Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9694 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-05-13
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English
• Dimensions: .25 pounds
• Running time: 123 minutes

From Amazon.co.uk
"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." That's more than the code of a newspaperman in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance; it's practically the operating credo of director John Ford, the most honoured of American filmmakers. In this late film from a long career, Ford looks at the civilising of an Old West town, Shinbone, through the sad memories of settlers looking back. In the town's wide-open youth, two-fisted Westerner John Wayne and tenderfoot newcomer James Stewart clash over a woman (Vera Miles) but ultimately unite against the notorious outlaw Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Ford's nostalgia for the past is tempered by his stark approach, unusual for the visual poet of Stagecoach and The Searchers. The two heavyweights, Wayne and Stewart, are good together, with Wayne the embodiment of rugged individualism and Stewart the idealistic prophet of the civilisation that will eventually tame the Wild West. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance may be the saddest Western ever made, closer to an elegy than an action movie, and as cleanly beautiful as its central symbol, the cactus rose. --Robert Horton

Amazon.com Essential Video
"When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." That's more than the code of a newspaperman in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance; it's practically the operating credo of director John Ford, the most honored of American filmmakers. In this late film from a long career, Ford looks at the civilizing of an Old West town, Shinbone, through the sad memories of settlers looking back. In the town's wide-open youth, two-fisted Westerner John Wayne and tenderfoot newcomer James Stewart clash over a woman (Vera Miles) but ultimately unite against the notorious outlaw Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Ford's nostalgia for the past is tempered by his stark approach, unusual for the visual poet of Stagecoach and The Searchers. The two heavyweights, Wayne and Stewart, are good together, with Wayne the embodiment of rugged individualism and Stewart the idealistic prophet of the civilization that will eventually tame the Wild West. This may be the saddest Western ever made, closer to an elegy than an action movie, and as cleanly beautiful as its central symbol, the cactus rose. --Robert Horton

Review
In his elegy to the Western hero, John Ford reveals the facts while printing the western legend. To examine what was at stake in transforming the western wilderness into a civilized garden, Ford sets up the opposition between James Stewart's Eastern lawyer Ranse Stoddard and Lee Marvin's brutal outlaw Liberty Valance, with John Wayne's archetypal hero Tom Doniphon forced to intervene. While Tom takes Stoddard's side in favor of the greater good, the spread of civilization comes at his own expense. Stoddard has to come to terms with the fact that the legendary words that fuel his success erase the truth of the genuine charismatic heroes; as a place of literary and cinematic legend, the West has no room for such veracity. Shot in black-and-white with few exteriors, Liberty Valance's melancholy nocturnal atmosphere matches the story's suggestion that the West's glory days have passed. Though not as highly regarded when it was released, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance has since come to be seen as one of Ford's greatest Westerns, and a key predecessor to such late '60s-'70s Western eulogies as The Wild Bunch (1969) and The Shootist (1976). ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

Customer Reviews

The law, or the gun

Director: John Ford
Format: Black and white
Studio: Paramount
Video Release Date: April 7, 1998

Cast:

John Wayne ... Tom Doniphon
James Stewart ... Ransom Stoddard (attorney)
Vera Miles ... Hallie Stoddard
Lee Marvin ... Liberty Valance
Edmond O'Brien ... Dutton Peabody (Editor of the Shinbone Star)
Andy Devine ... Marshal Link Appleyard
Ken Murray ... Doc Willoughby
John Carradine ... Maj. Cassius Starbuckle
Jeanette Nolan ... Nora Ericson
John Qualen ... Peter Ericson
Willis Bouchey ... Jason Tully (conductor)
Carleton Young ... Maxwell Scott
Woody Strode ... Pompey
Denver Pyle ... Amos Carruthers
Strother Martin ... Floyd
Lee Van Cleef ... Reese
Robert F. Simon ... Handy Strong
O.Z. Whitehead ... Herbert Carruthers
Paul Birch ... Mayor Winder
Joseph Hoover ... Charlie Hasbrouck (reporter for 'The Star')
Robert Donner
Larry Finley ... Bar X man
Shug Fisher ... Kaintuck (drunk)
Mario Arteaga ... Henchman
Sam Harris

Chuck Hayward ... Henchman
William Henry
Bryan 'Slim' Hightower ... Shotgun
Earle Hodgins ... Clute Dumphries
Stuart Holmes
Mike Edward Jauregui ... Drummer
Jack Kenny
Leonard Baker ... Man
Ted Mapes ... Highpockets
Montie Montana ... Politician on horseback
Bob Morgan ... Roughrider
Charles Morton ... Drummer
Jack Pennick ... Jack, Barman
Chuck Roberson ... Henchman
Buddy Roosevelt
Charles Seel ... President, election council
Slim Talbot
Charles Akins
Ralph Volkie ... Townsman
Max Wagner ... Poker game dealer
Blackie Whiteford
Jack Williams ... Henchman
Danny Borzage ... Townsman
Helen Gibson
Gertrude Astor
Anna Lee ... Mrs. Prescott (widow in stage holdup)
Jacqueline Malouf ... Lietta Appleyard
Eva Novak
Dorothy Phillips
Stephanie Pond-Smith

This movie is top heavy with some of the best stars in the business: John Wayne, James Stewart, Lee Marvin, Edmond O'Brien, Andy Devine, John Carradine, Denver Pyle and a host of lesser names. A classic tale of the old West, although it is in black and white--not a flaw for some of us.

The story is about a young lawyer, Ransom Stoddard (James Stewart) who comes West to practice law staright out of law school. He soon learns that in the West, the gun is more powerful than the law--although he is not willing to admit it, yet. He is robbed of all his money on the stagecoach, and discovers that almost everyone knows his robber, Liberty Valance, but no one, including the town Marshal, Link Appleyard (Andy Devine) is afraid to take on Liberty Valance. Everyone, that is, except Tom Doniphon (John Wayne), and he appears to be unwilling to get involved.

This sets up the conflict, and the story proceeds from there. This is a fine Western, entertaining, well acted (as one might expect) and well directed by John Ford, also as might be expected.

Joseph (Joe) Pierre

author of Handguns and Freedom...their care and maintenance
and other books

Jimmy Stewart and John Wayne's Definitive Western
John Wayne was never more of a tough cowboy than in this John Ford Masterpiece, Pilgrim, and James Stewart was never more the aw-shucks embodiment of educated idealism. Together they are rivals for Vera Miles, but they are also united against the outlaw who terrorizes the territory, Lee Marvin's Liberty Valance. Marvin is almost over the top as the evil Valance, but that is sort of the point - that he is a man universally recognized as evil. The question isn't "is Liberty Valance bad?" but rather which approach is more appropriate to combat him - fighting fire with fire (as exemplified by John Wayne's Tom Doniphon, the only man in the territory who is not intimidated by Liberty Valance) or whether "law and order" should prevail, as personified by Mr. Stewart's newly arrived Eastern Lawyer, Ransom Stoddard. The first time I saw this film the way that this central conflict was resolved surprised me - one of the biggest "twists" in the Western genre.

In my humble opinion it wasn't until Clint Eastwood's "Unforgiven" that another Western even approached the stature of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

Emperor's New Clothes?
I am impressed by the passion of the other reviewers but I must say I find most of it poorly shot, poorly paced, and poorly acted by most everybody by Wayne and Strode, with O'Brien giving one of the worst performances recorded on screen. I think this film must teach well. (English professors have come to believe that Bleak House is Dickens' best novel perhaps because it is the most interesting to teach, but not to read). The central idea is catchy and there is a clinging mournfulness to Wayne's fate, with echoes carrying over from "The Searchers". But I just can't see how anybody can prefer this to "My Darling Clementine", which many notable critics do. Because the movie is quite memorable, it is mistaken for being good.