Film: John Ford 1895-1973

Great American movie directors have traditionally been madmen, but what separated their madness from the usual hack hysterics was their faith in the visionary powers of film, its great foolish magic. Griffith’s symphonic gifts had the subconscious force of a whole people behind them—he wanted to show us the Civil War or the ride of Paul Revere the way we always imagined them to be. Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane was a self-conscious, larger-than-life tribute to the cartoon of crackerjack Americanism. In contrast, the work of John Ford, who died late last year at the age of 78, was serene. He had an elegiac feeling for the American West and, at its best, his pure, epic vision transformed horse opera into folk art. His best work was so eminently simple that it seemed almost childlike. Of all the great American directors, he was the sanest.

By the time John Ford started to direct his own films in 1917 the art had already been well established by Griffith. Griffith wanted to reach the people sitting in the unifying darkness of movie theaters all over the country and make them fellow visionaries of a shared heritage. He was America’s greatest celebrant, and the young Ford, with his embracing love of countryside and cowboys, was his natural heir. The early four-and five-reel westerns that Ford turned out in the years of Griffith’s decline were his apprenticeship. His first great success was The Iron Horse (1924), an epic about the first transcontinental railroad. With one exception Ford did not direct another western until 1935, with Stagecoach, but he was always among the busiest of Hollywood directors, in part because he was naturally prolific but also because churning out what the studios needed sometimes gave him the chance to sneak a personal project in on the side. (The Informer was practically smuggled out of RKO.) In the Forties, except for his WW II documentaries and some other notable exceptions (Grapes of Wrath, Long Voyage Home, How Green Was My Valley), Ford worked almost exclusively on westerns. The situation was much the same in the Fifties, only this time the documentaries were about Korea and his themes were a bit more brazenly Irish (Quiet Man, The Last Hurrah). Ford went right on making films until 1966—over 80 films in all— until he became too old to go on.

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Pete Rainer

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Great American movie directors have traditionally been madmen, but what separated their madness from the usual hack hysterics was their faith in the visionary powers of film, its great foolish magic. Griffith’s symphonic gifts had the subconscious force of a whole people behind them—he wanted to show us the Civil War or the ride of Paul Revere the way we always imagined them to be. Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane was a self-conscious, larger-than-life tribute to the cartoon of crackerjack Americanism. In contrast, the work of John Ford, who died late last year at the age of 78, was serene. He had an elegiac feeling for the American West and, at its best, his pure, epic vision transformed horse opera into folk art. His best work was so eminently simple that it seemed almost childlike. Of all the great American directors, he was the sanest.

By the time John Ford started to direct his own films in 1917 the art had already been well established by Griffith. Griffith wanted to reach the people sitting in the unifying darkness of movie theaters all over the country and make them fellow visionaries of a shared heritage. He was America’s greatest celebrant, and the young Ford, with his embracing love of countryside and cowboys, was his natural heir. The early four-and five-reel westerns that Ford turned out in the years of Griffith’s decline were his apprenticeship. His first great success was The Iron Horse (1924), an epic about the first transcontinental railroad. With one exception Ford did not direct another western until 1935, with Stagecoach, but he was always among the busiest of Hollywood directors, in part because he was naturally prolific but also because churning out what the studios needed sometimes gave him the chance to sneak a personal project in on the side. (The Informer was practically smuggled out of RKO.) In the Forties, except for his WW II documentaries and some other notable exceptions (Grapes of Wrath, Long Voyage Home, How Green Was My Valley), Ford worked almost exclusively on westerns. The situation was much the same in the Fifties, only this time the documentaries were about Korea and his themes were a bit more brazenly Irish (Quiet Man, The Last Hurrah). Ford went right on making films until 1966—over 80 films in all— until he became too old to go on.