Rio Bravo (1959, Howard Hawks)

Howard Hawks, director or numerous great films such as Scarface from 1932, His Girl Friday, The Big Sleep and Red River gives us an American western like no other.

One of the great things about Rio Bravo are the characters, Hawks has a great talent for making us care so much for these characters and here you get all the sort of characters you’d want in a great western.

There’s a tough sheriff (John Wayne as John T. Chance), a drunken ex-sheriff (Dean Martin as Dude), a young gunslinger (Ricky Nelson as Colorado Ryan), a beautiful dame who’s constantly flirting with the sheriff (Angie Dickinson as Feathers) and an old cripple who can’t shut-up to save his life (Walter Brennan as Stumpy).

Like another great American classic High Noon, we get one of the greatest showdowns in western history at the end that’s… well let me just say that it’s an explosive scene.

The plot is simple, a man named Joe is arrested for murder in a saloon and Chance is holding him in a small jail where his friend Stumpy is guarding him. If Joe’s brother’s henchmen try to break in the jail, Stumpy will kill Joe.

Usually I would say that if Dean Martin was in the picture, then I wouldn’t really care for the film. But to my surprise, his performance was the most interesting. Not that the other performances weren’t grand because this film simply doesn’t have a bad performance and I’m not the biggest fan of the Duke. Although he did have a few great performances such as Red River, Sands of Iwo Jima and The Searchers which is arguably is best role.

Watching this film for the second time, I was reminded of Dean Martin’s great battle over alcoholism in the film. From his torn clothes, his facial remarks, his non-stop sweating, to him punching his leg several times to stop the shaking or not even being able to role his own cigarettes since his shaking hands wont permit.

Rio Bravo was also remade into El Dorado, also directed by Howard Hawks which may not be as great but it still was a highly entertaining western also staring John Wayne. This time Robert Mitchum taking on Dean Martin’s role and to my surprise the young James Caan.

I've also read that director Quentin Tarantino stated that Rio Bravo is one of his all-time favourite films, and I find this very easy to understand because it’s a film that is very hard to dislike.

However out of the whole film, I had one objection to it. There is a scene where Dean Martin starts to sing in the jail and young Ricky Nelson joins in with his guitar and sings along. Now this bothered me not because I’m not a fan of these two singers but I just believe that no one wants to see people singing in a western.

Other than this scene, I have no complaints towards this film, the acting is great, the directing is great and hence the film is great.

Rating: Masterpiece

Click here for the trailer

Written: June 20th, 2008