Comments on: The Essentials: 22 Classic Westerns

By: Kimber Myers

Kimber Myers — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:18 +0000

Killer work, guys. I\’m going to use this as a primer for all the films I need to see in the genre.

By: Gary Berger

Gary Berger — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:18 +0000

I am sad to not see \”The Longriders\” and \”The Outlaw Josey Wales\” not on your list. They are certainly better than \”Open Range\”, don\’t get me wrong still a solid movie, but not close to these two.

By: bonzob

bonzob — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:18 +0000

Not to be grade quibbling guy, but…

The Quick and The Dead is a guilty pleasure, no doubt, but a B? Really?

And Unforgiven a B+? I think you mean A+.

By: Rashad

Rashad — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:18 +0000

Whoa, no Magnificent Seven?

I didn\’t like My Darling Clementine. I wished someone else had played Holliday. Mature was wrong for it. I would have like someone like Mitchum. And the girl was all wrong too

By: cirkusfolk

cirkusfolk — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is flat out the best western of all-time…spaghetti or not. Much better than Leone\’s own Once Upon a Time in the West. I also liked Jarmusch\’s Dead Man in a strange way. But then again, I like Shanghai Noon as well. It had all the western cliches but did them on purpose and in a fun way…much the same way Back to the Future 3 did. And no mention of which is better…Tombstone or Wyatt Earp? My vote has always been fopr Wyatt Earp.

By: ThePlaylist

ThePlaylist — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

While we like some of them, we decided to sort of skip the usual suspects, though we had planned to do the Wild Bunch and it fell through on the sked.

But Magnificent Seven is not only played out, it\’s simply not that good, especially compared to a lot of these classics.

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

Is THE GOOD, THE BAD & THE UGLY out because it\’s a Spaghetti Western?

By: Xian

Xian — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

So glad you mentioned \”Open Range\”… it is very underrated and much better than \”Dances\”… one of the best recent Westerns and very entertaining.

By: brit

brit — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

how about The Great Silence? Maybe Johnnie To\’s Exiled. Perhaps even Sholay…

By: Tom Voyten

Tom Voyten — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

The Shootist has a place here. A slow walk of inevitability.

By: Christopher Bell

Christopher Bell — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

I do like \”The Searchers,\” but man, that movie really has no sense of time. I don\’t remember the time frame – a few years, no? – but it feels like a week tops.

By: bobs

bobs — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

\”Ride The High Country\” would have been the appropriate Peckinpah western to add to this list.

By: Brian

Brian — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

Jeremiah Johnson. No list is complete without it.

By: cirkusfolk

cirkusfolk — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

You also forgot one of the wittiest westerns of all time, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and think what you like about Mel Gibson but Maverick is a damn entertaining film.

By: edward davis

edward davis — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

Glad no one actually reads. We didn\’t forget anything, we chose to focus on certain westerns. We figured we\’d skip a certain bunch of usual suspects for now in favor of the early true classics that not a lot of people of this generation have actually watched.

By: Katie Walsh

Katie Walsh — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

You people don\’t read. The Headline is \”22 Classic Westerns We Love\” NOT \”The Best Most Unimpeachably Classic Westerns That Are the Only Ones That Matter Ever In The Universe The End.\”

By: bonzob

bonzob — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

Those two statements are antithetical.

The early true classics ARE the usual suspects. Search for any \”best Westerns\” list and try to find one that doesn\’t mention High Noon, Shane, The Searchers, Stagecoach, or Rio Bravo.

Nice to see some of that old Playlist condescension toward its readership, though.

By: Edward Davis

Edward Davis — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

well, we didn\’t want to say it, but you nail it on the head. They are the true classics and that\’s what we\’ve been saying internally for a while now, but the fact of the matter is — for most young people — the reverse \”cooler\” \’70s westerns are in fact the usuals suspects and these ones — the original classics — are films a lot of people shrug at.

Ask this circusfolk guy how many of these he has seen? He\’s probably been too busy watching Cameron Crowe and PTA films like 7 times instead of getting deep into any of these.

By: Chris Broderick

Chris Broderick — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

\”Magnificent Seven\” should be on this list — great story adapted from Seven Samurai, great cast, great music, great fun. Unlike some of these, it holds up well after all these years.
\”Wild Bunch\” should be on it too – yes, I think it\’s overrated by critics but still groundbreaking for its time.
\”Butch Cassidy\” – a Western that didn\’t take itself seriously. \”Blazing Saddles\” has to be mentioned at least.
More recently, I liked \”Silverado\” — entertaining and fun — and \”3:10 to Yuma\” (the remake) was well made and acted despite a dumb ending.
\”Jeremiah Johnson\” isn\’t on here either and it\’s one of the most authtentic films ever made by Hollywood about the real West in the 1800s. \”Dances with Wolves\” should be on the list as well. Both these films should be on the list if \’McCabe and Mrs Miller\” and the \”Misfits\” are on it. Those are not Westerns.
You missed some good ones, particularly anything about Native Americans …

By: Nathan

Nathan — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

I\’m not usually one to nitpick on these lists, but…no The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly?? Nor Once Upon a Time in the West?

Rest of the list is solid, but without those two it\’s missing a big chunk of the genre. Though hey, it\’s a list of ones that you guys love, not best ever, so to each his/her own.

By: cirkusfolk

cirkusfolk — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

Wow, suddenly I\’m being called out for being too hip. Guess my mention of Dead Man outweighed my opinion on Shanghai Noon. At least I got accused of watching too much PTA instead of Edgar Wright. You guys are just too cool for school.

By: Perry

Perry — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

I really don\’t get your logic. You say you want to avoid the usual suspects so that\’s why we don\’t see any of Leone\’s pictures on here. But High Noon, Rio Bravo, Stagecoach, Unforgiven, these aren\’t usual suspects? And I love The Quick and the Dead, but there is no way it should be on a list of classic westerns over Once Upon A Time in the West or any of the Man With No Name flicks.

By: Tuco

Tuco — Fri, 13 May 2016 15:24:17 +0000

The man with no name trilogy and Django (1966). These are the top 4 westerns. period.