thedrifter
06-14-09, 11:17 AM
~~John Wayne~~
May 26, 1907 – June 11, 1979
http://images49.fotki.com/v1521/photos/2/292835/4670962/JohnWayne2-vi.jpg
In more than 200 films made over 50 years, John Wayne saddled up to become the greatest figure of one of America's greatest native art forms, the western.
The movies he starred in rode the range from out-of-the-money sagebrush quickies to such classics as "Stagecoach" and "Red River." He won an Oscar as best actor for another western, "True Grit," in 1969. Yet some of the best films he made told stories far from the wilds of the West, such as "The Quiet Man" and "The Long Voyage Home."
In the last decades of his career, Mr. Wayne became something of an American folk figure, hero to some, villain to others, for his outspoken views. He was politically conservative and, although he scorned politics as a way of life for himself, he enthusiastically supported Richard M. Nixon, Barry Goldwater, Spiro T. Agnew, Ronald Reagan and others who, he felt, fought for his concept of Americanism and anti-Communism.
http://images49.fotki.com/v1504/photos/2/292835/4670962/039_20255-vi.jpg
But it was for millions of moviegoers who saw him only on the big screen that John Wayne really existed. He had not created the western with its clear-cut conflict between good and bad, right and wrong, but it was impossible to mention the word "western" without thinking of "the Duke," as he was called.
Mr. Wayne was co-director and star of "The Green Berets," a 1968 film that supported the United States action in Vietnam. The movie was assailed by many major critics on all grounds, political and esthetic, but the public apparently did not mind; in only six months, it had earned $1 million above its production cost of $7 million.
Won Growing Respect
As the years passed, Mr. Wayne was recognized as some sort of American natural resource, and his various critics, political and film, looked on him with more respect. Abbie Hoffman, the radical of the 1960's paid tribute to Mr. Wayne's singularity. Reviewing "The Cowboys," made in 1972, Vincent Canby, film critic of The New York Times, who did not particularly care for it, wrote, "Wayne is, of course, marvelously indestructible, and he has become an almost perfect father figure."
But years before he became anything close to a father figure, Mr. Wayne had become a symbolic male figure, a man of impregnable virility and the embodiment of simplistic, laconic virtues, packaged in a well-built 6-foot-4-inch, 225- pound frame.
http://images49.fotki.com/v1500/photos/2/292835/4670962/johnwayne-vi.jpg
Overcame Great Odds
Appearances were not altogether deceiving. Mr. Wayne loved adventure and the outdoors. He did believe that things were either right or wrong, and he came back against great odds. In 1964, a malignant tumor was removed from his chest and left lung, and within several months he was on location making another movie.
Mr. Wayne made his last public appearance at the Academy Awards ceremony in April, where he drew an emotional standing ovation when he strode out on stage to present the Oscar for best picture.
He was recently presented with a special Congressional medal of the kind given to such national figures as the Wright Brothers.
Between his first starring role in "The Big Trail" in 1930, and his last one, as the most celebrated gunslinger in the West who finds he is dying of cancer in "The Shootist," in 1976, Mr. Wayne shot his way through generations of film fans with little change in style or personality. He had consciously adapted his posture for that first movie and retained it. He was sometimes inseparable from it in the flesh.
Famous movie quotes
"I'm looking at a tin star with a ... DRUNK pinned on it." ("El Dorado")
"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them." (The Shootist)
Speaking to his young cavalry lieutenants: "Don't apologize—it's a sign of weakness." (She Wore a Yellow Ribbon)
"Fill your hand, you son of a *****!" (True Grit)
"That'll be the day!" (The Searchers - Spoken several times; inspired Buddy Holly to write a song with that title.)
"Pilgrim." (The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance - Reportedly he used the expression "Pilgrim", as in "tenderfoot" or "dude" or "amateur", 23 times in that film, and once also in McLintock. It became a catchphrase for impressionists such as John Byner, and Rich Little)
"I haven't lost my temper in 40 years; but, Pilgrim, you caused a lot of trouble this morning; might have got somebody killed; and somebody oughta belt you in the mouth. But I won't. I won't. The hell I won't!" (He belts him in the mouth). (To Leo Gordon in McLintock!)
"Out here, due process is a bullet!" (To anti-war journalist David Janssen in The Green Berets)
~~America, Why I Love Her~~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sekHkR5BKOY
http://www.billsretroworld.com/cinema.htm
Wise Words from the DUKE
Father’s Advice
“I’ve always followed my father’s advice: he told me, first to always keep my word and, second, to never insult anybody unintentionally. If I insult you, you can be ******* sure I intend to. And, third, he told me not to go around looking for trouble.”
God
“I’ve always had deep faith that there is a Supreme Being, there has to be. To me that’s just a normal thing to have that kind of faith. The fact that He’s let me stick around a little longer, or She’s let me stick around a little longer, certainly goes great with me—and I want to hang around as long as I’m healthy and not in anybody’s way.”
On The Flag
“We’ve made mistakes along the way, but that’s no reason to start tearing up the best flag God ever gave to any country.”
America
“Sure I wave the American flag. Do you know a better flag to wave? Sure I love my country with all her faults. I’m not ashamed of that, never have been, never will be. I was proud when President Nixon ordered the mining of Haiphong Harbor, which we should have done long ago, because I think we’re helping a brave little country defend herself against Communist invasion. That’s what I tried to show in The Green Berets and I took plenty of abuse from the critics.”
On His Political Philosophy
“I have found a certain type calls himself a Liberal...Now I always thought I was a Liberal. I came up terribly surprised one time when I found out that I was a Right-Wing Conservative Extremist, when I listened to everybody’s point of view that I ever met, and then decided how I should feel. But this so-called new Liberal group, Jesus, they never listen to your point of view...”
“If everything isn’t black and white, I say why the hell not.”
On Giving UP
“No you’re not. We can’t turn back! We’re blazing a trail that started in England. Not even the storms of the sea could turn back those first settlers - and they carried it on further, they blazed it on through the wilderness of Kentucky. Famine, hunger, not even massacres could stop them. Now we’ve picked up the trail again and nothing can stop us, not even the snows of winter nor the peaks of the highest mountain. We’re building a nation, but we’ve got to suffer. No great trail was ever blazed without hardship. And you’ve got to fight. That’s life! And when you stop fightin’, that’s death! What are you going to do, lay down and die? Not in a thousand years! You’re going on with me!”
On Treatment
“I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, and I won’t be laid a hand on. I don’t do these things to other people and I require the same from them.
On Self Sufficiency
“Have you ever heard of some fellows who first came over to this country? You know what they found? They found a howling wilderness, with summers too hot and winters freezing, and they also found some unpleasant little characters who painted their faces. Do you think these pioneers filled out form number X6277 and sent in a report saying the Indians were a little unreasonable? Did they have insurance for their old age, for their crops, for their homes? They did not! They looked at the land, and the forest, and the rivers. They looked at their wives, their kids and their houses, and then they looked up at the sky and they said thanks God, we’ll take it from here.”
Ellie
May 26, 1907 – June 11, 1979
http://images49.fotki.com/v1521/photos/2/292835/4670962/JohnWayne2-vi.jpg
In more than 200 films made over 50 years, John Wayne saddled up to become the greatest figure of one of America's greatest native art forms, the western.
The movies he starred in rode the range from out-of-the-money sagebrush quickies to such classics as "Stagecoach" and "Red River." He won an Oscar as best actor for another western, "True Grit," in 1969. Yet some of the best films he made told stories far from the wilds of the West, such as "The Quiet Man" and "The Long Voyage Home."
In the last decades of his career, Mr. Wayne became something of an American folk figure, hero to some, villain to others, for his outspoken views. He was politically conservative and, although he scorned politics as a way of life for himself, he enthusiastically supported Richard M. Nixon, Barry Goldwater, Spiro T. Agnew, Ronald Reagan and others who, he felt, fought for his concept of Americanism and anti-Communism.
http://images49.fotki.com/v1504/photos/2/292835/4670962/039_20255-vi.jpg
But it was for millions of moviegoers who saw him only on the big screen that John Wayne really existed. He had not created the western with its clear-cut conflict between good and bad, right and wrong, but it was impossible to mention the word "western" without thinking of "the Duke," as he was called.
Mr. Wayne was co-director and star of "The Green Berets," a 1968 film that supported the United States action in Vietnam. The movie was assailed by many major critics on all grounds, political and esthetic, but the public apparently did not mind; in only six months, it had earned $1 million above its production cost of $7 million.
Won Growing Respect
As the years passed, Mr. Wayne was recognized as some sort of American natural resource, and his various critics, political and film, looked on him with more respect. Abbie Hoffman, the radical of the 1960's paid tribute to Mr. Wayne's singularity. Reviewing "The Cowboys," made in 1972, Vincent Canby, film critic of The New York Times, who did not particularly care for it, wrote, "Wayne is, of course, marvelously indestructible, and he has become an almost perfect father figure."
But years before he became anything close to a father figure, Mr. Wayne had become a symbolic male figure, a man of impregnable virility and the embodiment of simplistic, laconic virtues, packaged in a well-built 6-foot-4-inch, 225- pound frame.
http://images49.fotki.com/v1500/photos/2/292835/4670962/johnwayne-vi.jpg
Overcame Great Odds
Appearances were not altogether deceiving. Mr. Wayne loved adventure and the outdoors. He did believe that things were either right or wrong, and he came back against great odds. In 1964, a malignant tumor was removed from his chest and left lung, and within several months he was on location making another movie.
Mr. Wayne made his last public appearance at the Academy Awards ceremony in April, where he drew an emotional standing ovation when he strode out on stage to present the Oscar for best picture.
He was recently presented with a special Congressional medal of the kind given to such national figures as the Wright Brothers.
Between his first starring role in "The Big Trail" in 1930, and his last one, as the most celebrated gunslinger in the West who finds he is dying of cancer in "The Shootist," in 1976, Mr. Wayne shot his way through generations of film fans with little change in style or personality. He had consciously adapted his posture for that first movie and retained it. He was sometimes inseparable from it in the flesh.
Famous movie quotes
"I'm looking at a tin star with a ... DRUNK pinned on it." ("El Dorado")
"I won't be wronged, I won't be insulted, and I won't be laid a hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them." (The Shootist)
Speaking to his young cavalry lieutenants: "Don't apologize—it's a sign of weakness." (She Wore a Yellow Ribbon)
"Fill your hand, you son of a *****!" (True Grit)
"That'll be the day!" (The Searchers - Spoken several times; inspired Buddy Holly to write a song with that title.)
"Pilgrim." (The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance - Reportedly he used the expression "Pilgrim", as in "tenderfoot" or "dude" or "amateur", 23 times in that film, and once also in McLintock. It became a catchphrase for impressionists such as John Byner, and Rich Little)
"I haven't lost my temper in 40 years; but, Pilgrim, you caused a lot of trouble this morning; might have got somebody killed; and somebody oughta belt you in the mouth. But I won't. I won't. The hell I won't!" (He belts him in the mouth). (To Leo Gordon in McLintock!)
"Out here, due process is a bullet!" (To anti-war journalist David Janssen in The Green Berets)
~~America, Why I Love Her~~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sekHkR5BKOY
http://www.billsretroworld.com/cinema.htm
Wise Words from the DUKE
Father’s Advice
“I’ve always followed my father’s advice: he told me, first to always keep my word and, second, to never insult anybody unintentionally. If I insult you, you can be ******* sure I intend to. And, third, he told me not to go around looking for trouble.”
God
“I’ve always had deep faith that there is a Supreme Being, there has to be. To me that’s just a normal thing to have that kind of faith. The fact that He’s let me stick around a little longer, or She’s let me stick around a little longer, certainly goes great with me—and I want to hang around as long as I’m healthy and not in anybody’s way.”
On The Flag
“We’ve made mistakes along the way, but that’s no reason to start tearing up the best flag God ever gave to any country.”
America
“Sure I wave the American flag. Do you know a better flag to wave? Sure I love my country with all her faults. I’m not ashamed of that, never have been, never will be. I was proud when President Nixon ordered the mining of Haiphong Harbor, which we should have done long ago, because I think we’re helping a brave little country defend herself against Communist invasion. That’s what I tried to show in The Green Berets and I took plenty of abuse from the critics.”
On His Political Philosophy
“I have found a certain type calls himself a Liberal...Now I always thought I was a Liberal. I came up terribly surprised one time when I found out that I was a Right-Wing Conservative Extremist, when I listened to everybody’s point of view that I ever met, and then decided how I should feel. But this so-called new Liberal group, Jesus, they never listen to your point of view...”
“If everything isn’t black and white, I say why the hell not.”
On Giving UP
“No you’re not. We can’t turn back! We’re blazing a trail that started in England. Not even the storms of the sea could turn back those first settlers - and they carried it on further, they blazed it on through the wilderness of Kentucky. Famine, hunger, not even massacres could stop them. Now we’ve picked up the trail again and nothing can stop us, not even the snows of winter nor the peaks of the highest mountain. We’re building a nation, but we’ve got to suffer. No great trail was ever blazed without hardship. And you’ve got to fight. That’s life! And when you stop fightin’, that’s death! What are you going to do, lay down and die? Not in a thousand years! You’re going on with me!”
On Treatment
“I won’t be wronged, I won’t be insulted, and I won’t be laid a hand on. I don’t do these things to other people and I require the same from them.
On Self Sufficiency
“Have you ever heard of some fellows who first came over to this country? You know what they found? They found a howling wilderness, with summers too hot and winters freezing, and they also found some unpleasant little characters who painted their faces. Do you think these pioneers filled out form number X6277 and sent in a report saying the Indians were a little unreasonable? Did they have insurance for their old age, for their crops, for their homes? They did not! They looked at the land, and the forest, and the rivers. They looked at their wives, their kids and their houses, and then they looked up at the sky and they said thanks God, we’ll take it from here.”
Ellie