Joe,
I've read your review of UNFORGIVEN (1992) on the IMDB and, of course, I'm glad that you gave it a ***1/2 (9/10) rating. However, I don't understand why, if you thought so highly of it, you still say it was a "dubious" Best Picture Oscar winner. Is it because it was too violent, because it belonged to a "dying" breed of film or because you actually think that there were better (and, consequently, more deserving) contenders among the nominees? THE CRYING GAME (1992) and HOWARD'S END (1992) are both very good films but I wouldn't say that they topped Eastwood's masterpiece in any incontestable way.
I've watched the film three times so far and I still have that 2-Disc SE DVD to watch but, in my opinion, it is not only one of the finest Westerns ever made but also, together with L.A. CONFIDENTIAL (1997), the best American film of the 1990s. As good a film as MILLION DOLLAR BABY (2004) is on its own terms, it falls short of Clint's towering achievement as actor-director in UNFORGIVEN.
I guess now is as good a time as any for us to discuss the Western genre; I was going to bring this up after your "objection" at setting Laurel & Hardy's WAY OUT WEST (1937) away from the amiable comic duo's usual urban milieu but I think this is even more appropriate. Actually, I'm quoting from a post I wrote on another online Forum about two years ago...so please bear with me if there are any anachronisms within the following text
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"I’ve just come from my second viewing of Andrew V. McLaglen’s large-scale, old-fashioned Western THE WAY WEST (1967) with three great movie stars: Kirk Douglas, Robert Mitchum and Richard Widmark. It’s a decent and incident-packed film but I wouldn’t be too surprised if it didn’t cut the mustard with movie-going audiences in the age of ultra-stylish films like Arthur Penn’s BONNIE AND CLYDE and John Boorman’s POINT BLANK (both released that same year), dismissing it as an old relic of a bygone era of film-making.
My first encounters with the Western genre were through a series of films shown on two Italian TV channels all Summer long in the mid-Eighties on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings. The prime time spot was given to the higher profile titles like THE SEARCHERS (1956), THE BIG COUNTRY (1958) and LITTLE BIG MAN (1970); on Sunday mornings, then, smaller scale Westerns like THE HANGING TREE (1958), THE LEFT-HANDED GUN (1958) and LAST TRAIN FROM GUN HILL (1959) kept me glued to the TV screen every week. Nowadays, having watched over 250 of them (I swear - I have a list of all of them at hand in case anyone’s incredulous!), I can safely say that Westerns are my second favorite genre of films...after Horror/Sci-Fi, of course!
Anyway, to answer the question posed by this thread: if I were asked this same question a decade ago, I would have been pretty conservative and answered with probably the three most popularly perceived to be the best Westerns of all time (or, if you will, the most famous Westerns ever made): STAGECOACH (1939) HIGH NOON (1952) and SHANE (1953), in that order. Nowadays, however, my thoughts tend to stray more often towards THE WILD BUNCH (1969), THE SEARCHERS and RED RIVER (1948) when thinking on this particular subject.
Taking a look at the titles listed by other fellow Forum members as being “the best Western (they) have ever seen”, one cannot but note an egregious preference for Spaghetti Westerns. This is perhaps unsurprising since this Forum is concerned with “cult” movies after all; however, one would have thought that the Western being the “national” genre i.e. purely American, as it were, more of you would have enjoyed a more varied diet of its many delicacies over the years. I can understand that one would naturally progress from enjoying “mindless” John Wayne action Westerns to the later and more “thoughtful” Clint Eastwood fare, but to say outright that one has little or no interest in watching a pre-1960s Western simply because it’s in black and white or else offers a “romanticized” view of things is to miss out on a lot of beautifully made movies which have stood the test of time admirably.
The Western genre has made its mark on popular culture from the earliest days of Silent cinema. The one which spawned the whole gnere, THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1903), was a sensation in its day. The three most notable Silent Westerns, however, were THE COVERED WAGON (1923), THE IRON HORSE (1924) and TUMBLEWEEDS (1925), all of which showed that the American West was an ideal setting in which to stage spectacular sequences – such as the still impressive “Land Rush” of the latter.
The Thirties started well enough with another “spectacular” – Raoul Walsh’s THE BIG TRAIL (1930), the first Widescreen Western in which John Wayne played his first important starring role - but the genre was soon overtaken by innumerable low-budget oaters churned out quickly to appease audiences who were clamoring for more. Henry Hathaway tried to restore some respectability to the genre filming the first Technicolor Western, THE TRAIL OF THE LONESOME PINE in 1936, but the genre truly kicked into high gear towards the end of the decade, specifically in 1939, with such marvelous films like DESTRY RIDES AGAIN, STAGECOACH, UNION PACIFIC and the Technicolor productions of DODGE CITY, DRUMS ALONG THE MOHAWK and JESSE JAMES!
The Forties saw the jovial mood of many of the earlier Westerns turn sour to reflect America’s entry into WWII. Notable examples of the genre during this period were THE OX-BOW INCIDENT (1943), Ford’s magnificent retelling of the Earp/Clanton feud - MY DARLING CLEMENTINE (1946) and the first “psychological” Western – Raoul Walsh’s noir-ish PURSUED (1947), a precursor of the maturity and sensitivity with which several major directors would start treating the Western genre in the following decade. The Forties ended strongly with two masterworks in the genre and their film-makers’ respective careers: Howard Hawks’ RED RIVER (1948) and John Ford’s SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON (1949) – both of which proved that John Wayne was a wonderful actor when provided with the right script!
The Fifties may be considered as being the Golden Age of the Western. During this decade the genre truly came into its own with a series of bold, stylish and imaginative films which eschewed the apparent simplicity which had been the order of the day in the earlier days of the format in favor of a growing maturity and intelligence. We not only had the series of five splendid Anthony Mann Westerns with James Stewart – WINCHESTER ’73 (1950), BEND OF THE RIVER (1952), THE NAKED SPUR (1953), THE FAR COUNTRY (1954) and THE MAN FROM LARAMIE (1955) – and “The Ranown Cycle”, a series of six low-budget Westerns starring Randolph Scott and directed by Budd Boetticher - SEVEN MEN FROM NOW (1956), THE TALL T (1957; often cited as being the best B-movie ever made), DECISION AT SUNDOWN (1957), BUCHANAN RIDES ALONE (1958; allegedly an inspiration for both YOJIMBO [1961] and A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS [1964]), RIDE LONESOME (1959) and COMANCHE STATION (1960) – but also several key works by major directors, like Fritz Lang’s RANCHO NOTORIOUS (1952), Nicholas Ray’s JOHNNY GUITAR (1954), John Ford’s THE SEARCHERS (1956), Anthony Mann’s MAN OF THE WEST (1958) and Howard Hawks’ RIO BRAVO (1959).
The Sixties could not hope to sustain such a momentum of continuing excellence and many bought into “the bigger the better” argument to counter the audiences’ desertion of theaters to TV. We therefore saw the release of overblown, overlong if still watchable movies like THE ALAMO (1960), CIMARRON (1960), HOW THE WEST WAS WON (1962), CHEYENNE AUTUMN (1964) and THE HALLELUJAH TRAIL (1965). Nevertheless, the odd masterpiece still managed to make its way towards cinema screens with Ford’s THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE (1962) and Sam Peckinpah’s RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY (1962) being the most notable examples. Still, the emphasis was once again starting to drift towards spectaclular action and light-hearted fun with a seemingly never-ending stream of Westerns starring that living legend and embodiment of the genre – John Wayne. Even such masters as Howard Hawks were reduced to making lazy if still entertaining rehashes of earlier successes: both EL DORADO (1966) and RIO LOBO (1970) – his last film - were reworkings of the much better RIO BRAVO.
The unexpected arrival of a new myth from the European continent was like a sweet breath of fresh air to the stale Western genre: the highly irreverent and original style with which Sergio Leone infused his vision of the Western would not only have a revitaliszing effect on the genre, but also a more profound and lasting one on up-and-coming film-makers the world over. It created a new star in Clint Eastwood and ushered in an unexpected realism in the depiction of screen violence which would reach its zenith with Sam Peckinpah’s masterpiece THE WILD BUNCH (1969). However, the Spaghetti Western craze spawned only a handful of genuinely great films and a few good ones as well but the majority of them were low-budget oaters the likes of which had not been seen since the Thirties. This ensured that this subgenre bit the dust a little more than a decade after it started.
The Seventies are known to be the twilight years of the Western genre due to the continuing decline in the quality of the films themselves as well as the increasingly indifferent public reaction and hostile attitude from film studios towards them. Nevertheless, a bunch of excellent Westerns (albeit mostly revisionist in nature) came out during this moribund period: Arthur Penn’s LITTLE BIG MAN (1970), Robert Altman’s McCABE AND MRS. MILLER (1971), Sam Peckinpah’s PAT GARRETT AND BILLY THE KID (1973), Clint Eastwood’s THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES (1976) and Don Siegel’s THE SHOOTIST (1976; John Wayne’s last film), not to mention some genuine oddities like Alexandro Jodorowsky’s EL TOPO (1971) and Arthur Penn’s THE MISSOURI BREAKS (1976; which was a notorious flop in its day despite starring Marlon Brando and Jack Nicholson).
Apart from a couple of interesting excursions out West during the Eighties, the Westerns made during this decade were mainly notable for their absence; perhaps the studio-breaking financial disaster of Michael Cimino’s HEAVEN’S GATE (1980) had something to do with this as well. The genre had to wait until the unexpected triumph at the Oscars of Kevin Costner’s DANCES WITH WOLVES (1990) and Clint Eastwood’s magnificent UNFORGIVEN (1992) to attain a long-denied payback with both audiences and critics alike. Still, in the ten-year interim since then, very few Westerns of any merit have reached our screens and I fear that this beloved genre is once again, if not extinct, decidedly dormant!
And now after such a long-winded lecture, the Professor will retire from the stage, catch the next stagecoach out of town and head straight towards the nearest saloon for a well-deserved alcoholic refreshment!"
I don't know how extensive your knowledge of the Western genre is, Joe - apart from THE OX-BOW INCIDENT, THE SEARCHERS, THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE, BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID (1969; I can't believe I failed to mention this iconic film), LITTLE BIG MAN and UNFORGIVEN - but I hope that my (hardly definitive) "essay" will prompt you to seek out on DVD some of the titles mentioned and put them on your Netflix queue
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out of 
: 22
