Rio Bravo (1959)

[T.H.]

I think the point Wayne/Hawks were trying to make was that dissenion among people or a community is more dangerous and harmful than any single imposing figure or force. You know, you got to join together, serve your duty and beat those commies, which is communist in itself but that's a different debate altogether.

For the life of me, I'll never understand how people can compare the highly inferior El Dorado to RB. I just don't get it. To me, it's like comparing a very bad movie to a very good movie.   

[Groggy]

I agree with all three of those faults, though for what it's worth I did like that the bad guys wouldn't kill Chance and Co., even though it proved to be a rather stupid move on their part. I also hate the "My Rifle, My Pony and Me" scene. Not a bad song, but it brings the film to a screeching hault just as the tension is building up.

There's an argument on this topic going on on the IMDB Westerns board. Rio Bravo seems to be winning, but then some idiot brings up Rio Lobo (and claims it's better!).

[marmota-b]

Yes, I think I agree that the romance and the singing scene are really stopping the pace of the film.

Though I think, if you viewed it as a real-life story (it really had that impact on me - like watching the life of the heroes day by day, almost minute by minute), the singing scene would have its importance as something that unified the heroes. It's boring to watch, but from my own experience I know such singing with guitar makes miracles at making friends with somebody. It's similar to sitting at a campfire with someone. Before the scene they all still kept their own separate problems, and didn't trust one another completely, after that they were one. I hope you know what I mean. This is what makes me think the singing scene should be there, only maybe a bit shorter.

Wow. I think the film grows on me with time, without watching it again!

You know, you got to join together, serve your duty and beat those commies, which is communist in itself but that's a different debate altogether.

I don't think it is. You could just as well say that it's nazist in itself or whatever. The danger is not in joining, the danger is in losing your own personality in the unity. Would you say this board's members are communists because they joined together to persuade the world to believe in Leone's greatness?

I mean, that's exactly what I liked on Rio Bravo. It wasn't like "join together and believe in the same things and be one and everything will be allright". The people were different, and often not very willing to join, and even after they joined, they kept having problems with it.

[Groggy]

Though I think, if you viewed it as a real-life story (it really had that impact on me - like watching the life of the heroes day by day, almost minute by minute), the singing scene would have its importance as something that unified the heroes. It's boring to watch, but from my own experience I know such singing with guitar makes miracles at making friends with somebody. It's similar to sitting at a campfire with someone. Before the scene they all still kept their own separate problems, and didn't trust one another completely, after that they were one. I hope you know what I mean. This is what makes me think the singing scene should be there, only maybe a bit shorter.

I understand the intention, but shouldn't a movie be, y'know, entertaining? This isn't a Goddard film, it's a Howard Hawks Western.

I don't think it is. You could just as well say that it's nazist in itself or whatever. The danger is not in joining, the danger is in losing your own personality in the unity. Would you say this board's members are communists because they joined together to persuade the world to believe in Leone's greatness?

Agree with this 100%. Unifying doesn't mean Communist. If you want to be extreme you could say fascist, although that's misleading too. Nationalist might not be a bad term.

I mean, that's exactly what I liked on Rio Bravo. It wasn't like "join together and believe in the same things and be one and everything will be allright". The people were different, and often not very willing to join, and even after they joined, they kept having problems with it.

Good show Marmota. You said all this more eloquently than I probably could have.

[T.H.]

I don't think it is. You could just as well say that it's nazist in itself or whatever. The danger is not in joining, the danger is in losing your own personality in the unity. Would you say this board's members are communists because they joined together to persuade the world to believe in Leone's greatness?

I mean, that's exactly what I liked on Rio Bravo. It wasn't like "join together and believe in the same things and be one and everything will be allright". The people were different, and often not very willing to join, and even after they joined, they kept having problems with it.

I was being facetious when I made the original post. In no way do I think that the characters or their motivations were communist. I was just playing on the notion of how Rio Bravo was made as a response to High Noon, which was interpeted by many as an allegory to McCarthyism (not to bring that Hollywood 10 crap to light, I don't want to discuss it). I guess I should use more emoticons from now on.

Would you say this board's members are communists because they joined together to persuade the world to believe in Leone's greatness?

No, fascists. 

[marmota-b]

I understand the intention, but shouldn't a movie be, y'know, entertaining? This isn't a Goddard film, it's a Howard Hawks Western.

Well, then maybe a lot shorter. I still think it should be there. Most of the film nothing really happens, in terms of action, so I think it wouldn't change much. If you took it away, something would change, at least in my eyes.

And thanks for the compliment.

I was being facetious when I made the original post. In no way do I think that the characters or their motivations were communist. I was just playing on the notion of how Rio Bravo was made as a response to High Noon, which was interpeted by many as an allegory to McCarthyism (not to bring that Hollywood 10 crap to light, I don't want to discuss it). I guess I should use more emoticons from now on.

That's perfectly OK. I just "caught you by word", as we say in Czech.

[T.H.]

My entire reason for making the quip was that it makes more sense to create a film about the strengths of individualism, if hatred of communism is a catalyst for making a film.

[Groggy]

My entire reason for making the quip was that it makes more sense to create a film about the strengths of individualism, if hatred of communism is a catalyst for making a film.

It was hatred of High Noon much more than Communism. And I'm not sure I buy your argument anyway.

[T.H.]

Well, agree to disagree. I am quite tired of defending a comment made in jest.

[Groggy]

Well, agree to disagree. I am quite tired of defending a comment made in jest.

Why would we do that?

In the words of a great man:
"There's only one way to win an argument: Shout, shout, and SHOUT AGAIN!!!!!"

[dave jenkins]

Rio Bravo at 50: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123802062186941663.html

[marmota-b]

My entire reason for making the quip was that it makes more sense to create a film about the strengths of individualism, if hatred of communism is a catalyst for making a film.

Thinking of it months later, not necessarily. If the film is not good enough, you might end up either convincing everybody that only individualism at the brink of egoism is good, or convincing them that communism is in fact good...
The question is, what aspects of communism you're fighitng against. If you're fighting against the cruelty of communist regimes, or against the economic theory of communism, or what... and by the answer to that question you'd answer the question of how to do it.
I suppose in the times of Rio Bravo you'd be simply fighting against the expansionism of it. Though I might be wrong. I was born decades later, and on the other side of the Iron curtain, so I can't tell.

[dave jenkins]

Wow: http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/lgrin/2009/05/03/haunted-by-the-memory-of-her-song-fifty-years-of-rio-bravo/

[Groggy]

Ebert's latest great movies article:
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090715/REVIEWS08/907159989

[Groggy]

Second time in a week I've rewatched a film I hadn't seen in years.

To paraphrase Titoli's post above, this movie perfectly encapsulates everything that was both good AND bad about classic American Westerns. It has a great Wayne performance and some excellent set-pieces, but it definitely isn't the sum of its parts.

For future reference, allow me to ennumerate the film's biggest flaws:

- It's long and slow-paced. Most members of SLWB, I imagine, wouldn't have an inherent problem with a long and slow-paced movie, but Rio Bravo is filled with padding, long and repetitive dialogue scenes and side-tracks that don't add much to the film, and it really drags in spots. With such a simple, straightforward story, a leaner, more fast-paced treatment probably would have worked better. Someone needed to teach Hawks dramatic economy, I guess.

- Ricky Nelon isn't completely horrible - he ain't good but he's balanced out by Dean-O and Brennan, and he's sidelined for most of the film anyway. What is troubling about him, though, is that Colorado is the progenitor of all the colorless young sidekicks the Duke would take on, and those flicks wouldn't have the benefit of strong supporting players.

- Angie Dickinson. I don't know if her presence is so much a bow to commerciality, as CJ and others seem to think, as that Rio Bravo is a Howard Hawks film. Hawks loved strong female characters, which worked wonderfully in his screwball comedies, but he didn't seem to know what to do with them in Westerns (see also: Red River). Dickinson, lovely as she is, does nothing but flirt with Duke and hover around the bar, and there's no justification for her presence whatever.

- The singing. Please stop it.

- I don't mind the lack of action out of town, but I did mind that we saw maybe a half-dozen townspeople in the whole movie. I guess Chance is Sheriff of a film set.

- A pretty bland, unremarkable musical score. I like some of Tiomkin's stuff but his best work was generally outside of the Western genre.

- The bad guys. Joe Burdette is completely absent for most of the film's second half, even though we spent a lot of time in the jail - did Stumpy knock him unconscious every night? Plus the bad guys outside the jail are completely stupid, not the least for their "don't kill anyone" rule. There's not a lot of dramatic tension when the baddies are complete pushovers.

It also occurred to me that this movie is pretty much the template for all of Wayne's later films. He was getting on in age by 1959 and not able to carry a lot of the physical action. He had sidekicks before this, but as said above, Colorado is the clear precursor to the colorless pretty-boy dopes in The Alamo/The Comancheros/Rio Lobo/The Shootist/etc. This also applies to the weak plot and the generic, unthreatening bad guys. Rio Bravo has the good fortune of being a Howard Hawks film, which mot of the above do not (I won't try and account for Rio Lobo).