Though The Searchers is regularly hailed as the finest exemplar of its genre and one of the best movies of any kind (seventh-best of all time, according to the decennial Sight & Sound poll), John Ford’s 1956 film is mediocre for most of its run time. It is not easy to defend a movie like "The Searchers." Films like Stagecoach and The Searchers depict a type of racism that practically justified genocide. So, Conrad was a racist (at least by our standards) and a colonist, but what he saw there repulsed even him, inspiring him to write a particularly gruesome book. John Wayne: The toxic legacy of one of Hollywood’s most beloved stars. John Ford's 1956 film "The Searchers" is one of the finest of the great director's career. In order to understand how the story came to be, and why it is the way it is, we need to evaluate it in terms of its own time and culture. I am the author of three other books: God vs. Darwin: The War Between Evolution and Creationism in the Classroom (2009), The Achievement Gap in US Education: Canaries in the Mine (2005), and Quest for Truth: Scientific Progress and Religious Beliefs (2000). How Did “The Searchers” Influence Future Filmmakers? Really, we don’t need every movie character to make a last minute conversion or receive some sort of third act punishment. Just like Ethan, the Comanche is driven by a need for revenge, and while he’s definitely a murderer, at least we’re given a minute to understand his motivations. John Ford was a man known for creating many films under the genre “western”, and although he has created many, this one is one of his most famous and renowned; New York magazine even called it “the most influential movie in American history” (Ebert). Who does the narrator tell us matters? Dealing with things like Heart of Darkness is really complicated, and made more complicated by the fact that we rarely fully know what we’re trying to do, and further by the fact that people tend to dive immediately in to their respective foxholes when topics like this arise. Heart of Darkness was not a comfortable book then, and it is not a comfortable book now. Perhaps the most striking argument against calling The Searchers racist is the character of Martin Pawley, the true hero of the film. Ironically, Chinua Achebe gave a talk criticizing the book and saying that Conrad’s novel, whatever its other merits, perpetuated African stereotypes. John Ford was also a racist, but a very talented and influential film maker. On the flip side, it is not hanging Conrad with 2019 theory, well past the statute of limitations, to evaluate the book in the context of here and now — but it sure as hell can look like that’s what you’re doing. And that is the problem with the book and the film. But I don’t find that racism enters into ‘News of the World’ at all.” The Searchers (1956) A SDG Original source: National Catholic Register The reputation of John Ford’s The Searchers as a classic but troubling Western in which John Wayne plays an Indian-hating racist is so widely accepted that it’s a bit of a surprise to discover that the film, and the character, are in fact more complex than the reputation suggests. Though The Searchers is regularly hailed as the finest exemplar of its genre and one of the best movies of any kind (seventh-best of all time, according to the decennial Sight & Sound poll), John Ford’s 1956 film is mediocre for most of its run time. As Steve Leftridge of Pop Matters points out, “Had it been a white woman lying next to Martin, there’s no way Ford would’ve shown Martin exact such violence against her and expect audiences to find it funny.”. Sound familiar? In “Django Unchained,” Why does Quentin Tarantino use Modern Music. Of course, it’s still a White Man story, with the Apaches (already having been confined to reservations) merely reacting (and doing so quite understandably). When approaching a topic such as racism in films, it is important to take into account the age of the film and the subject matter. The problem is that I want to spend time in class discussing the moral implications of colonialism, but “the canon” (as expressed in the Norton Anthology) doesn’t do a great job with addressing this. Who’s been put at the center? But to dismiss the entire movie as “racist” is not only inaccurate…it’s also flat-out wrong. In a segment slated to air before a run of the 1956 John Ford classic “The Searchers,” Mankiewicz, Alicia Malone and Eddie Muller ponder some of the movie’s less heroic themes. Since more than 40 years I’ve refused to watch any movie with John Wayne for exactly your reasons. In 2012, Quentin Tarantino was making the rounds, sitting down with reporters to discuss his new film, Django Unchained. That goes without saying, and we shouldn’t dismiss or forget his more troublesome work. “The Searchers” raises disturbing questions about the psychosexual and political roots of racism in the American experience. In Taxi Driver (196), Travis Bickle is an unrepentant racist who vehemently hates African-Americans, but by the end of the film, he’s (probably) become a national hero. So often those who do have voices use them to limit who else is heard and to shout down others who speak. When he chases after Debbie with murder in his eyes, Ford doesn’t want us to root for the guy. Of course, Tarantino isn’t the only one who’s condemned Ford’s treatment of Native Americans in his films. I used to pair it with Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant,” which is also all about the deleterious moral effects of colonialism on the colonists while ignoring the effects on the colonized. 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