similar effects). Reportedly, proper rear-projection began near the advent of sound films around 1930.

[John Edmond]

Rear projection debuted with Borzage's Liliom in 1930. But even before then, there were equivalents.

[Tommaso]

Right, I was thinking about the work with miniatures in Murnau's "Der letzte Mann" and "Sunrise", too, but am not sure whether this was rear projection in the strict sense of the word.

[movielocke]

I caught up with some other Ford films:

Three Godfathers is warm and corny and more or less terrible, the whole thing felt tonally off to me throughout. Nothing ever quite gels in the film and it hammers with a heavy hand continually and in the worst ways. It was amusing the backflips of plotting the film had to perform to explain why the baby didn't starve right away, but this only led to more eyerolling from myself.


The Wings of Eagles at least the first half hour, is possibly one of the worst things Ford ever did. The comedy is off and tone deaf, there is no romantic chemistry, the patronizing patriotizing is beyond grating and unbearable, nothing works.

Then John Wayne falls down the stairs and looks like he broke his neck, I laughed because it was in keeping with the poor tone of the humor to have a bad fall down the stairs and break your neck joke right after a romantic reconciliation and implied sex. I thought, "if this were a better film he would have broken his neck, instead of using this scene as a cheap gag," and then the film reveals the character actually did break his neck. Holy Shit what an out of nowhere hit that was, did Ford pepper the early part of the film with bad gags just to pull this shocking inversion on the audience? I don't think so, but the film swiftly becomes a completely different beast after John Wayne is paralyzed (and Wayne gives a fine performance, btw, relatively restrained compared to the antics of many of the costars in the film). The extremely long sequence in which he discovers he is only partially paralyzed and slowly regains some very minor motor control is the highlight of the film and is some truly impressive filmmaking as Ford expertly manages the audiences expectations and beliefs, moving you through an up and down roller coaster of initially expecting some Pollyanna magic, then accepting that no the movie is surprisingly going to take a real world approach and admit he's paralyzed, to being surprised that he retains some nerve function and then a little bit thrilled at the agonizing slow progression to a facsimile of walking, it's a fine sequence. The rest of the film isn't worth much, and it becomes unsalvageable with a plethora of hollywood, reunite with da wife, and world war II subplots, but that twenty minute segment in the middle is surprisingly excellent.

Sergeant Rutledge is a film that I'd always heard favorable mentions of but never knew much about, I'd sort of forgotten it was even a Ford film.

The film is a stunning near masterpiece. It's got some minor elements that don't quite work or undermine it, but it's a spectacular piece of storytelling from Ford's darker period. This film makes a superb companion to Two Rode Together or the Man Who Shot Liberty Valence in the way that it continues the skepticism towards romanticizing the Old West. There's a sense of outrage towards the casual injustice and prejudice of humanity in general, there's a bitterness to the piece that belies the happy ending. If the film took the To Kill a Mockingbird tack with its ending, it would be a great film, possibly even a masterpiece, but it never quite reaches that level of honesty.

[hearthesilence]

The Museum of the Moving Image is holding a mini retrospective on John Ford, which is already several days into its run. Most of his greatest films are being shown, all on film prints. Definitely worth checking out.

In the meantime, is it just me or has there been a resurgence of criticism against John Ford, falling back on the lazy, shallow argument that his films are terribly racist works? Well, yeah, racism plays a role in his films, but unlike many other commercial films of the same era that also had problems with race, his films grow increasingly aware of it and have a lot to say about racism, not just about the times Ford's films were being made but the nature of racism and its acceptance among some cultures/populations in general. The A.V. Club just published (or maybe revived) an embarrassing piece claiming that Tarantino was on to something, completely oblivious to Kent Jones surgical demolition of Tarantino's argument. And across social media, I've seen the occasional post worthy of politicians offering soundbites to the media - that is, lots of fire and accusations, but completely devoid of any careful or intelligent analysis of what we're really seeing in Ford's films.

[domino harvey]

The AV Club has turned into a Tumblr-esque NPR Liberal circlejerk haven, much like Cracked and other click-bait sites, don't worry about it too much. Their piece the other day mocking Dustin Hoffman for making fairly innocuous remarks on the basis that he was old was one of the many signs that I myself am getting too old for this shit

EDIT: That Jones essay is great, by the way. Thanks for sharing

[hearthesilence]

It's not just politics. I feel like the AV Club has precipitously dropped in quality with the most inane arguments about anything. You know how some people are prone to latching on to one detail as a way of dismissing an entire film in the most idiotic and arrogant way? (Usually because it seems to be the easiest thing to do rather than admit you don't get the film/album and need time to think everything over.) Their criticism is gradually becoming that.

[domino harvey]

I read an interesting theory the other day (can't remember where) that the reason why AV Club and other sites are dropping in quality and taking a hard left turn is because the kind of people who tend to hold kneejerk views like these are also the ones willing to provide content for websites for nothing or next to nothing, unlike professionals who demand more because they deliver more.

[Drucker]

The retrospective does look like a treat, and I'm looking forward to seeing The Searchers on the big screen/in a film print. If only Queens wasn't such a schlep!

I don't think what you're seeing is necessarily limited to Ford. I got into a Twitter debate about whether or not Psycho was transphobic, and while perhaps I didn't make the best argument that it wasn't, the person on the other end basically thought that any film that depicted cross-dressing at all was inherently transphobic.

[hearthesilence]

Ridiculous. If they're just going to dwell on how a film doesn't reflect political trends from our current era, they're not really engaging with the film, just imposing a demand on it with no relation to context.

I saw The Searchers at MoMI not too long ago and posted about it over in the film's own thread. Looked great - if it's the same print, you'll be in for a treat!

[John Hodson]

MovieMail are at it too - http://www.moviemail.com/blog/hollywood ... Searchers/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It really is the definition of ridiculous; the comparison with Birth of a Nation is just too ugly, the dismissal of Rio Grande as a 'shamefully xenophobic diatribe' is beyond daft. Fort Apache - perhaps Ford's most powerfully complex political statement to that date - gets namechecked, but nothing more.

[FrauBlucher]

Political correctness has become an overwhelming reaction in society that it puts almost everything being judged in a vacuum. It's a shame that Ford has to be viewed and critiqued this way.

[hearthesilence]

Jesus, what are they looking for, Dances with Wolves? Politically, I loved with Costner was trying to do with that movie, but as a work of art, it's pretty flat. A great political statement isn't the same thing as great art. Politically, Ford's work is usually uncomfortable, even ugly, but conflicted, rich and complex - brutally honest with no easy answers. That's why he's a great artist.

[Drucker]

It makes me think of people who dislike films for not being perfectly accurate. There are probably better examples, but The Social Network comes to mind. When Mark Zuckerberg criticized it, he did so by mentioning the entire "pining for his ex-girlfriend" angle is a fabrication, and he dated the same woman throughout and beyond college (and eventually married her). There's a failure to admire the film itself and what's there.

I also remember that when I was getting into film, I read somewhere that Grapes Of Wrath was an odd choice because Ford was "conservative." Maybe that idea carries weight because of how often John Wayne appeared in his films, but is there really any evidence that Ford was conservative? I haven't found any, and his concern seems mainly to celebrate the common man, who often stands against the interest of the more powerful.

[hearthesilence]

I think Joseph McBride covered Ford's politics extremely well in Searching for John Ford, partly for the way it evolved and how McBride reflected Ford's politics off the surrounding culture. Not just on a nationwide scale but with other communities and subcultures as well (not just with other ethnicities but within Caucasian culture as well - especially important considering Ford's Irish heritage). Long story short, he was conservative, but saying that wouldn't do his work or his actual politics justice, especially when labeling someone's ideology these days usually leads to broad assumptions. (Understandable in the era of Fox News, yeesh.)

[John Hodson]

Political correctness has become an overwhelming reaction in society that it puts almost everything being judged in a vacuum. It's a shame that Ford has to be viewed and critiqued this way.

It's shameful. Shame on them.

[domino harvey]

It's also the default because it's easier to feel superior to a film or a work of art than engage with it, let it challenge your existent beliefs, compare it to other films with similar aims, explore its context and response, or any other manner of truly responding to a film. Dismissal is quick, simple, and makes you look "enlightened" in the process, giving one the appearance of intelligence without doing anything to earn it. Film not as art but as a bullet point on a checklist of preexisting agendas.

[Michael Kerpan]

The Ford films I've seen don't _feel_ nearly so conservative as McCarey's films.

[hearthesilence]

The Ford films I've seen don't _feel_ nearly so conservative as McCarey's films.

HAH, ain't that the truth? I'm almost glad for McCarey's relative obscurity - God knows how much time I'd be wasting defending My Son John. (Politics are horrendous but seen as a domestic drama, it's brilliant...then again, I could just upload Gary Giddins' interview for Criterion and forward people to that, he does a pretty succinct job.)

[knives]

I just heard a particularly odious variation of this absurdity today on the radio. Some Scrabble guy had to explain to the reporter use mention differentiation with regards to allowing racial slurs and she just could not appreciate that racial slurs are still words.