Thursday, February 26, 2026

The Searchers (1956)

 


The Searchers is a 1956 American epic Western film directed by John Ford and written by Frank S. Nugent, based on the 1954 novel by Alan Le May. It is set during the Texas–Indian wars, and stars John Wayne as a middle-aged Civil War veteran who, accompanied by his adopted nephew (Jeffrey Hunter), spends years looking for his abducted niece (Natalie Wood). It was shot in VistaVision on Eastmancolor negative with processing and prints by Technicolor.[3][4]

The film was a critical and commercial success. Since its release, it has come to be considered a masterpiece and one of the greatest and most influential films ever made. It was named the greatest American Western by the American Film Institute in 2008, and it placed 12th on the same organization's 2007 list of the 100 greatest American movies of all time.[5] Entertainment Weekly also named it the best Western.[6] The British Film Institute's Sight and Sound magazine ranked it as the seventh-best film of all time based on a 2012 international survey of film critics[7][8] and in 2008, the French magazine Cahiers du Cinéma ranked The Searchers number 10 in their list of the 100 best films ever made.[9]

In 1989, The Searchers was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress, and selected for preservation in its National Film Registry; it was one of the first 25 films selected for the registry.[10]

The Searchers was the first major film to have a purpose-filmed making-of, requested by John Ford. It deals with most aspects of making the film, including preparation of the site, construction of props, and filming techniques.[11]

Plot

In 1868, Ethan Edwards returns after an eight-year absence to the home of his brother Aaron in West Texas. Ethan fought in the Civil War on the side of the Confederacy, and in the three years since that war ended, he also apparently fought in the Second Franco–Mexican War. He has in his possession a lot of gold coins of uncertain origin, and a medal from the Mexican campaign that he gives to his eight-year-old niece, Debbie. As a former Confederate soldier, when he is asked to take an oath of allegiance to the Texas Rangers, he refuses.

Shortly after Ethan's arrival, cattle belonging to his neighbor Lars Jorgensen are stolen, and Rev. Captain Samuel Clayton leads Ethan and a group of Rangers to recover them. After discovering that the theft was a Comanche ploy to draw the men away from their families, they return and find the Edwards homestead in flames. Aaron, his wife Martha, and their son Ben are dead, while Debbie and her older sister Lucy have been abducted.

After a brief funeral, the men set out in pursuit. When they find the Comanche camp, Ethan recommends a frontal attack, but Clayton insists on a stealth approach to avoid killing the hostages. The camp turns out to be deserted, and further along the trail, the men ride into an ambush. Despite fending off the attack, the Rangers are left with too few men to fight the Comanche effectively. They return home, leaving Ethan to continue his search for the girls with only Lucy's fiancé, Brad Jorgensen, and Debbie's adopted brother, Martin Pawley. Ethan finds Lucy murdered (and, it is implied, raped) in a canyon near the Comanche camp. In a blind rage, Brad rides directly into the camp and is killed.

"I figure on gettin' myself un-surrounded," insists Captain Clayton to Ethan as they realize they are caught in a trap and must run for their lives.

When winter arrives, Ethan and Martin lose the trail and return to the Jorgensen ranch. Martin is enthusiastically welcomed by the Jorgensens' daughter Laurie, and Ethan finds a letter waiting for him from a trader named Futterman, who claims to have information about Debbie. Ethan, who would rather travel alone, leaves without Martin the next morning, but Laurie reluctantly provides Martin with a horse to catch up. At Futterman's trading post, Ethan and Martin learn that Debbie has been taken by Scar, the chief of the Nawyecka band of Comanches. A year or more later, Laurie receives a letter from Martin describing the ongoing search. Reading the letter aloud, Laurie narrates the next few scenes, in which Ethan kills Futterman for trying to steal his money, and Martin accidentally buys a Comanche wife who runs away when she hears Scar's name; later, she is among the dead when the two men find a portion of Scar's band killed by soldiers.

Martin shields Ethan's niece to prevent Ethan from murdering her.

In New Mexico Territory, they find Debbie after five years, now an adolescent, living as one of Scar's wives. She says that she has become a Comanche and wishes to remain with them. Ethan would rather see her dead than living as a Native American, and tries to shoot her, but Martin shields her with his body and a Comanche wounds Ethan with an arrow as they escape. Although Martin tends to Ethan's wound, he is furious with him for attempting to kill Debbie. Later, they return home.

Meanwhile, Charlie McCorry has been courting Laurie in Martin's absence. Ethan and Martin arrive home just as Charlie and Laurie's wedding is about to begin. After a fistfight between Martin and Charlie, a nervous Yankee soldier, Lieutenant Greenhill, brings news that Ethan's friend Mose Harper has located Scar. Clayton leads his men to the Comanche camp, this time for a direct attack, but Martin is allowed to sneak in ahead of the assault to find Debbie, who welcomes him. Martin kills Scar to save Debbie. Ethan, finding Scar's body, scalps him for revenge. Ethan then finds Debbie, and pursues her on horseback. Martin chases them desperately, fearing that Ethan will shoot her. Instead, Ethan sweeps her up into his arms and takes her to the Jorgensen ranch, where Martin reunites with Laurie. While everyone else enters the house, Ethan watches, then walks away.

Cast

Original trailer of The Searchers (1956)

Production

Producers and film crew

The Searchers was the first production from "distinguished turfman"[12] Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney; it was directed by John Ford and distributed by Warner Bros. Behind the camera film crew included cinematographer Winton C. Hoch and editor Jack Murray.

The Searchers is the first of only three films produced by Whitney's company C.V. Whitney Pictures; the second was The Missouri Traveler in 1958 with Brandon deWilde and Lee Marvin, and the last was The Young Land in 1959 with Wayne's son Patrick Wayne and Dennis Hopper.

Filming locations

While the film was primarily set in the staked plains (Llano Estacado) of northwestern Texas, it was actually filmed in Monument Valley, Arizona/Utah. Additional scenes were filmed in Mexican Hat, Utah, in Bronson Canyon in Griffith Park, Los Angeles, and in Elk Island National Park.[13] The film was shot in the VistaVision widescreen process. Ford originally wanted to cast Fess Parker, whose performance as Davy Crockett on television had helped spark a national craze, for the Martin Pawley role, but Walt Disney, to whom Parker was under contract, refused to allow it and did not tell Parker about the offer, according to Parker's videotaped interview for the Archive of American Television. Parker has said retrospectively that this was easily his worst career reversal.[14]

Monument Valley

Promotion

C.V. Whitney Pictures, Inc. trade magazine ad promoting the Native American casting of The Searchers

As part of its promotion of The Searchers in 1956, Warner Bros. produced and broadcast one of the first behind-the-scenes, "making-of" programs in movie history, which aired in 1956 as an episode of its Warner Bros. Presents TV series.[15][16]

Historical background

Ethan leads an attack on a Native American village

Author Alan Le May's surviving research notes indicate that the two characters who go in search of a missing girl were inspired by Britton Johnson, an African American teamster who ransomed his captured wife and children from the Comanches in 1865.[17] Afterward, Johnson made at least three trips to Indian Territory and Kansas, relentlessly searching for another kidnapped girl, Millie Durgan (or Durkin), until Kiowa raiders killed him in 1871.[18]

Several film critics have suggested that The Searchers was inspired by the 1836 kidnapping of nine-year-old Cynthia Ann Parker by Comanche warriors, who raided her family's home at Fort Parker, Texas.[19][20] She spent 24 years with the Comanches, married a war chief, and had three children (one of whom was the famous Comanche Chief Quanah Parker), only to be rescued against her will by Texas Rangers.[21] James W. Parker, Cynthia Ann's uncle, spent much of his life and fortune in what became an obsessive search for his niece, much like Ethan Edwards in the film.

In addition, the rescue of Cynthia Ann, during a Texas Ranger attack known as the Battle of Pease River, resembles the rescue of Debbie Edwards when the Texas Rangers attack Scar's village. Parker's story was only one of 64 real-life cases of 19th-century child abductions in Texas that author Alan Le May studied while researching the novel on which the film was based.

The ending of Le May's novel contrasts to the film's, with Debbie running from the white men and the Native Americans. Marty, in one final leg of his search, finds her days later, only after she has fainted from exhaustion.

In the film, Scar's Comanche group is referred to as the Nawyecka, correctly the Noyʉhka or Nokoni,[22] the same band that kidnapped Cynthia Ann Parker. Some film critics[specify] have speculated that the historical model for the cavalry attack on a Comanche village, resulting in Look's death and the taking of Comanche prisoners to a military post, was the well-known Battle of the Washita River, November 27, 1868, when Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer's 7th U.S. Cavalry attacked Black Kettle's Cheyenne camp on the Washita River (near present-day Cheyenne, Oklahoma).[23] The sequence also resembles the 1872 Battle of the North Fork of the Red River, in which the 4th Cavalry captured 124 Comanche women and children and imprisoned them at Fort Concho.

Reception

Contemporaneous reviews

Although the film was set in the flat Llano Estacado of Texas, it was filmed in Monument Valley.

Upon the film's release, Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called it a "ripsnorting Western" (in spite of the "excessive language in its ads"); he credits Ford's "familiar corps of actors, writers, etc., [who help] to give the gusto to this film. From Frank S. Nugent, whose screenplay from the novel of Alan LeMay is a pungent thing, right on through the cast and technicians, it is the honest achievement of a well-knit team."[12] Crowther noted "two faults of minor moment":[12]

  • "Episode is piled upon episode, climax upon climax, and corpse upon corpse... The justification for it is that it certainly conveys the lengthiness of the hunt, but it leaves one a mite exhausted, especially with the speed at which it goes.
  • "The director has permitted too many outdoor scenes to be set in the obviously synthetic surroundings of the studio stage... some of those campfire scenes could have been shot in a sporting-goods store window."

Variety called it "handsomely mounted and in the tradition of Shane", yet "somewhat disappointing" due to its length and repetitiveness; "The John Ford directorial stamp is unmistakable. It concentrates on the characters and establishes a definite mood. It's not sufficient, however, to overcome many of the weaknesses of the story."[24]

The New York Herald Tribune termed the movie "distinguished"; Newsweek deemed it "remarkable". Look described The Searchers as a "Homeric odyssey". The New York Times praised Wayne's performance as "uncommonly commanding".[25] The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote, "Though it does not consistently achieve the highest Ford standards, The Searchers is surely the best Western since Shane."[26]

The film earned rentals of $4.8 million in the US and Canada during its first year of release.[27]

The film helped revive the career of Jeffrey Hunter.[28]

Later assessments

Critic Roger Ebert found Wayne's character, Ethan Edwards, "one of the most compelling characters Ford and Wayne ever created". Ebert writes: "The Searchers indeed seems to be two films. The Ethan Edwards story is stark and lonely, a portrait of obsession, and in it we can see Schrader's inspiration for Travis Bickle of Taxi Driver. [...] The film within this film involves the silly romantic subplot and characters hauled in for comic relief, including the Swedish neighbor Lars Jorgensen (John Qualen), who uses a vaudeville accent, and Mose Harper (Hank Worden), a half-wit treated like a mascot. [...] This second strand is without interest, and those who value The Searchers filter it out, patiently waiting for a return to the main story line."[29]

The Searchers has been cited as one of the greatest films of all time, such as in the BFI's decennial Sight & Sound polls. In 1972, The Searchers was ranked 18th; in 1992, 5th; in 2002, 11th; in 2012, 7th. In a 1959 Cahiers du Cinéma essay, Jean-Luc Godard compared the movie's ending to the reuniting of Odysseus with Telemachus in Homer's Odyssey[25] and wrote:

How can I hate […] John Wayne, who supports Goldwater, and love him tenderly when he suddenly takes Natalie Wood in his arms in the penultimate reel of The Searchers?[30]

In 1963, he ranked The Searchers as the fourth-greatest American movie of the sound era, after Scarface (1932), The Great Dictator (1940), and Vertigo (1958).[31] The 1998 American Film Institute 100 greatest American films list ranked The Searchers in 96th place, and the 2007 iteration of the list ranked it in 12th place. In 1998, TV Guide ranked it 18th.[32] In 2008, the American Film Institute named The Searchers as the greatest Western of all time.[33] In 2010, Richard Corliss noted the film was "now widely regarded as the greatest Western of the 1950s, the genre's greatest decade" and characterized it as a "darkly profound study of obsession, racism, and heroic solitude".[34]

The film currently maintains an 87% rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes based on 98 reviews, with an average rating of 9.1/10. The site's critics' consensus reads: "The Searchers is an epic John Wayne Western that introduces dark ambivalence to the genre that remains fashionable today."[35] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 94 out of 100 based on reviews from 15 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[36]

The film has been recognized multiple times by the American Film Institute:

On "They Shoot Pictures Don't They", a site which numerically calculates critical reception for any given film, The Searchers has been recognized as the ninth-most acclaimed movie ever made.[37] Members of the Western Writers of America chose its title song as one of the top 100 Western songs of all time.[38]

Scott McGee stated, "... more than just making a social statement like other Westerns of the period were apt to do, Ford instills in The Searchers a visual poetry and a sense of melancholy that is rare in American films and rarer still to Westerns."[39]

In 2006, Writers Guild of America West ranked the film's screenplay 97th in WGA’s list of 101 Greatest Screenplays.[40] Glenn Frankel's 2013 study of the film calls it "the greatest Hollywood film that few people have seen".[25]

Critical interpretations

Race relations

Ethan angrily confronts Clayton after being interrupted while gunning down retreating Native Americans.

A major theme of the film is the historical attitude of white settlers toward Native Americans. Ford was not the first to attempt this examination cinematically, but his depiction of harshness toward Native Americans was startling, particularly to later generations of viewers; Roger Ebert wrote, "I think Ford was trying, imperfectly, even nervously, to depict racism that justified genocide."[29] At the heart of The Searchers is Wayne's performance as the angry, vengeful Ethan Edwards. From the beginning of his quest, he is quite clearly less interested in rescuing Debbie than in wreaking vengeance on the Comanches for the slaughter of his brother's family.[41]

In a 1964 interview with Cosmopolitan, Ford said,

There's some merit to the charge that the Indian hasn't been portrayed accurately or fairly in the Western, but again, this charge has been a broad generalization and often unfair. The Indian didn't welcome the white man ... and he wasn't diplomatic ... If he has been treated unfairly by whites in films, that, unfortunately, was often the case in real life. There was much racial prejudice in the West.[42]

Film scholar Ed Lowry writes, "[W]hile the Comanches are depicted as utterly ruthless, Ford ascribes motivations for their actions, and lends them a dignity befitting a proud civilization. Never do we see the Indian commit atrocities more appalling than those perpetrated by the white man."[check quotation syntax][39] "Wayne is plainly Ahab", wrote cultural critic Greil Marcus. "He is the good American hero driving himself past all known limits and into madness, his commitment to honor and decency burned down to a core of vengeance."[41] For Brenton Priestley, Ford indicates that Scar's cruelty is also motivated by revenge ("Two sons killed by white men. For each son, I take many... scalps.")[42]

Miscegenation

Natalie Wood as Debbie

The theme of miscegenation also runs through the film. Many critical analyses of The Searchers highlight Ethan's view of Debbie as having been "contaminated" through her abduction and implied rape.[43][44][45]

The rape of captive white women by the Comanche is an unspoken theme. No actual rape scene is depicted, but Alexandra Heller-Nicholas in her study of Rape-Revenge Films says, "the abduction, captivity, and implied rape of Debbie (Natalie Wood) ... drives the narrative";[46] and Edward Buscombe points out a scene in which "[Ethan] turns off the trail to penetrate a narrow crevice in the rocks, and when he emerges, his savage stabbing with his knife seems to mimic a violent sexual act, drawing us 'a picture' of the act of rape which obsesses him."[47] Glenn Frankel writes that in real life, "Rape was a fact of life for many captives, although it was seldom discussed by those women who escaped or were ransomed back to the white world."[48]

Early on, Martin earns a sour look from Ethan when he admits to being one-eighth Cherokee. Ethan says repeatedly that he will kill his niece rather than have her live "with a buck", that "living with the Comanche ain't living". Even one of the film's gentler characters, Vera Miles's Laurie, tells Martin when he explains he must protect his adoptive sister, "Ethan will put a bullet in her brain. I tell you Martha would want him to." This outburst makes it clear that even the supposedly gentler characters hold the same fear of miscegenation.[42]

Randy Roberts and James Olson write that Ethan Edwards

is also an obsessed maniac. White settlers are not simply the advanced vanguard of civilization; they are racists. Indians are not just noble savages; they are savage killers. The frontier is not a place of opportunity; it is a wasteland. ... In the character of Ethan Edwards, John Wayne had extended the Western hero to the border of evil.[49]

Ethan and Martha

The unspoken love between Wayne's Ethan and his brother's wife Martha and his obsession with avenging her drive the film.

An important plot undercurrent is the obvious mutual attraction between Ethan Edwards and his brother's wife, Martha. Although no dialogue alludes to it, many visual references to their relationship are seen throughout the film.[50][51][52] Some critics have suggested that this unspoken passion implies that Debbie—who is specifically described as eight years old, as Ethan returns from an eight-year absence—may be Ethan's daughter. Such a situation would add further layers of nuance to Ethan's obsessive search for Debbie, his revulsion at the thought that she might be living as a Native American, and his ultimate decision to bring her home—and then walk away. Beyond the ostensible motivations, it might depict a guilt-ridden father's need to save the daughter he made by cuckolding his brother, then abandoned.[53]

Influence

The Searchers has influenced many films. David Lean watched the film repeatedly while preparing for Lawrence of Arabia to help him get a sense of how to shoot a landscape.[54] The entrance of Ethan Edwards in The Searchers, across a vast prairie, is echoed in the across-the-desert entrance of Sherif Ali in Lawrence of Arabia. Sam Peckinpah referenced the aftermath of the massacre and the funeral scene in Major Dundee (1965), and according to a 1974 review by Jay Cocks, Peckinpah's Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia contains dialogue with "direct tributes to such classics as John Huston's The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and John Ford's The Searchers."[55][56]

Martin Scorsese's 1967 film Who's That Knocking at My Door features a sequence in which the two primary characters discuss The Searchers,[57] and in his 1973 film Mean Streets, three characters attend a screening of The Searchers.[58] In 2012, in a Sight & Sound poll, Scorsese listed The Searchers as one of his all-time favorite films.[59][60]

Scott McGee, writing for Turner Classic Movies, notes "Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, John Milius, Paul Schrader, Wim Wenders, Jean-Luc Godard, and George Lucas have all been influenced and paid some form of homage to The Searchers in their work."[39] Wenders' Palme d'Or-winning 1984 film Paris, Texas in particular has been cited for similarities.[61][62]

The film influenced several aspects of George Lucas' film saga Star Wars.[54] The scene in which Ethan Edwards discovers the flaming wreckage of his family homestead is reflected in 1977's Star Wars, wherein the character Luke Skywalker finds that his homestead has been burned and destroyed by Imperial Stormtroopers.[63][64][65] The Searchers was also an influence on the 2002 prequel film in the series, Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones. In the film, Anakin Skywalker learns that one of his family members has been abducted by a group of Tusken Raiders (though the character's mother is kidnapped, rather than a niece). Anakin massacres the kidnappers in vengeance, much like The Searchers' climactic battle in the Comanche camp.[63][64] The opening scenes of Rogue One mirror those of The Searchers: the pig-tailed character of Jyn is hidden by her parents when their homestead is attacked in the same way little Debbie is saved by her parents when they are attacked by the Comanches.

Douglas Gordon's 1995 artwork, 5 Year Drive-By, stretches out The Searchers from the original 119-minute runtime to five years (reflecting the events of the movie taking place over a timespan of five years), playing at a speed of one frame every 24 minutes.[66][67][68]

The 2007 film Searchers 2.0 by Alex Cox includes many discussions of The Searchers as well as other revenge films. In the film, the characters attend a screening of a remake of The Searchers directed by Ted Post and starring James Mitchum as Ethan Edwards and Telly Savalas as Chief Cicatriz (Scar), though no such remake was ever made in reality (Ted Post had actually directed a remake of John Ford's Stagecoach).

Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan stated that the ending to the show's final episode, "Felina", was influenced by the film.[69]

The 2016 Canadian film Searchers is a partial remake of the film, in which an Inuk man in 1913 finds his wife and daughter have been kidnapped. However, co-director Zacharias Kunuk discarded the original's plot about conflicts between white people and indigenous peoples, instead using only Inuit characters. Kunuk explained racism was not an intended theme of his film.[70] Kunuk said he watched Western films in the Igloolik community hall as a boy, and declared The Searchers star John Wayne "was our hero".[71]

John Wayne's repeatedly used line "that'll be the day" inspired Buddy Holly to write the song "That'll Be the Day" after seeing the film in a theater in Lubbock, Texas.[72]

The title of the novel The Searcher by Tana French is an allusion to the film.[3][4]

Home media

The Searchers was first released on home video on VHS and Betamax in 1980, followed by releases on LaserDisc in 1984 and DVD in 1997. It was released by the Warner Archive Collection on Blu-ray, HD DVD and a remastered DVD in 2006 for the film's 50th anniversary.[73] The film was released on Ultra HD Blu-ray and a remastered Blu-ray on December 17, 2024, by the Warner Archive Collection as the label's first 4K release, featuring a remaster from its original VistaVision camera negative.[74]

Comic book adaptation

Posted by at No comments:
Labels:

West Side Story (1961)

 


West Side Story is a 1961 American musical romantic drama film directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins, written by Ernest Lehman, and produced by Wise. The film is an adaptation of the 1957 Broadway musical of the same title, which in turn was inspired by Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. It stars Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, Russ Tamblyn, Rita Moreno, and George Chakiris and was photographed by Daniel L. Fapp in Super Panavision 70. The music was composed by Leonard Bernstein, with lyrics by Stephen Sondheim.

Released on October 18, 1961, through United Artists, the film received praise from critics and viewers, and became the highest-grossing film of 1961. It was nominated for 11 Academy Awards and won 10, including Best Picture (in addition to a special award for Robbins), becoming the record holder for the most wins for a musical. West Side Story is regarded as one of the greatest musical films of all time. The film was designated as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1997.[5] A second film adaptation by Steven Spielberg was released in December 2021.

Plot

In New York City in 1957, two teenage gangs compete for control on the Upper West Side. The Jets, a group of whites led by Riff, brawl with the Sharks, Puerto Ricans led by Bernardo. Lieutenant Schrank and Officer Krupke arrive and break it up. The Jets challenge the Sharks to a rumble to be held after an upcoming dance.

Riff wants his best friend Tony, a co-founder and former member of the Jets, to fight at the rumble. Riff invites Tony to the dance, but Tony says he senses something important is coming. Riff suggests it could happen at the dance. Tony finally agrees to go. Meanwhile, Bernardo's younger sister, Maria, tells her best friend and Bernardo's girlfriend, Anita, how excited she is about the dance. At the dance, the two gangs and their girls refuse to intermingle. Tony arrives; he and Maria fall in love instantly, but Bernardo angrily demands that Tony stay away from her and sends her home. Riff proposes a midnight meeting with Bernardo at Doc's drug store to settle the rules for the rumble.

Anita argues that Bernardo is overprotective of Maria, and they compare the advantages of Puerto Rico and the US mainland. Tony sneaks onto Maria's fire escape where they reaffirm their love. Krupke, who suspects the Jets are planning something, warns them not to cause trouble. The Sharks arrive, and the gangs agree to a showdown the following evening under the highway, with a one-on-one fistfight. When Schrank arrives, the gangs feign friendship. Schrank orders the Sharks out and fails to discover information about the fight.

The next day at the bridal shop where they work, Anita accidentally tells Maria about the rumble. Tony arrives to see Maria. Anita, shocked, warns them about the consequences if Bernardo learns of their relationship. Maria makes Tony promise to prevent the rumble. Tony and Maria fantasize about their wedding.

The gangs approach the area under the highway. Tony arrives to stop the fight, but Bernardo antagonizes him. Unwilling to watch Tony be humiliated, Riff initiates a knife fight. Tony intervenes, leading to Bernardo stabbing and killing Riff. Tony kills Bernardo with Riff's knife, and a melee ensues. Police sirens blare, and everyone flees, leaving behind the dead bodies. Maria waits for Tony on the roof of her apartment building; her fiancé Chino (an arranged engagement) arrives and tells her what happened. Tony arrives and asks for Maria's forgiveness. He plans to turn himself in to the police. Maria is devastated but confirms her love for Tony and asks him to stay.

The Jets and their new leader, Ice, reassemble outside a garage and focus on reacting to the police. Anybodys arrives and warns them that Chino is after Tony with a gun. Ice sends the Jets to warn Tony. A grieving Anita enters the apartment while Tony and Maria are in the bedroom. The lovers arrange to meet at Doc's, where they will pick up getaway money to elope. Anita spots Tony leaving through the window and chides Maria for the relationship with Bernardo's killer, but Maria convinces her to help them elope. Schrank arrives and questions Maria about the rumble. Maria sends Anita to tell Tony that Maria is detained from meeting him.

The Jets attacking Anita at Doc's drug store

When Anita reaches Doc's, the Jets harass and even try to rape her, when Doc appears and intervenes. Anita angrily lies, saying that Chino has killed Maria. Doc banishes the Jets, gives Tony his getaway money and delivers Anita's message. Tony, distraught, runs into the streets, shouting for Chino to kill him, too. In the playground next to Doc's, Tony spots Maria and they run toward each other, only for Chino to shoot Tony. The gangs arrive to find Maria holding Tony, who dies in her arms. Maria takes the gun from Chino and threatens to shoot everyone, blaming their hate for the deaths. Schrank and Krupke arrive to arrest Chino, and the gangs end their feud by uniting to carry Tony's body away in a funeral procession with Maria following.

Cast

  • Natalie Wood as Maria, Bernardo's younger sister and Chino's arranged fiancée,[6] who falls in love with Tony
    • Marni Nixon as Maria's singing voice (also Anita's singing voice in Quintet)
  • Richard Beymer as Tony, co-founder and one-time member of the Jets and best friend of Riff, who works at Doc's drugstore and falls in love with Maria
  • Russ Tamblyn as Riff, leader of the Jets, best friend of Tony
  • Rita Moreno as Anita, Bernardo's girlfriend, and Maria's closest confidante
    • Betty Wand as Anita's singing voice for "A Boy Like That"
    • Marni Nixon as Anita’s singing voice for "Tonight Quintet"
  • George Chakiris as Bernardo, leader of the Sharks, older brother of Maria and Anita's boyfriend
  • Simon Oakland as Lieutenant Schrank, a hard-boiled plainclothes detective
  • Ned Glass as Doc, Tony's boss; a decent, elderly Jewish drugstore owner
  • William Bramley as Sergeant Krupke, a brusque beat cop (Bramley played the role in the original Broadway production)

Uncredited:

  • John Astin as Glad Hand, well-meaning but ineffective social worker
  • Penny Santon as Madam Lucia, bridal shop owner

Musical numbers

Production

Executive producer Walter Mirisch enlisted the services of Jerome Robbins, who had directed and choreographed the stage version of West Side Story. Because Robbins had no previous film experience, Mirisch hired Robert Wise to co-direct and produce because of his "experience in gritty subject matter" and his ability to complete motion pictures under budget and ahead of schedule. Robbins was to direct the musical sequences, and Wise would handle the story's dramatic elements.[7] Robbins directed his portion of the film first, spending a great deal of time on retakes and on-set rehearsals as well as discussing setups with Wise.[8][9] Assistant director Robert Relyea recalled an unusual number of injuries endured by the dancers.[10] After 45 days of shooting, the picture was 24 days behind schedule.[11] With the film over budget, Wise dismissed Robbins.[12] The remaining dance numbers were directed with the help of Robbins's assistants. Recognizing Robbins's considerable creative contribution to the film, Wise agreed that Robbins should be given co-directing credit. Robbins and Wise also kept in contact and discussed the production, with Wise's taking many of Robbins's suggestions about the editing of the film.[13] The titles and end credits sequences were designed by Saul Bass with Elaine Makatura Bass. Bass was credited as visual consultant for creating the opening sequence over the film's overture.[14]

On location shooting for the "Prologue" and "Jet Song" occurred at two different Manhattan, New York locations. A playground located at East 110th Street, now Tito Puente Way, between 2nd and 3rd Avenues, served as the backdrop for introducing the two gangs. West 68th Street between West End and Amsterdam Avenues, three blocks north of the San Juan Hill community, provided additional realism for where the gangs roamed.[15] The sound stages at the Samuel Goldwyn Studio, located in West Hollywood, California, were used for rehearsals and studio shooting.[16]

Casting

Jose De Vega as Chino, Natalie Wood as Maria, and George Chakiris as Bernardo

Although Robbins pushed for 29-year-old Carol Lawrence, the first Maria, to be cast in the same role in the film, after seeing her screen test the producers agreed she was too old to play the part. A number of other cast members from the Broadway and West End productions were cast in the film. Tony Mordente, who played A-Rab on stage, was cast as Action in the film, and George Chakiris, Riff in the London stage production, played Bernardo in the film.[17] Tucker Smith, who joined the Broadway production several months into its run, played Diesel, renamed Ice for the film. David Winters, the first Baby John on stage, played A-Rab. Eliot Feld, an ensemble member and understudy for Baby John on Broadway, played Baby John. Jay Norman, Juano on stage, appeared as Pepe. Reprising their stage roles in the film were Carole D'Andrea as Velma, Tommy Abbott as Gee-Tar, and William Bramley as Officer Krupke.

Elvis Presley was approached for Tony, but his manager Colonel Tom Parker turned down the part.[18] Others who were considered for the part included Russ Tamblyn,[19][20] Warren Beatty, Burt Reynolds, Anthony Perkins, Bobby Darin, Troy Donahue, Marlon Brando, Richard Chamberlain, and Robert Redford.[21][22] Reynolds was considered "too tough" for the part. Chamberlain was believed to be "too mature" for the role. Tamblyn impressed Wise and was given the supporting role of Riff.[21] Ultimately, Richard Beymer won the part of Tony despite having no history of singing or dancing.[23]

Natalie Wood was filming Splendor in the Grass with Warren Beatty and was involved with him romantically off-screen. The producers were not considering her for the role of Maria at that time. When considering Beatty for the role of Tony, Wise requested a reel of his work. However, after seeing a clip from Splendor in the Grass, the producers decided his co-star Wood was perfect for Maria, but Beatty was not suitable for the role of Tony.[24] Jill St. John, Audrey Hepburn, Diane Baker, Elizabeth Ashley, Suzanne Pleshette and Angela Dorian were among the many actresses who were considered for the role of Maria in the film.[21][25]

Editing

Thomas Stanford won the Academy Award for Best Film Editing for his work on West Side Story.[26] The film was listed as the 38th best-edited film of all time in a 2012 survey of members of the Motion Picture Editors Guild.[27] The dance sequences in particular have been noted by critics.[28] In Louis Giannetti's textbook Understanding Movies, he writes: "Musicals are often edited in a radically formalist style, without having to observe the cutting conventions of ordinary dramatic movies. The editing of West Side Story is very abstract. The music...and the dance numbers...are edited together for maximum aesthetic impact, rather than to forward the story. Nor are the shots linked by some principle of thematic association. Rather, the shots are juxtaposed primarily for their lyrical and kinetic beauty, somewhat like a music video".[29] In his retrospective review, Roger Ebert singled out the dances as extraordinary.[30] Robbins participated in the editing of the musical numbers along with Stanford, Wise, and Walter Mirisch. His notes to Stanford stress that the editing should reveal the characters' emotions even if that compromised the dancing.[31] The quote from Giannetti above indicates that the notes didn't strongly affect the final cuts of the dance numbers.

Reception

Critical response

West Side Story is regarded as one of the greatest musical films ever made.[32] It holds a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 116 reviews, with an average rating of 8.4/10. The site's critical consensus states: "Buoyed by Robert Wise's dazzling direction, Leonard Bernstein's score, and Stephen Sondheim's lyrics, West Side Story remains perhaps the most iconic of all the Shakespeare adaptations to visit the big screen".[33] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 86 out of 100, based on 17 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[34]

Original teaser trailer for West Side Story

Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that "moving [the story] from stage to screen is to reconstruct its fine material into nothing short of a cinema masterpiece".[35] Whitney Williams of Variety was also effusive, writing: "Technically, it is superb; use of color is dazzling, camera work often is thrilling, editing fast with dramatic punch, production design catches mood as well as action itself".[36] Arthur Knight from the Saturday Review called it a "triumphant work of art."[37] A review in The Hollywood Reporter called it "a magnificent show, a milestone in movie musicals, a box-office smash. It is so good that superlatives are superfluous. Let it be noted that the film musical, the one dramatic form that is purely American and purely Hollywood, has never been done better".[38] By contrast, Pauline Kael derided the film as "frenzied hokum", decrying that the dialogue was "painfully old-fashioned and mawkish" and the dancing was a "simpering, sickly romantic ballet".[39] In 1962, Mae Tinee of the Chicago Tribune gave a mixed review. She praised the cast, cinematography, dancing and script but wrote: "[T]his is a case when the big screen sometimes is a handicap. When the giant-sized, tear-stained faces of a desolated boy and girl fill the entire front of a theater, it seems incongruous for these young lovers to break into song. Some of the music is fresh and bright, some of it tiresomely repetitious, but all the members of the cast dance like demons. ... It's a cleverly stylized and dramatized depiction of a bloody story which probably will appeal most to those who like lengthy musicals, and to the younger generation who are fascinated by 'rumbles'. Their elders may find it depressing."[40]

Writing in 2004, Roger Ebert included the film in his list of "Great Movies": "So the dancing is remarkable, and several of the songs have proven themselves by becoming standards, and there are moments of startling power and truth. West Side Story remains a landmark of musical history. But if the drama had been as edgy as the choreography, if the lead performances had matched Moreno's fierce concentration, if the gangs had been more dangerous and less like bad-boy Archies and Jugheads, if the ending had delivered on the pathos and tragedy of the original, there's no telling what might have resulted".[30]

Box office

West Side Story was a commercial success upon its release. It became the highest-grossing film of 1961, earning rentals of $19,645,000 in the United States and Canada. It remained the highest-grossing musical film of all time[41] until the release of The Sound of Music in 1965. The film grossed $44.1 million worldwide ($475 million in 2025). Because of profit participation, United Artists earned a profit of only $2.5 million on the film ($27 million in 2025).[42]

Accolades

West Side Story won 10 Academy Awards, making it the musical film with the most Oscar wins (including Best Picture).[43] It was the first film to share the Academy Award for Best Director between two people, with Wise winning in the Best Picture and Best Director categories.[44]

Award Category Nominee(s) Result Ref.
Academy Awards Best Motion Picture Robert Wise Won [45]
Best Director Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins Won
Best Supporting Actor George Chakiris Won
Best Supporting Actress Rita Moreno Won
Best Screenplay – Based on Material from Another Medium Ernest Lehman Nominated
Best Art Direction – Color Art Direction: Boris Leven;
Set Decoration: Victor A. Gangelin 		Won
Best Cinematography – Color Daniel L. Fapp Won
Best Costume Design – Color Irene Sharaff Won
Best Film Editing Thomas Stanford Won
Best Scoring of a Musical Picture Saul Chaplin, Johnny Green, Irwin Kostal, and Sid Ramin Won
Best Sound Fred Hynes and Gordon E. Sawyer Won
Academy Honorary Award[46] Jerome Robbins Won
British Academy Film Awards Best Film Nominated [47]
Directors Guild of America Awards Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins Won [48]
Golden Globe Awards Best Motion Picture – Musical Won [49]
Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy Richard Beymer Nominated
Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture George Chakiris Won
Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture Rita Moreno Won
Best Director – Motion Picture Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins Nominated
Most Promising Newcomer – Male Richard Beymer Nominated
George Chakiris Nominated
Grammy Awards Best Sound Track Album or Recording of Original Cast From a Motion Picture or Television West Side Story
Saul Chaplin, Johnny Green, Irwin Kostal, and Sid Ramin 		Won [50]
National Film Preservation Board National Film Registry Inducted [51]
New York Film Critics Circle Awards Best Film Won
Best Director Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins Nominated
Producers Guild of America Awards PGA Hall of Fame – Motion Pictures Won
Sant Jordi Awards Best Foreign Film Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins Won
Satellite Awards Best Classic DVD Won [52]
Writers Guild of America Awards Best Written American Musical Ernest Lehman Won [53]

American Film Institute lists:

The film's cast appeared and was honored at the 50th anniversary of West Side Story at the 2011 Ventura Film Festival.[54]

Score and soundtrack

Main article: West Side Story (1961 soundtrack)

Leonard Bernstein was displeased with the orchestration for the movie, which was the work of Sid Ramin and Irwin Kostal, who had orchestrated the original Broadway production. That show had been orchestrated for roughly 30 musicians; for the movie, United Artists allowed them triple that, including six saxophone parts, eight trumpets, five pianos and five xylophones.[55] Bernstein found it "overbearing and lacking in texture and subtlety".[5]

Stephen Sondheim, who did not like the sequence of the songs in the Broadway version, had the song "Gee, Officer Krupke" being sung before the rumble in place of the song "Cool" which is sung instead after the rumble; the song "I Feel Pretty" is also sung before the rumble instead of after. In addition, the song "America" was sung in-between the two love songs "Maria" and "Tonight", instead of having the two love songs being sung consecutively. Though mentioned in earlier scripts, the "Somewhere" dream ballet was not well defined for the film and was put on the back burner for Robbins to conceive and execute towards the end of shooting. With Robbins relieved of his duties midway in the production, the dance sequence was eliminated.[56] "Somewhere" was left to be sung by Tony and Maria in her bedroom. Reprises of the lyrics were omitted as well, especially in the songs "One Hand, One Heart" and "A Boy Like That". Some lyrics were changed in order to avoid censorship, especially in the songs "Jet Song", "Gee, Officer Krupke", "America" and the "Tonight Quintet". Even the phrase "womb to tomb, sperm to worm" between Riff and Tony had to be replaced with "womb to tomb, birth to earth" between Riff and Tony near the beginning of the film and "one-two-three, one-two-three" between Riff and Diesel in the Quintet.

As provided in her contract, Wood prerecorded her songs and allowed the production team to decide whether to use her voice. She found the songs challenging, but was allowed to film her scenes lip-synching to her own vocals and was led to believe that these versions would be used, although music supervisors Saul Chaplin and Johnny Green had already decided to use Marni Nixon's voice. Wood's singing voice is only heard during the reprise of the song "Somewhere" when Tony dies. Though Nixon had recorded the songs in the same orchestra sessions as Wood, she had to re-record them to synch with Wood's filmed performances. Even the one song for which Wood had lip-synched to Nixon's voice, "One Hand, One Heart", had to be recorded again because Wood's lip-synching was unsatisfactory.[57] When Marni Nixon learned that she had not signed a contract for participating in the recording and demanded a percentage of the LP record, she was told that all percentages had been allocated. Bernstein gave her 0.25% of his album royalties. This set a precedent for all future "ghost singers".[58]

Beymer's vocals were performed by Jimmy Bryant. Tucker Smith, who played Ice, dubbed the singing voice of Riff in "Jet Song", instead of Russ Tamblyn. Tamblyn's own voice was used in "Gee, Officer Krupke" and the "Quintet". Rita Moreno was dubbed by Betty Wand in the song "A Boy Like That" because the song needed to be performed at a register that was too low for her. However, Moreno sang her own vocals in "America". Marni Nixon sang some of Moreno's parts in the "Quintet" when illness prevented Moreno from doing so. Wand was also ill on the day of final recording, and so Nixon recorded Anita's vocal line as well.

For the 50th anniversary of the film's 1961 release, a score closer to the Broadway version was created by Garth Edwin Sunderland of the Leonard Bernstein Office to be performed live at screenings of the movie with the score removed, but with the original vocals maintained. The score's New York City premiere was presented at Lincoln Center's David Geffen Hall, called Avery Fisher Hall at the time, built atop the original film locations, which were razed in a late 1950s urban renewal project.[55]

Legacy

A scene in the 1965 French movie "Gendarme in New York" pastiches West Side Story.[59]

In 2009, photographer Mark Seliger re-created scenes from the film for magazine Vanity Fair called West Side Story Revisited, using Camilla Belle as Maria, Ben Barnes as Tony, Jennifer Lopez as Anita, Rodrigo Santoro as Bernardo and Chris Evans as Riff. Portraying the Sharks are Minka Kelly, Jay Hernandez, Natalie Martinez, Brandon T. Jackson and Melonie Diaz. Portraying the Jets are Ashley Tisdale, Sean Faris, Robert Pattinson, Cam Gigandet, Trilby Glover, Brittany Snow and Drake Bell.[60]

West Side Story influenced Michael Jackson's "Beat It" and "Bad" music videos.[61][62] The first features Jackson as a peacemaker between two rival gangs in an homage to his favorite film.[63]

2021 film

Main article: West Side Story (2021 film)

A second film adaptation of the musical was released by 20th Century Studios on December 10, 2021,[64] directed by Steven Spielberg and choreographed by Justin Peck, with a screenplay by Tony Kushner.[65] It stars Ansel Elgort as Tony, Rachel Zegler as Maria and Ariana DeBose as Anita; Moreno returns as a new character, Valentina, who is Doc's widow.[66] It received seven nominations at the 94th Academy Awards, including Best Picture,[67] winning one Oscar for DeBose's performance.[68]

Posted by at No comments:
Labels:
Subscribe to: Comments (Atom)