John Winkler
11/1/11
Title: The Searchers
Language/Country: English/United States
Runtime: 119min
Release Date: 1956
Awards: Nominated for several (including 1956’s Best Director from the Directors Guild of America), but won none.
The Searchers
“The Searchers” is an American film directed by John Ford, starring John Wayne. It was released in the United States in 1956. Although this film has not won many awards, it has been highly influential for some major films and directors.
The film is set in 1868 Texas, featuring John Wayne as the main character Ethan Edwards. Ethan returns from the American Civil War, to the home of his brother Aaron and his family. When Aaron’s youngest daughter, Debbie is kidnapped by Native Americans, Ethan ventures off with Martin, her adopted older brother, to catch the natives tribe and get her back. We follow Ethan and Martin as they vigorously search for years to find Debbie and bring her back to them.
Besides this film seeming like one giant montage to begin with, due to it’s storyline going quickly through several years, it also represented something Eisenstein claimed to be one of the vital tools for montage. Eisenstein talked about using conflict in order to produce a montage. One of the things he talked about used in this film is called “conflicts of depths.” “Conflict of depths” can be used in several different ways, however the one way it was used most powerful in this film was its use of close shots and long shots.
“The long shots give the film a poetic, formal quality,” wrote Ken Dancyger in his book “The technique of film and video editing: history, theory, and practice.” Ken explained how “shots are dramatically very important to the evolution of the scene.” He talked about Ford’s use of long shots and mid shots and used them as reference to explain the importance of shot selection. This shot selection chosen by Ford definitely created the conflict he claimed was needed.
This film has influenced many films and directors. One of the great influences this film had was on that of David Lean. David Lean directed the critically proclaimed “Lawrence of Arabia,” which had direct influences from “The Searchers.” Wikipedia, claims that Lean “watched the film repeatedly while preparing for Lawrence of Arabia to help him get a sense of how to shoot a landscape.” Turner Classic Movie, notes " Steven Speilberg, Martin Scorsese, John Milius, Paul Schrader, Wim Wenders, Jean-Luc Goddard and George Lucas have all been influenced and paid some form of homage to The Searchers in their work.”
When I first began to watch the film I was immediately disinterested due to the fact that I despise western films. However, before I knew it this movie quickly won me over. The film featured such a good story, and really intriguing character played by John Wayne. He wasn’t like the usual hero/ lovable character you find in westerns. He was rough and tough and walked around with a chip on his shoulder. Also the shots and scenery worked really well together. The film really appealed to me and made me want to watch it again.
Sources
“The technique of film and video editing: history, theory, and practice” By Ken Dancyger
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