The American West of John Ford (1971)
Not Rated | 52min | Documentary, Biography, Western | TV Movie 5 December 1971
The Western films of iconic director John Ford are fondly remembered by stars James Stewart, Henry Fonda, and John Wayne, with whom he shoots a scene in Monument Valley.
Director: Denis Sanders
Writers: David H. Vowell, Dan Ford (format) (as Daniel Sargent Ford)
Stars: John Ford, John Wayne, James Stewart
Not Rated | 52min | Documentary, Biography, Western | TV Movie 5 December 1971
The Western films of iconic director John Ford are fondly remembered by stars James Stewart, Henry Fonda, and John Wayne, with whom he shoots a scene in Monument Valley.
Director: Denis Sanders
Writers: David H. Vowell, Dan Ford (format) (as Daniel Sargent Ford)
Stars: John Ford, John Wayne, James Stewart
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00Yeah
00:10So it in there right by that bush, that's good
00:21Okay, there you go
00:25Don't you want me to say the other line or just the thing?
00:30Get up. I mean, you know, okay first thing rub me a butt. I hear you
00:34Chuck out
00:36Yes, sir. All right, we're rolling
00:39Good
00:40dust
00:50Thanks, I like that he just takes that one just as thanks
00:55They want action pictures dammit, it's what we're getting paid for
01:00Try it again print the other two takes
01:25You
01:38The American West of John Ford
01:43You'd have to look hard to find them
01:45But 90,000 people live here the entire Navajo Nation
01:50There are no television antennas or
01:53Telephone poles. It's just like
01:56Just like it was when America was 13 colonies and a dream
02:00This place makes it seem like it wasn't that long ago
02:05On the maps of
02:07Arizona and Utah, this is called
02:10Monument Valley
02:12But to me, it'll always be John Ford country as a matter of fact folks call this
02:18Ford's point
02:20When you stand here and look around you you
02:23Don't have to ask why John Ford loves to make Westerns or why we like to go see them
02:30I've been a student of John Ford for a
02:33few years
02:34He doesn't make pictures about good guys or bad guys. He makes stories about people they bend or they
02:42Break or hold their ground depending on the kind of people that they are
02:47Of course when Westerns were first being made it was a different story
02:56Shoot-'em-ups, they called him the hero wore a white hat wasn't afraid of anything always got the girl
03:03They were short simple and except for a few stars like
03:07Harry Carey
03:08easily forgotten in
03:111924 the Iron Horse broke the pattern
03:15It wasn't short or simple. It was an epic an action spectacle that ran two hours and 40 minutes
03:22The plot wasn't just good guys versus bad guys
03:26the Iron Horse was the story of a nation's determination to
03:31Unite itself with a continent-spanning railroad
03:40This was no horse opera
03:43This was a whole new way of looking at the American West no one before
03:48since has been able to get on film the
03:52vitality and sheer beauty of the West
03:55When Pepe found Monument Valley
03:57He found a subject equal to his talent
04:01He came here for the first time in
04:031938 brought me with him the picture stagecoach
04:12I
04:14Was 30 years old and been around pictures for about 10 years. I'd made
04:21dozens of Westerns with other directors, but except for a
04:24Bit part here and there I hadn't worked with Pappy
04:28Stagecoach was not only the first film. He shot in Monument Valley. It was also the first Western he'd made with sound
04:36And the first time he'd ever worked with me
04:38You may need me in this Winchester curly
04:42Saw a ranch house burning last night. You don't understand kid
04:48You're under arrest
05:08Took us about
05:11Six weeks to make that picture
05:14It was fun all the way
05:17Pappy always knew how to keep what we call a happy set
05:22And I was usually the butt of the jokes on that happy set. I
05:26remember once I I was a new boy then and I was working with a lot of
05:31wonderful actors and
05:33after we'd been on the picture for about
05:36Three weeks Jack said
05:38Would you like to go see some of the picture? I said gosh I should say this is we'll go take a look at it
05:43and
05:44See if you can come up with any ideas
05:47Well, I went in to see the picture and the only thing that I could see wrong was I had asked the prop man to
05:53bring along one of those
05:54Arm stretchers because if you put that on the other end of the lines then where I was driving the stagecoach
05:59It looks more natural. Well, he forgot to bring that
06:03So this fella that was driving the
06:05Stagecoach was sitting up there and it was tough on him because he had to shake the lines this way rather than have a natural
06:12Pull so when I got back to set Jack said what's the matter?
06:15I said well the fellow driving the stagecoach is just sitting up there jogging. He says hold it
06:21Everybody come down. He brought the electricians down out of the flies
06:24He brought everybody down into the middle of the set and he says well Duke's made it
06:29He thinks he's great and that fella driving the stagecoach is horrible
06:34Well, we all had a good laugh about it later, but right then I felt about that big
06:39Well, are you still mad at me Duke? Oh
06:42Yeah, thank you
06:44Special kind of a man does still be mad after 30 years coach
06:49You're talking about the fellow that fat fella the ex-cowboy that drove the stagecoach. Yeah, what was his name?
06:56Oh, I don't know what his name is
06:58we couldn't get Ward born because he couldn't drive a six up and
07:03We got this ex-stuntman. I
07:06Don't know whatever happened in the last. I knew of me. I
07:11Can't believe it. Is that any divine?
07:16Hey Andy, you're still mad
07:19You're doing all the fat parts you mean that literally I suppose
07:27I
07:28Was just telling the audience a little about stagecoach
07:32First time we worked together. It seemed to me
07:35right out here was
07:37one of your setups
07:39Are you still trying to impress me with your expertise?
07:43Oh, I was just thinking about how many pictures we'd made together since then
07:49How wonderful it is to be back up here again
07:52Anderson living good living
07:57Oh
08:04They're engraved everything
08:07This is good to Jimmy Stewart. Well, I appreciate very much boss. I
08:14Never told I have wired up so right for upstairs
08:17Mm-hmm
08:24For John Ford
08:26Making films has always been what he calls a job of work
08:30But the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences has occasionally considered it more than just a living
08:37in 1935
08:39They presented an Oscar to John Ford for his direction of the informer
08:45Five years later the Grapes of Wrath won him a second one
08:49the next year how green was my valley was voted best picture of the year and
08:55John Ford won an Oscar for directing it in
08:591942 John Ford was in the Navy
09:01But he won an Oscar as the director and photographer of the documentary the Battle of Midway
09:08one year later
09:10Commander Ford won his fifth Oscar for another documentary
09:14December 7th in
09:171952 the quiet man put this one on his mantle
09:22six all together and
09:25Not one of them for a Western
09:28Maybe that's because the excellence of a John Ford Western is something that we all take for granted
09:34Or maybe it's because he has made so many of them that even he has lost count
09:40He made his first one when he was 22 years old. That was back in 1917
09:46it was a two-wheeler called the tornado and
09:50He wrote it and directed it and he also worked as an actor in it
09:57He made eight other pictures that year all of them Westerns
10:02they
10:04Didn't win any awards, but they weren't too bad for a young man learning his trade
10:09And the memories of that year and of all the years in between
10:15They're all scattered around the walls of this room
10:19The deerskin was a gift of the Navajos after stagecoach
10:24They called him Natani Ness tall soldier
10:28The thank-you note was written by Shirley Temple after he directed her in Wee Willie Winky
10:35The photograph of Lincoln was used in Cheyenne autumn
10:40Here's a musical trio that never made it big. That's Pappy on the drums
10:45I'm in the corner. The only real musician is a fellow in the middle Danny Berzeghi
10:51Danny was a fixture on almost every Ford picture
10:54He was in some of them, but mostly he just played the accordion
10:59on camera or backstage
11:01Music has always been an important part of John Ford's Westerns and by that I don't mean background music
11:10Happy always told me that
11:12He'd rather hear good music than bad dialogue
11:15but more than that
11:17The music in a John Ford Western means something
11:21it evokes a sense of tradition a
11:25nostalgia for
11:26simpler times
11:28When all hope lay ahead
11:31When Americans were convinced that the promise of America lay over the next rise
11:38That greener pastures did in fact
11:42beckon from beyond the next boundary
11:46in search of that promise
11:49pioneers walked across the continent
11:53For John Ford they also danced
11:57in wagon master
11:59We can chuckle at the comedy romance between Alan Mowbray and Jane Darwell, but at the same time
12:07We learned that there was more to pioneer life than fighting off Indian attacks
12:17The music in this scene Marina Hara and Rio Grande plays a different role
12:30And for John Ford there was no need for dialogue the music said at all
12:46The character of a strong woman was a constant element in all his films in stagecoach
12:53Claire Trevor got the job
12:56she played a
12:57Ballroom girl with a heart of gold
13:08Now Dallas, I've got my orders don't blame these ladies it ain't there
13:14Doc have I any right to live? What have I done?
13:18We're the victims of a foul disease called social prejudice my child
13:23These dear ladies of the Law and Order League are scouring out the drinks of the town. Come on
13:30They are proud
13:32Glorified dregs like me you get going doc. You're drunk
13:35Two of the kind just two of the kind
13:47Thomas Mitchell won an Academy Award for his portrayal of the drunken doctor
13:53The characters are cliches now
13:56But that's because there have been so many bad imitations of the original
14:01In the film is the searchers Olive Carey sums up the philosophy of John Ford's pioneer women
14:07Just so happens we be Texicans
14:11Texican is nothing but a human man way out on a limb this year and next
14:16Maybe for a hundred more, but I don't think it'll be forever
14:21Someday this country's gonna be a fine good place to be
14:25Maybe it needs our bones in the ground before that time can come
14:29that time
14:31She was a schoolteacher, you know
14:34Even disguised in Eastern frills and fragility John Ford's women lose none of their strength
14:40And of the desert flower
14:44That's me
14:47Barber
14:49In my darling Clementine Kathy Downs could even get Henry Fonda's Wyatt Earp to take her to church
14:56You are going to the services, aren't you?
15:01Yes, ma'am
15:04I
15:06Yes, ma'am, I'd admire it. Thank you
15:16The scene is simple clear and to the point but to me
15:20What's just as important as the way John Ford treats the characters?
15:25His admiration for Wyatt Earp and others who won the West at gunpoint is almost reluctant
15:31While for women like Clementine the subtle and the subtle
15:35Like Clementine the settlers and the school moms. He gave his wholehearted respect
15:42Like to hear something from mr. Stewart, is it right?
15:47They said that they'd like to hear something from mr. Stewart in Cheyenne autumn
15:53you I remember you telling me that the reason you put me in as Wyatt Earp that the the
15:59the whole picture was kind of serious and
16:02It needed an intermission, but you didn't want people to get out and get drinks and go to the bathroom
16:08So you put me in as Wyatt Earp to keep them in their seats?
16:13And it actually was an intermission on film. Is that correct?
16:19Well, I don't know
16:21Yeah, that deck feels white that little white a little like that wider. Yeah, I know
16:31What
16:33Over there are four Texans
16:36That is why there's a 51 cards in that deck every citizen of Dodge stays ready to go out with me
16:41I swear I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I didn't do it
16:44I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I didn't do it
16:46I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I didn't do it
16:48I didn't do it
16:51Major where's the card? What if we shoot him? We won't have anyone left to play with
16:59Gentlemen good point. That's new deck. I just wondered if the reason
17:08To keep people from going to the bathroom is that well, that's quite a that's quite a feathering a cat
17:16but
17:18Any chance I get to work with you or Henry, I would leap at the chance. I mean, I mean, that's why I'm here today
17:25Yeah, well, I'm very flattered and pleased
17:28Well, we love you boss, you're a hell of an intermission
17:37I'd like to tell a prank of having a film in the camera
17:42Just tell it they're not rolling. Well, I want to tell this on film. Oh roll them roll them
17:48Be the gag that I remember most
17:52Was on mr. Henry formed on me
17:55We're doing young. Mr. Lincoln and
17:59Henry I
18:02Had never met Henry and
18:05The first time I saw him here was in makeup. This is true, isn't it?
18:09And we were on location up at Sacramento working on the river
18:14So we finished and we got on the plane last night and this very
18:19Upstanding young man sat by me and we start chatting. I said would you like a smoke and he says
18:25No, thanks. I have some cigarettes and you're smoking cigars and I says we've met before haven't we?
18:33He said yes, I believe we have as well. I mean, my name is John Ford. He's fine
18:39He said my name is Henry Ford. I said what?
18:43This is true, isn't it?
18:45I'd never seen without the makeup and I didn't even recognize it. That's a true story
18:52That's a prank you pulled on me
18:57In Fort Apache
19:00Ford created his own version of the Battle of Little Bighorn with Henry Fonda and the role model on Custer
19:07Ford's version may be at variance with history, but his interest was not in the man
19:13But in the hero
19:15His concern was not with assignment of blame or placement of glory
19:21His interest was in the birth of a legend
19:30To John Ford Fort Apache was a eulogy to an era
19:35And perhaps his way of saying that heroes are men
19:40After all
19:42No man died more gallantly
19:44No one more honored for his regiment
19:46He's become almost a legend already
19:48He's the hero of every schoolboy in America
19:50But what of the men who died with him?
19:52What of Collingworth and...
19:54Collingwood
19:56Oh, of course, Collingwood
19:58That's the ironic part of it
20:00We always remember the Thursdays
20:02But the others are forgotten
20:04You're wrong there
20:06They aren't forgotten because they haven't died
20:08They're living
20:10Right out there
20:12Collingwood and the rest
20:14They'll keep on living as long as the regiment lives
20:18Their pay is $13 a month
20:20Their diet beans and hay
20:22Maybe horse meat
20:24Before this campaign is over
20:26Fight over cards or rut gut whiskey
20:28But share the last drop in their canteens
20:32Their faces may change
20:34Their names
20:36But they're there
20:38They're the regiment
20:40The regular army
20:42Now and 50 years from now
20:46They're better men than they used to be
20:48Thursday did that
20:50He made it a command to be proud of
20:52Halt!
20:56Halt!
21:02I will persist across that hill
21:04And over the Florida Valley
21:06But every time I look
21:08There's still this bobbin' in my sally
21:10I seek no more the fire
21:12And carry more retail but my mind
21:14Is always beyond compassion
21:16To the girl I left behind
21:22Now maybe that's not the way things were
21:24But it's the way they should have been
21:26And that's a point of view
21:28John Ford took in almost every western
21:30he ever made
21:32He summed up his approach to history
21:34in a film I worked in, in 1962
21:36It was called
21:38The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
21:40I played a senator
21:42Lawyer
21:44And he said
21:46The man who shot liberty
21:48Valance
21:50I played a senator
21:52Lawyer who got elected
21:54Because the people thought he killed the bad guy
21:56Well of course I didn't
21:58John Wayne did
22:04I'd say that was liberty valance
22:06There now
22:08Wouldn't you?
22:10Yes I would
22:12We'll be seeing you Mr. Stoddard
22:16Get out of that shadow, dude
22:20As I recall it
22:22Lee Marvin has never looked meaner
22:24Than he did then
22:36You got two hands
22:38Harry Slinger, pick it up
22:50I was obviously
22:52No match for Lee
22:54But Duke was
22:56He and Woody Strode were across the street
22:58Of course I didn't know that
23:00And neither did anybody else in town
23:02All right, dude
23:04This time
23:06Right between the eyes
23:20And in the picture
23:22When I told the truth
23:28You're not going to use the story, Mr. Scott?
23:30No, sir
23:36This is the West, sir
23:38When the legend becomes fact
23:40Print the legend
23:42He's right, Vance
23:44When the legend becomes fact
23:46Print the legend
23:48He's right, Vance
23:50And that's what John Ford does
23:52He prints the legend
23:54And that's a fact
23:56John Ford
24:12John Ford has said that the best things in film
24:14Happen by accident
24:16And he may be right
24:18When I went out to what used to be
24:20The backlot of 20th Century Fox
24:22I didn't expect to find him there
24:26The last time we worked together
24:28Was in Mr. Roberts
24:30And the first time was in young Mr. Lincoln
24:32Do you remember where you are?
24:34Do you recognize this?
24:36No, I don't
24:40I have no idea where the hell we are
24:42Well, because this is Olympic
24:44I know that the Western Street
24:46Had to be over there
24:48Isn't this where the French Street was
24:50A part of a French Street?
24:52You mean the Bernadette Street?
24:55Bernadette Street
24:57Now where is it
24:59Over there is where you did the walk
25:01In Lincoln
25:03In talking about those days
25:05I was reminded that I hadn't wanted to play Lincoln
25:07And I was a little scared of the part
25:09In awe of Lincoln, I suppose
25:11And I remember Jack telling me then
25:13In language a little too colorful to repeat
25:15That I wasn't going to play the great emancipator
25:17Just a backwoods lawyer
25:19Still wet behind the ears
25:21He convinced me to do it as much
25:23As he said
25:25You walked up the road, if you remember
25:27I do
25:29I'll never forget
25:31God was looking down
25:33On us that day
25:35The tears of the multitude, I think you said
25:37I think you said the tears of the multitude
25:39When it started to rain
25:41I had a kid, somebody come out the other day
25:43Came in fair and trembling
25:47To interview me
25:49So I put him right at ease
25:51I guess when you get right down to it
25:53John Ford is as much an actor
25:55As he is a director
25:57I got the feeling that he enjoyed
25:59Playing the cantankerous old man
26:01Making jokes with the crew
26:03Having a good time razzing
26:05One of the fellows who had gone to Yale
26:07At one point he even broke into a chorus
26:09Of the Whiffenpoof song
26:11From the tables down at Maury's
26:13I understand Maury's being sued
26:15What happened to Maury's
26:17They're being sued by Women's Lib
26:19He told me that a writer had come to see him
26:21That week to interview him
26:23The result, I gathered, satisfied him
26:25But didn't give the writer much material to work with
26:27I didn't tell him anything
26:32John Ford will talk about anything but himself
26:34That makes him an easy man to like
26:36And a hard man to explain
26:40That was the unique thing about working with Ford
26:42He made you feel
26:44Related to each other
26:46Actors, technicians, everybody
26:48He's a part of his family
26:50I'm not saying that he's not the
26:52Hard-nosed, cantankerous
26:54Do-it-my-way-or-not-at-all director
26:56He claims he is
26:58But he's also a sentimentalist
27:00And there are several generations
27:02Of film workers who vouch for that
27:06In 1925, Victor McLoughlin
27:08Made his first film with John Ford
27:10He played an Irish prizefighter
27:12A quarter of a century later
27:14He's still just as Irish
27:16And very much a fighter
27:18The character is Sergeant Major Quincannon
27:20A thirty-year soldier
27:22Six days away from an unwelcome retirement
27:26The movie is She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
27:30Duke played McLoughlin's commander
27:32Determined to keep him out of trouble
27:34By getting him into trouble
27:36Sergeant Quincannon is improperly dressed on duty
27:38And he's under the influence
27:40Throw him in a guardhouse
27:42The bartender, by the way
27:44Is Francis Ford, Jack's brother
27:46You'll find him in a lot of Pappy's pictures
27:48When I played that up
27:50It just threw me out
27:56You're under arrest, Quincannon
27:58By whom's orders?
28:00By order of Captain Brittles
28:02Are you coming peaceably?
28:04Laddie, I've never gone
28:06Anyplace before
28:08I've never gone
28:10I've never gone anyplace peaceably
28:12In me life
28:36McLoughlin was Jack's
28:38Ideal Irish brawler
28:40He could lick any man in the house
28:42But always showed proper respect for the ladies
28:44Who, in this case, is another
28:46Ford regular, Mildred Natwick
28:48I just had a nip
28:50To the guardhouse, Quincannon
28:52Quick step, march
28:56What's this touch, ma'am?
28:58Aren't you ashamed?
29:00Eight of you picking on one poor man
29:02Only seven, ma'am
29:04Forward, yo
29:07Comedy is what John Ford
29:09Claims he does best
29:11And I don't want to argue with him
29:13But somebody said
29:15I think it was Orson Welles
29:17That John Ford is as much a poet
29:19As he is a comedian
29:21Maybe he's both
29:23For sure he's a sentimentalist
29:25To Jack
29:27Victor McLoughlin wasn't just an actor
29:29He was a friend
29:31They made eleven pictures together
29:33This was the tenth one
29:35I feel better now
29:37It'll kill you or cure you
29:41Doctor
29:43With your fine education
29:45Would you be telling me something?
29:47Yeah
29:49What is an arsonist?
29:53An arsonist is a person
29:55That sets buildings on fire
29:57For profit or perverse excitement
29:59Why?
30:01It all started
30:03When we rode down
30:05The Shenandoah Valley, Doctor
30:07It was because it looked
30:09To be ordered to burn
30:11The crops and the barns
30:13At Bridesdale
30:15It was owned by the same family
30:17Ever since that grand Irishman
30:19Sir Walter Wrighty
30:21First smoked a pipe
30:23Seems like I've heard
30:25That story before
30:27And there's the blind man
30:29And there's the black hand
30:31That did the dirty deed
30:33I wish you'd knock it off
30:35With that stick
30:45You see a lot of the same
30:47Faces in Jack's pictures
30:49Harry Carey Jr., Ward Bond
30:51Jane Darwell
30:53It was like being part
30:55Of a large and loyal
30:57Repertory company
30:59Ward made 22
31:01Including my first
31:03Ford Western
31:05My darling Clementine
31:09And as for you
31:11When Doc finds out
31:13You butted him last night
31:15The girl is Linda Darnell
31:17I'm the fellow
31:19Pretending to be Wyatt Earp
31:21I guess more people
31:23Have asked me about this balancing act
31:25Than almost anything else I've done
31:27It wasn't in the script
31:29It was just something Jack figured
31:31Wyatt Earp would do
31:33So I did it
31:35You remember the gunfight
31:37In the OK crowd in Clementine
31:39I'd seen it a couple of times
31:41I mean the other versions
31:43How did you come to stage it
31:45The way you did
31:47Had you heard Earp himself
31:49You know as we've reminisced
31:51About this many times
31:53When Wyatt Earp retired
31:55As a lawman
31:57As you know
31:59He went to some little town
32:01North of Pasadena
32:03Now his wife was a very
32:05Devout religious woman
32:07And a couple of times a year
32:09She'd go to these religious
32:11Conventions in Utah
32:13And eastern Arizona
32:15And Wyatt would get on a streetcar
32:17And he became quite friendly
32:19And I didn't know anything
32:21About the OK corral at the time
32:23But Harry cared about it
32:25And he asked Wyatt
32:27And Wyatt
32:29Described the fight fully
32:31Exactly the way
32:33That you did it
32:35As a matter of fact
32:37He drew it out on paper
32:39A sketch of the entire thing
32:41And Wyatt said I was not a good shot
32:43I did it close to a man
32:46And that's exactly what you did
32:48The Clantons were in a defensive
32:50Position at the corral Earp said
32:52So he approached the situation
32:54As if it were a small scale military
32:56Campaign
32:58The only advantage he, his brother Morg
33:00And Doc Holliday had was mobility
33:02Doc Holliday's
33:04With him
33:08The way Earp saw it
33:10A frontal attack on the Clantons
33:12Wouldn't do anything but get him killed
33:14I remember the
33:16When we shot it you had a stagecoach
33:18Coming through and raise a big cloud of dust
33:20That they used like
33:22The present day
33:24Smokescreen
33:26Was that in his
33:28Original story?
33:30As a matter of fact
33:32He told me he had time
33:34He knew exactly when the stagecoach
33:36Would come by
33:38And he weighed his time
33:40And when the stagecoach
33:42Came by you made your move
33:44And the others made their move
33:46But that's exactly the way it happened
33:52Morning Mr. Clanton
34:04Let's talk a while
34:06Hank!
34:08Well now
34:12You go right ahead and talk
34:14I got a warrant here for you and your sons
34:16Charging the murderer
34:18James and Virgil Earp
34:20There's also
34:22A charge of cattle rustling
34:24I'm giving you a chance to
34:26Submit to proper authority
34:28Well you come on right in here
34:30Marshal and serve your warrant
34:32Which one of you killed
34:34James?
34:36I did
34:38And the other one too
34:42Well
34:46I'm gonna kill you
35:02Jack Holliday's
35:04Silk handkerchief isn't documented
35:06But then as I said
35:08Jack used history
35:10And he was married to it
35:34The ending was pure Ford sentiment
35:36But it had the ring of truth in it
35:38Throw your gun down and come on out old man
35:46My boys
35:48Ike, Sam, Vin
35:50Billy
35:52I ain't gonna kill you
35:54I hope you live
35:56A hundred years
35:58Feel just a little what my pa's
36:00Gonna feel
36:02Now get out of town
36:04Start wandering
36:08The O.K. Corral
36:10And the town of Tombstone
36:12Were built from the ground up
36:14In the corner of Monument Valley
36:16But the interiors were done here
36:18The same place where we made
36:20Young Mr. Lincoln
36:22Drums along the Mohawk
36:24And the Grapes of Wrath
36:28They were good years
36:30Very good years
36:32When this was the back lot
36:34Of 20th Century Fox
36:36Back lot's gone now
36:42It's been homesteaded
36:53Monument Valley is so identified
36:55With John Ford
36:57It's been said that if
36:59Anybody else made a picture here
37:01They'd be accused of plagiarism
37:03A shot like this
37:05Or a man on a horse
37:07Riding against a background
37:09Of harshness and beauty
37:11That's a John Ford trademark
37:16He doesn't just tell you a story
37:18He writes a poem about it
37:20He doesn't just point the camera
37:22He paints a picture with it
37:24I guess what John Ford has been doing
37:26For close to half a century
37:28Is showing his love for the West
37:30By putting in motion
37:32The moods of Remington and Russell
37:34It's a big country
37:36And people who seem big
37:38Because they were part of it
37:40He gave us something to look up to
37:42Like Jimmy Stewart says
37:44When it comes to a choice
37:46Between what really happened
37:48And what should have happened
37:50John Ford prints the legend
37:52The legend has become our folklore
37:54And the Western the most
37:56Colorful part of our American heritage
37:58It's the way we keep in touch
38:00With our past
38:03And this is something
38:05That we sadly take for granted
38:07Can you imagine how it would be
38:09Without them?
38:11There'd be no cowboys
38:13Or Indians
38:15Or homesteaders
38:17Or gunfighters
38:19No covered wagons
38:21Or stagecoaches
38:23No villains
38:25No heroes
38:27It'd be like
38:29Not having a soul
38:31And that's one scene
38:33And the second
38:35Don't talk too much
38:47And the third rule
38:49Is what hurts
38:51A lot of action
38:55This is the land rise scene
38:57From the three bad men
38:59In 1926
39:01Some directors would have settled for the spectacle
39:03But Pappy wanted drama
39:15He never missed an opportunity
39:17For humor or a
39:19Chance to do what he called
39:21Busting them up
39:23Pappy liked contrast
39:25Mood and lighting
39:27He knew how to get
39:29Everything there was out of a scene
39:31And how to put a period on it
39:47When you pull a gun
39:49Kill a man
39:57Police!
40:21But the real action
40:23To Pappy always happened outside
40:25To get it started
40:27All I'd have to say was
40:29Get to Fort Grant
40:31Tell them where we are
40:33Tell them we may still be alive if they hurry
40:35Move
40:47Whenever Ben Johnson showed up
40:49In one of Pappy's pictures
40:51You knew you were in for at least one
40:53Spectacular riding sequences
40:55Ben liked to ride
40:57And Pappy liked to shoot him doing it
41:23Pappy has said that on film
41:25He's killed more Indians than Custer
41:27The fact is
41:29He's never hurt anyone
41:31Just looks that way
41:35In all the stunts he's staged
41:37Never once was a man or a horse
41:39Seriously injured
41:41I picked up a bruise or two
41:43Maybe here and so did Hank
41:45But that was in the line of duty
41:47It was supposed to look dangerous
41:53The granddaddy of all the chases
41:55Pappy put on film
41:57Is the one in stagecoach
42:03The villains were the Indians
42:05We'd been dodging them
42:07For two thirds of the picture
42:09Some realist will you mess hard
42:11I think
42:13Once pointed out that if a chase like this
42:15Had actually happened
42:17The Indians would have shot the horses
42:19And hunted them in that
42:23But Pappy wasn't as interested in facts
42:25As he was in heroic tradition
42:27He was more interested
42:29In the real world
42:31In the real world
42:33In the real world
42:35In the real world
42:37In heroic tradition
42:39Besides it made a better story his way
42:43One of the most spectacular stunts
42:45Was performed by
42:47Yakimo Canut
42:49He's really an Irishman by the way
42:51His first name is Enos
42:57This is how Pappy earned the reputation
42:59Of being a hard-nosed old action director
43:03He didn't rehearse anything
43:05He was just like Pappy
43:23Keep the suspense going
43:25He'd create crisis within crisis
43:27Action within action
43:30I'd like to take credit
43:32For this stunt
43:34But it was Yakimo again
43:36One of the best stuntmen
43:38I've ever worked with
43:40It was a dangerous piece of work
43:42And I was satisfied to settle
43:44For the close-up
43:54In those days the cavalry
43:56Always arrived in the nick of time
43:58And the Indians always faded
44:00Into the background
44:02Until they were needed as villains again
44:10To set the record straight
44:12Pappy cast the Indians as heroes
44:14In the last western he made
44:16Cheyenne Autumn
44:18He did it he said in an interview
44:20Because we've treated them so badly
44:24In The Searchers however
44:26There was no casting
44:28And in my opinion
44:30It was one of the finest westerns
44:32That he ever made
44:34What good did that do you?
44:36By what you preach none
44:38By what that Comanche believes
44:40He ain't got no eyes
44:42He can't enter the spirit land
44:44Has to wander forever between the winds
44:46You get it reverend
44:48I played Ethan Edwards
44:50A man whose niece
44:52A young girl he hardly knew
44:54Had been captured by a band of Comanches
44:56Two sons
44:58A young girl
45:00A young girl
45:02Two sons
45:04Killed by white men
45:06For each son
45:08I take many
45:10Scouts
45:12It took him ten years to track down
45:14The Comanches who had
45:16Taken the little girl
45:18And when he did his hate was still intact
45:20The problem was that the girl
45:22Was now a woman
45:24And the woman was now a Comanche
45:28Yo I checked
45:32Leave us for a motion
45:34You go
45:58Get in
46:02Get in
46:14Ethan Edwards was probably the most
46:16Fascinating character I ever played
46:18In the John Ford western
46:20Happy conceived Ethan
46:22As a complicated man
46:24Determined, ruthless
46:26But somehow admirable
46:28I was so impressed by him
46:30I named one of my sons after him
46:49Let's go home Debbie
46:51Let's go
46:58The ending of The Searchers has fascinated
47:00Students of the
47:02John Ford western world
47:04Since it was first released
47:06In 1856
47:08Maybe it does because it's an
47:10Unhappy happy ending
47:12The lost girl Natalie Wood
47:14Is found and returned to her family
47:16John Quailen and Olive Carrie
47:18Jeff Hunter
47:20And Vera Miles
47:22The young lovers are reunited
47:24But Ethan Edwards
47:26The man the story was all about
47:28Is left standing outside
47:30All alone
47:32People have wondered what John Ford
47:34Meant by that
47:36He's never answered
47:38I can't answer for him
47:40I can only tell you what I had in mind
47:42When I crossed my arm
47:44I did it the way Harry Carrey
47:46Used to do it
47:49And he was the man Pappy said
47:51Taught him his trade
48:05Jack Ford made all
48:07Or part of nine westerns here
48:09In Monument Valley
48:11When we came back in June
48:13It was the first time we'd been here together
48:15In 15 years
48:17It never changed
48:19It never does
48:21But we had
48:23Mostly just getting older
48:25I guess
48:27I came back to reminisce
48:29When I got the feeling
48:31That maybe Pappy came back
48:33To say goodbye
48:35He came across out in the action
48:37I said what in the action
48:39Them horsemen down
48:41Wayne almost rode over me
48:43I said oh I think it looks good
48:45I did too
48:47I just ran up on him
48:49Yeah
48:53Isn't that the road there
48:55Where the coach came up there
48:57Right around there
48:59Right up to
49:01The Indians right here
49:05It's a very funny
49:07Coincidence
49:09The fellow we picked out as Geronimo
49:11Actually is Geronimo's grandson
49:13Is that right?
49:15We didn't find Harry
49:17Just dug it out
49:19He was half Apache half Navi
49:21That's like
49:23Mickey
49:25What's his name?
49:27The half Irish
49:29Half Indian
49:31Yeah
49:33Half Indian and a whole son of a
49:39Memories come back
50:03The American West
50:05Of John Ford
50:19Motion picture home of course
50:21Company home
50:23As you always do
50:25I'm not a career man
50:27I never was
50:29I'm just a hard nose hard working
50:31Director
50:33That hand me a script
50:35I said this ought to make a fair picture
50:37Make a good picture
50:39I think it's going to be a lousy picture
50:41You have a schedule
50:43So I'll go ahead and do the best I can with it
50:47I never felt important
50:49I was a
50:51Career director
50:53A genius or any other
50:55Damn thing
50:57When you get your cue
50:59Okay
51:01Ready take off
51:08When I pass on
51:10I want to be remembered as
51:12John Ford
51:14The guy that made westerns