I knew I read it but I forgot....I read so much stuff

It turns out that I read a novel about the life of Cynthia Ann Parker by one of my favorite authors Douglas C. Jones who wrote "The Season of Yellow Leaf." It is a shame that his books are out of print. I hope they are reissued on Kindle. I enjoyed his first novel "The Court marshal of George Armstrong Custer." That was one of the first alternative history novels I ever read. Jones was a bit of a hippie but a pretty damn good Western writer.

You know what would make a good book.....

I am currently reading "The Searchers: The Making of An American Legend" by Glenn Frankel. It is the story of the making of the John Ford movie. As you might or might not know the story of "The Searcher's" is a meditation on the story of Cynthia Ann Park who was kidnapped by the Comanche. She was the mother of the famous Comanche's last chief Quanah Parker. Now I think the story has been told from Cynthia Ann's perspective. I bet there were novels written from her point of view. But I would like to take a crack at it.

The Searchers Part Two

Ethan Edwards is an angry man. He is enraged about the attacks and the crimes committed against his family and his community. He has no faith in the law enforcement (the Texas Rangers) or the government (The Army). He has to take the matters into his own hands. He is a loner with a gun. A vigilante if you will. Someone who feels that he has to step in to restore the peace of his community. He feels that he knows best. He is paranoid. Angry. Vengeful.

Racist? Perhaps but he bases his hate of a group on the crimes committed against his family and his community. He gets along more or less with harmless Indians like the "wife" that Martin collects along the way. But he is suspicious of every one of those "people" he meets because he knows what they have done and continue to do.

Is he wrong? Well his family was wiped out and his nieces carried off. Does he have reason to hate? Is he right to take the matter into his own hands regardless of the effect it would have on him and his life and those around him.

Ethan Edwards saw crime all around him and he took his gun in his hand and took a stand.

Ethan Edwards is George Zimmerman?

The Searchers Part One

Sixty Grit said...

Troop, what do you think of The Searchers. It was on last night and I sort of watched it. It didn't live up to the hype, primarily because they kept saying they were in Texas when they were in Monument Valley, Utah. Five years they wandered, never left a 10 square mile area.

My feelings about "The Searchers" are a little complicated Sixty. Although it is probably the most artistic and "deep" of the John Wayne and John Fork collaborations it is not my favorite. It is the Western most cited by the intelligentsia and the movie auteur's as their favorite Western which is enough to give me pause. It is a complete work and the absolute fruition of Ford's talent but it is flawed in many ways. But what piece of art doesn't have it flaws? (Well except for Angie Dickenson)

The reason it was shot in Monument Valley is because it was John Fords personal presevre. Where he was most comfortable shooting his movies. Away from the onerous hand of studio supervision. They lived in tents and had no running water or toilets. So the big wigs stayed away. It was supposed to mimic the Llano Estacado or great desert plain of west Texas where the Comanche ruled in the days of the frontier. Of  course it was much dryer and desolate but it was just a convention of the time. Like filming in front of a backdrop or wearing a white hat if you were a good guy.

The story of the movie is one of redemption. Of love turning to hate and back to love again. Of the ties of family that bind even the loner and the outside with chains of love. It is a tale of endurance and perservance and stubborness born out of a sense of obligation and loyality. It is a tale of what America once was and will never be again. Much more now than in the days it was filmed. That America and those Americans are gone forever. It is an ode to an era that has passed and will not return. And like Ethan Edwards all we can do is turn our back and walk out into the darkness of the night.

Edutcher is talking out of his ass!

edutcher said...
Next to "The Big Country", (The Searcher's is) the worst we-painted-ourselves-into-a-corner-and-we-have-to-come-up-with-a-really-stupid-unbelievable-resolution-so-the-picture-will-make-money ending in the history of movies.The logical ending would have to have been have The Duke try to kill Natalie and Jeff Hunter has to shoot it out with him - and almost certainly kill him. But we couldn't do that.

You obviously missed the point pilgrim. Ethan Edwards always loved his sister-in-law. She was the girl he left behind when he went off to fight in the Civil war. He looks at her children as his children. He could never speak of his love for her....it drips off of every part of their brief scene together. His devotion to her can only be redeemed by saving the one daughter she has left. So he goes on a ten year Odyssey to rescue her. But he is fully a man of his times. Ford doesn't sugar coat it. He is a racist bullheaded hot head who would rather kill Debbie than see her polluted by becoming Scar's concubine. In that final moment when he holds Debbie in his arms he sees the woman that he had lost forever. In that moment where he forgives her and makes his peace with her he is fully redeemed. The easy ending would be as you describe. But Ford would not copy Hawk's plot in "Red River." He is not about to have Ethan's surrogate son shoot him in a final confrontation. He chose a different path. Ethan Edwards still had the capacity to love. To remember. To redeem his life and his search.

That is what makes "The Searchers" an epic masterpiece.

We have to be like Martin.

Laurie: [Martin is preparing to join a raid against the Indians and rescue Debbie] You're not goin', not this time.
Martin: Are you crazy?
Laurie: It's too late. She's a woman grown now.
Martin: But I gotta go, Laurie, I gotta fetch her home.
Laurie: Fetch what home? The leavings a Comanche buck sold time and again to the highest bidder, with savage brats of her own?
Martin: [upset] Laurie, shut your mouth.
Laurie: Do you know what Ethan will do if he has a chance? He'll put a bullet in her brain.
[pause]
Laurie: I tell you, Martha would want him to.
Martin: Only if I'm dead.

(The Searchers, 1956)

You know in life, we have to be more like Martin and less like Ethan. Or at least I have to be less dogmatic.