Saturday, December 13, 2008

World's Best Westerns


  • The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez
  • The Big Country *
  • Broken Trail (mini-series)
  • Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
  • The Claim
  • Dances With Wolves
  • The Grey Fox
  • Into the West (mini-series)
  • Heartland
  • Hidalgo
  • High Noon
  • Jeremiah Johnson
  • Lonesome Dove (mini-series)
  • McCabe and Mrs. Miller
  • Open Range
  • Shane
  • She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
  • Silverado
  • The Three Burials of Malquiades Estrada
  • Tom Horn
  • The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
  • Unforgiven


Runners-Up: Fistful of Dollars, The Good the Bad and the Ugly (wah wah wah...), The High Country*, The Long Riders, The Magnificent Seven, The Man from Snowy River, The Missouri Breaks*, Once Upon a Time in the West*, One-Eyed Jacks*, The Proposition*, Ride the Pink Horse*, The Searchers, The Shooter, Comanche Moon (mini-series)

I included the mini-series here because they were classic westerns and should not be missed. Interesting how many were directed by actors: Dances and Range (both by Costner), Three Burials (Tommy Lee Jones), Unforgiven (Eastwood). Was there ever a villain as bad or as great as Jack Palance in Shane? You kinda had to pull for a guy that well-dressed, especially when Alan Ladd looked like an urban cowboy! Hidalgo, though not technically a western, was about men racing horses cross-country, close enough for me!

[update: 9.18.09]