SHADOWLAND
The emotional otherworlds of classic cinema. Unspooling the ribbon of dreams every Sunday afternoon.
Films in this Series
John Ford
97 minutes
John Ford takes on the legend of the O.K. Corral shoot-out in this multilayered, exceptionally well-constructed western, one of the director’s very best films. Henry Fonda cuts an iconic figure as Wyatt Earp, the sturdy lawman who sets about the task of shaping up the disorderly Arizona town of Tombstone, and Victor Mature gives the performance of his career as the boozy, tubercular gambler and gunman Doc Holliday. Though initially at cross-purposes, the pair ultimately team up to confront the violent Clanton gang. Affecting and stunningly photographed, MY DARLING CLEMENTINE is a story of the endlessly fraught triumph of civilization over the Wild West from American cinema’s consummate mythmaker.
“If ever there was a gateway drug to the happy addiction of Hollywood oaters, this is it.” - Time Out
“The low-slung genius of this film is that its every nuance appears loaded with information about a world (*the* world) that exists outside the confines of the frame. So the film we see is merely a cozy point of convergence, with swirling metaphysical gravity and back-porch nostalgia attained through the way in which Ford frames the story as a curious detail on an epic canvas, or a single, gorgeous constellation amid a blanket of stars. The characters are rounded, rootsy products of lives lived and knowledge procured, and this story little more than a juncture of souls or a random point of communal progression. It’s not our duty to read things into the film that aren’t there. It is to know what the things that aren’t there are.” - David Jenkins
“If ever there was a gateway drug to the happy addiction of Hollywood oaters, this is it.” - Time Out
“The low-slung genius of this film is that its every nuance appears loaded with information about a world (*the* world) that exists outside the confines of the frame. So the film we see is merely a cozy point of convergence, with swirling metaphysical gravity and back-porch nostalgia attained through the way in which Ford frames the story as a curious detail on an epic canvas, or a single, gorgeous constellation amid a blanket of stars. The characters are rounded, rootsy products of lives lived and knowledge procured, and this story little more than a juncture of souls or a random point of communal progression. It’s not our duty to read things into the film that aren’t there. It is to know what the things that aren’t there are.” - David Jenkins
John Ford
118 minutes
It would be no exaggeration to call Ford’s multiple-Oscar winning saga of a struggling Welsh mining family one of the most emotionally resonant and genuinely moving films of the studio era. HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY is a triumph of expressive realism that gives emotional depth and dignity to those suffering social injustice, rendering vivid and authentic the difficult lives and plain pleasures of the coal miners and their families. In his first starring role, child actor Roddy MacDowell poignantly captures the awkward, fragile innocence of youth in his portrayal of a wide-eyed, precocious romantic pulled abruptly into adulthood when a contentious miners' strike fractures his family's unity.
“Ford was an enormously complex 20th century American artist whose films embody and transmit many different and sometimes contradictory aspects of the culture, and I expect they will always be debated. But if there are two core elements of his artistry that make him an essential figure, they are his dynamism, a direct creative response to the cinema itself near its very beginning as an art form, and his aching desire and formidable ability to incarnate and dramatize both the power and the fragility of human fellowship, how it can endure and how it can fray and come undone with rancor, intolerance and the sadness of aging and loss. These elements are embodied in every single frame of HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY.” - Kent Jones
“Ford was an enormously complex 20th century American artist whose films embody and transmit many different and sometimes contradictory aspects of the culture, and I expect they will always be debated. But if there are two core elements of his artistry that make him an essential figure, they are his dynamism, a direct creative response to the cinema itself near its very beginning as an art form, and his aching desire and formidable ability to incarnate and dramatize both the power and the fragility of human fellowship, how it can endure and how it can fray and come undone with rancor, intolerance and the sadness of aging and loss. These elements are embodied in every single frame of HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY.” - Kent Jones
John Ford
129 minutes
Dust storms and bank notices push the Joad family west, chasing a promise that keeps receding as the road goes on. John Ford’s riveting adaptation of Steinbeck’s classic novel of Okie farmers made destitute by the Depression and the Dust Bowl is a film of rare radical politics from studio-era Hollywood. Although Ford envisioned the film as a character study—a portrait of a struggling family—rather than an open attack on capitalism, his adaptation faithfully retains the book’s hard-eyed look at the exploitation of the rural poor.
Like so much of his thirties work, THE GRAPES OF WRATH reveals Ford’s then-ardent Leftist populism. The suffering of the Joad family as it marches slowly toward California is given iconic status by Ford’s monumental compositions, by the remarkable performances from a talented cast and by pioneering cinematographer Gregg Toland’s successful fusion of Ford’s expressionist aesthetic and photojournalist realism. Camps fill, wages fall and the dream curdles, but Ford keeps his gaze fixed on the people holding the line.
"Too many films these days trivialize poverty as an ironically, tastelessly over-produced pageant to earn kudos. THE GRAPES OF WRATH captures that shiver of panic that grips anyone for whom the money for the next meal is unknown. The film remains a vital document of the perversion and torment of the fantasy most commonly known as the American Dream." - Chuck Bowen
Like so much of his thirties work, THE GRAPES OF WRATH reveals Ford’s then-ardent Leftist populism. The suffering of the Joad family as it marches slowly toward California is given iconic status by Ford’s monumental compositions, by the remarkable performances from a talented cast and by pioneering cinematographer Gregg Toland’s successful fusion of Ford’s expressionist aesthetic and photojournalist realism. Camps fill, wages fall and the dream curdles, but Ford keeps his gaze fixed on the people holding the line.
"Too many films these days trivialize poverty as an ironically, tastelessly over-produced pageant to earn kudos. THE GRAPES OF WRATH captures that shiver of panic that grips anyone for whom the money for the next meal is unknown. The film remains a vital document of the perversion and torment of the fantasy most commonly known as the American Dream." - Chuck Bowen
John Ford
86 minutes
One of John Ford’s unsung masterpieces, WAGON MASTER at first seems a variation of Stagecoach, with another motley assortment of character types embarking on a perilous journey through the Wild West. But the film takes on a Fellinian picaresque quality in the almost musical combination, separation and recombination of the various groups formed when two young cowboys cross paths with a Mormon wagon train, a traveling theater troupe and a gang of outlaws.
WAGON MASTER exhibits the lyrical sense of the everyday so often encountered in postwar filmmaking and usually labeled “neorealist” not only in its episodic narrative but also in the relaxed framing of its images. Ford’s favorite of his own films, WAGON MASTER can be seen as one of the greatest classic Westerns ever made or as the beginnings of the revisionist Western in its espousal of the idea that the West was always multicultural and a haven for outcasts, individualists and the oppressed.
“This is a film where the plot takes a backseat to gesture, landscape, and character. There is a conflict and a resolution but it’s handled so swiftly and without emphasis it’s obvious Ford’s concerns are elsewhere. He’s focused on the manner in which Ben Johnson whittles a stick of wood, Joanne Dru stares from the back of a wagon, or Harry Carey twirls his hat. After watching WAGON MASTER for the first time, you’ll consider it minor, a trifle of Western whimsy. Then images will linger in your mind, and you’ll wonder why. It’s a mastery that sneaks up on you, that speaks quietly and calmly about a world within our reach. And as much as Ford could ease out the natural humor and personality of his performers, his overriding concern is always that of the community, and WAGON MASTER is his purest statement on the matter.” - R. Emmet Sweeney
WAGON MASTER exhibits the lyrical sense of the everyday so often encountered in postwar filmmaking and usually labeled “neorealist” not only in its episodic narrative but also in the relaxed framing of its images. Ford’s favorite of his own films, WAGON MASTER can be seen as one of the greatest classic Westerns ever made or as the beginnings of the revisionist Western in its espousal of the idea that the West was always multicultural and a haven for outcasts, individualists and the oppressed.
“This is a film where the plot takes a backseat to gesture, landscape, and character. There is a conflict and a resolution but it’s handled so swiftly and without emphasis it’s obvious Ford’s concerns are elsewhere. He’s focused on the manner in which Ben Johnson whittles a stick of wood, Joanne Dru stares from the back of a wagon, or Harry Carey twirls his hat. After watching WAGON MASTER for the first time, you’ll consider it minor, a trifle of Western whimsy. Then images will linger in your mind, and you’ll wonder why. It’s a mastery that sneaks up on you, that speaks quietly and calmly about a world within our reach. And as much as Ford could ease out the natural humor and personality of his performers, his overriding concern is always that of the community, and WAGON MASTER is his purest statement on the matter.” - R. Emmet Sweeney
John Ford
123 minutes
“When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” Director John Ford prints it—and prints the facts behind it—and makes a movie about the moral burden of a life lived in the name of a lie and the ethical implications of violent action. THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE is one of the great movies about America.
Ford brings us to the lawless frontier village of Shinbone, a town plagued by larger-than-life nemesis Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Jimmy Stewart plays the bungling but charming big-city lawyer determined to rid Shinbone of Valance, who finds that he has an unlikely ally in the form of a rugged, local rancher (John Wayne). The two men also share the same love interest (Vera Miles) and when the final showdown becomes inevitable, one of the two will have to put everything on the line to take down the gunman. There are no easy answers in this twilight western that serves as Ford’s profound summation and reevaluation of his earlier movies, his role as a mythmaker, and the history of the nation.
“Ford's purest and most sustained expression of the familiar themes of the passing of the Old West, the conflict between the untamed wilderness and the cultivated garden, and the power of myth.” - Nigel Floyd
“One of the perfect films, a synthesis of a filmmaker's and a genre's most central concerns, carried out with a human sense of perspective, wistfulness and humor, THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE was the culminating effort of John Ford's triumphant career.” - Ben Sachs
“There’s much to say about it; the simplest is that it’s both the most romantic of Westerns and the greatest American political movie.” - Richard Brody
Ford brings us to the lawless frontier village of Shinbone, a town plagued by larger-than-life nemesis Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Jimmy Stewart plays the bungling but charming big-city lawyer determined to rid Shinbone of Valance, who finds that he has an unlikely ally in the form of a rugged, local rancher (John Wayne). The two men also share the same love interest (Vera Miles) and when the final showdown becomes inevitable, one of the two will have to put everything on the line to take down the gunman. There are no easy answers in this twilight western that serves as Ford’s profound summation and reevaluation of his earlier movies, his role as a mythmaker, and the history of the nation.
“Ford's purest and most sustained expression of the familiar themes of the passing of the Old West, the conflict between the untamed wilderness and the cultivated garden, and the power of myth.” - Nigel Floyd
“One of the perfect films, a synthesis of a filmmaker's and a genre's most central concerns, carried out with a human sense of perspective, wistfulness and humor, THE MAN WHO SHOT LIBERTY VALANCE was the culminating effort of John Ford's triumphant career.” - Ben Sachs
“There’s much to say about it; the simplest is that it’s both the most romantic of Westerns and the greatest American political movie.” - Richard Brody
Sidney Lumet
96 minutes
Following closing arguments in a capital murder trial, 12 jurors—all men, all strangers—retreat to a sweltering deliberation room to determine the fate of a teenage boy. A guilty verdict means death. Eleven are ready to convict—until one juror (Henry Fonda, also the film’s producer) raises quiet, persistent doubts. As tempers flare and the clock ticks, the group is forced to reckon not just with the facts of the case, but with their own assumptions, biases, and buried grievances. Adapted from Reginald Rose’s teleplay, Sidney Lumet’s blistering debut feature transforms civic duty into a pressure cooker of ideological tension. It remains, nearly 70 years later, a master class in confined-space suspense and superbly performed drama.
Stanley Kubrick
88 minutes
Stanley Kubrick's PATHS OF GLORY is among the most powerful antiwar films ever made. A fiery Kirk Douglas stars as a World War I French colonel who goes head-to-head with the army’s ruthless top brass when his men are accused of cowardice after being unable to carry out an impossible mission. This haunting, exquisitely photographed dissection of the military machine in all its absurdity and capacity for dehumanization (a theme Kubrick would continue to explore throughout his career) is assembled with its legendary director’s customary precision, from its tense trench warfare sequences to its gripping courtroom climax to its ravaging final scene.
Billy Wilder
116 minutes
When a wealthy widow is found murdered, the curmudgeonly, brilliant barrister Wilfrid Robards (Charles Laughton), agrees to defend the suspect Leonard Vole. As the trial unfolds, Leonard’s wife, the inscrutable Christine (Marlene Dietrich) takes the stand, and the twists begin in an airy game of guile and deceit. Based on an Agatha Christie play - who called it the best adaptation for the cinema of any of her works - Billy Wilder’s WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION is a gripping courtroom drama, a pitch-perfect comedy, and an acting masterclass - the shocking ending is the cherry on top of a flawless film. As you catch your breath, over the credits, a friendly voice is heard, “The management of this theater suggests that for the greater entertainment of your friends who have not yet seen the picture you will not divulge to anyone the secret of the ending of WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION.” Case closed!
Otto Preminger
160 minutes
One of the best courtroom movies ever made. James Stewart plays an Upper Peninsula of Michigan lawyer drawn out of retirement to represent an Army Lieutenant charged with murder. The Lieutenant admits to the crime despite having no memory of committing it, and Stewart’s character is given the unenviable task of mounting an “irresistible impulse” defense. The contrast between the scandal and the wholesome, small-town setting in which it’s discussed is perfectly realized by director Otto Preminger. The director constantly pushed the boundaries of what could be depicted onscreen, and ANATOMY OF A MURDER represents the platonic ideal in terms of blending entertainment with social commentary. Stewart earned a fifth and final Oscar nomination for his work here, but he’s given stiff competition from George C. Scott, Ben Gazzara and jazz luminary Duke Ellington, who also composed the score.
