The Searchers

Now Showing

On Sky Movies Classics 14/12/09 08:00

Director: John Ford

Stars: John Wayne, Natalie Wood, Vera Miles, Jeffrey Hunter

Year: 1956 Running Time: 114 mins Rating:

John Wayne is the man obsessively searching for his niece after she is kidnapped by Comanches in this classic John Ford western. Natalie Wood has a small but key role and the action is first rate. Regular cinemagoers will notice the similarities between this and Ron Howard's The Missing, starring Cate Blanchett, almost 50 years later. The original, however, is still the best.

Review

Ethan (John Wayne) spends five years searching for his two nieces, abducted by Indians, in this lengthy Western, with some first-rate VistaVision photography rather dominating the acting of the leading players:John Wayne merely plays himself and Vera Miles is disappointing.

Jeffrey Hunter, though, is excellent and Ward Bond solid, while a great featured-role performance by veteran Antonio Moreno leads some eye-catching supporting acting, which includes a surprisingly small, if key, role for the star-billed Natalie Wood.

Action is pretty good, story first-rate and powerfully told too.

You'll find the ending haunting, or over-melodramatic according to your tastes, although it's lovingly composed by director John Ford, who really picks up the pace towards the end.

Full of wide open spaces and interesting characters, this may not be Ford or Wayne's best Western, as many would claim; but it's still head and shoulders above most big-scale adventure films.