The Shootist - 1976
He's got to face a gunfight once more to live up to his legend once more. To win just one more time.
Director(s)
Don Siegel
Writer(s)
Glendon Swarthout (novel)
Scott Hale (screenplay) and
Miles Hood Swarthout (screenplay)
Producer(s)
M.J. Frankovich producer
William Self producer
Cast
John Wayne - J.B. Books
Lauren Bacall - Bond Rogers
Ron Howard - Gillom Rogers
James Stewart - Dr. E.W. Hostetler
Richard Boone - Mike Sweeney
Hugh O'Brian - Jack Pulford (faro dealer at Metropole Saloon)
Bill McKinney - Jay Cobb (owner, Cob's Creamery)
Harry Morgan - Carson City Marshal Walter Thibido
John Carradine - Hezekiah Beckum (undertaker)
Sheree North - Serepta (Books' ex-girlfriend)
Rick Lenz - Dan Dobkins (reporter, 'Morning Appeal') (as Richard Lenz)
Scatman Crothers - Moses Brown (liveryman)
Gregg Palmer - Burly man
Alfred Dennis - Dearden (barber)
Dick Winslow - Streetcar driver
Melody Thomas Scott - Girl on streetcar (as Melody Thomas)
Kathleen O'Malley - Schoolteacher
Johnny Crawford - Books' victim in flashback (uncredited)
Christopher George - Books' victim in flashback (uncredited)
Leo Gordon - Books' victim in flashback (uncredited)
Charles G. Martin - Murray (the bartender) (uncredited)
Ricky Nelson - Books' fellow lawman in flashback (uncredited)
James Nolan - Gambler (uncredited)
Henry Slate - Pulford confidante (uncredited)
Ralph Volkie - White-haired bartender (uncredited)
Review by Theo Robertson
The Shootist (1976)
Hardly A Great Tribute,
I’ve never been a fan of John Wayne. His films in general and his westerns in particular drown in unrealistic American WASP-ish values and unrealistic history. Look at the opening sequence when Wayne’s character protects himself from a would be mugger. In reality most gunfighters were poor shots, not to mention most of their victims died after being shot in the back, so the idea of shooting someone’s gun from out of their reach is rather laughable because these things didn’t happen, and going back to the historical unreality Wayne’s character is responsible for killing 30 men in gunfights, but in reality the top gunslinger in the wild west - Depending what source you read - is either Jim Miller or John Wesley Hardin neither of whom killed more than twenty men in gun fights
I can understand the subtext of THE SHOOTIST . Wayne was diagnosed with cancer and this is supposed to be a tribute, but instead of being sad and poignant ends up as feeling both self indulgent and tasteless. It also jars style wise since this type of western (That had more or less been invented by John Ford) had disappeared after the likes of A FISTFULL OF DOLLARS, THE WILD BUNCH and THE CULPEPPER CATTLE CO were released a few years earlier
What you think of this film all depends on what you think of both John Wayne and John Ford.
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