Aboard the freighter Glencairn, the lives of the crew are lived out in fear, loneliness, suspicion and cameraderie. Read More »
Tag Archives: John Ford
The World Moves On (1934) John Ford, Madeleine Carroll, Franchot Tone, Reginald Denny, Drama, History, Romance, War
Richard Girard is part of a New Orleans family working closely with the English Warburtons. When Richard meets Mary Warburton she is engaged to Erik von Gerardt. Read More »
Pinky (1949) Elia Kazan, John Ford, Jeanne Crain, Ethel Barrymore, Ethel Waters, Drama
Pinky, a light skinned black woman, returns to her grandmother’s house in the South after graduating from a Northern nursing school. Read More »
Submarine Patrol (1938) John Ford, Richard Greene, Nancy Kelly, Preston Foster, Adventure, Drama, War
A naval officer is demoted for negligence and put in command of a run-down submarine chaser and with a motley crew. Read More »
Pilgrimage (1933) John Ford, Henrietta Crosman, Heather Angel, Norman Foster, Drama
Hannah Jessop (Henrietta Crosman) fears being abandoned by her son Jim (Norman Foster), and she doesn’t approve of his romance with Mary Saunders (Marian Nixon). Read More »
The Lost Patrol (1934) John Ford, Victor McLaglen, Boris Karloff, Wallace Ford, Adventure, War
A World War I British Army patrol is crossing the Mesopotomian desert when their commanding officer, the only one who knows their destination is killed by the bullet of unseen bandits. Read More »
Men Without Women (1930) John Ford, Kenneth MacKenna, Frank Albertson, J. Farrell MacDonald, Action, Drama
Aboard the U.S. submarine S13 in the China seas, Chief Torpedoman Burke goes about his duties. Read More »
Tobacco Road (1941) John Ford, Charley Grapewin, Gene Tierney, Marjorie Rambeau, Comedy, Drama
Shiftless Jeeter Lester and his family of hillbilly stereotypes live in a rural backwater where their ancestors were once wealthy planters. Their slapstick existence is threatened by a bank’s plans to take over the land for more profitable farming; subplots involve the affairs and marriages of son Dude and daughter Ellie May.
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She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949) John Ford, John Wayne, Joanne Dru, John Agar, Western
After Custer and the 7th Cavalry are wiped out by Indians, everyone expects the worst. Capt. Nathan Brittles is ordered out on patrol but he’s also required to take along Abby Allshard, wife of the Fort’s commanding officer, and her niece, the pretty Olivia Dandridge, who are being evacuated for their own safety. Brittles is only a few days away from retirement and Olivia has caught the eye of two of the young officers in the Company, Lt. Flint Cohill and 2nd Lt. Ross Pennell. She’s taken to wearing a yellow ribbon in her hair, a sign that she has a beau in the Cavalry, but refuses to say for whom she is wearing it.
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The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962) John Ford, James Stewart, John Wayne, Vera Miles, Western
When Senator Ransom Stoddard returns home to Shinbone for the funeral of Tom Doniphon, he recounts to a local newspaper editor the story behind it all. He had come to town many years before, a lawyer by profession. The stage was robbed on its way in by the local ruffian, Liberty Valance, and Stoddard has nothing to his name left save a few law books. He gets a job in the kitchen at the Ericson’s restaurant and there meets his future wife, Hallie. The territory is vying for Statehood and Stoddard is selected as a representative over Valance, who continues terrorizing the town. When he destroys the local newspaper office and attacks the editor, Stoddard calls him out, though the conclusion is not quite as straightforward as legend would have it.
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How the West Was Won (1962) John Ford, Henry Hathaway, James Stewart, John Wayne, Gregory Peck, Western
Sprawling epic which follows the Prescotts, an emigrant family through four generations, from the Erie Canal in the 1830’s to their settled home in the West a half a century later. On the way they encounter river pirates, and escape with the help of fur trapper Linus Rawlings, who subsequently marries one of their daughters, Eve. The parents are drowned on a foundering raft, and the other daughter Lilith becomes a riverboat singer and catches the eye of a genteel adventurer Cleve Van Valen. They cross the plains together in a wagon train and make and lose a fortune in California; meanwhile Linus has turned farmer and, comes the Civil War, joins the Union Army and is killed at the Battle of Shiloh. One of his sons Zeb also joins the army and stays after the war as a cavalry officer and is sent to Colorado to help guard the pioneering railroad against the Indians, whose land they are crossing. By this time Lilith is the elderly lady of the family, having survived long enough to see the …
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The Horse Soldiers (1959) John Ford, John Wayne, William Holden, Constance Towers, Adventure, War, Western
A Union Cavalry outfit is sent behind confederate lines in strength to destroy a rail/supply center. Along with them is sent a doctor who causes instant antipathy between him and the commander. The secret plan for the mission is overheard by a southern belle who must be taken along to assure her silence. The Union officers each have different reasons for wanting to be on the mission.
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The Informer (1935) John Ford, Victor McLaglen, Heather Angel, Preston Foster, Drama
Dublin, 1920. Gypo Nolan, strong but none too bright, has been ousted from the rebel organization and is starving. When he finds that his equally destitute sweetheart Katie has been reduced to prostitution, he succumbs to temptation and betrays his former comrade Frankie to the British authorities for a 20 pound reward. In the course of one gloomy, foggy night, guilt and retribution inexorably close in…
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The Sun Shines Bright (1953) John Ford, Charles Winninger, Arleen Whelan, John Russell
John Ford weaves three “Judge Priest” stories together to form a good- natured exploration of honour and small-town politics in the South around the turn of the century. Judge William Priest is involved variously in revealing the real identity of Lucy Lake, reliving his Civil War memories, preventing the lynching of a youth and contesting the elections with Yankee Horace K. Maydew.
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