Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Top Westerns?

IGN has released their list of top Westerns of all time.

They claim their list was generated on the basis of each films:
popularity and longevity with audiences, their impact on the genre, their basic coolness quotient, and their quotability.

Here is IGN's list:

1. Once Upon a Time in the West (Sergio Leone; 1968)
2. Unforgiven (Clint Eastwood; 1992)
3. High Noon (Fred Zinneman; 1952)
4. Shane (George Stevens; 1953)
5. The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah; 1969)
6. The Searchers (John Ford; 1956)
7. The Good, The Bad and the Ugly (Sergio Leone; 1966)
8. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (George Roy Hill; 1969)
9. The Magnificent Seven (John Sturges; 1960)
10. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford; 1962)
11. Rio Bravo (Howard Hawks; 1959)
12. The Outlaw Josey Wales (Clint Eastwood; 1976)
13. My Darling Clementine (John Ford; 1946)
14. Tombstone (George P. Cosmotos; 1993)
15. The Professionals (Richard Brooks; 1966)
16. 3:10 to Yuma (James Mangold; 2007)
17. McCabe and Mrs. Miller (Robert Altman; 1971)
18. The Naked Spur (Anthony Mann; 1952)
19. Will Penny (Tom Gries; 1968)
20. Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (Sam Peckinpah; 1973)
21. A Fistful of Dollars (Sergio Leone; 1964)
22. The Gunfighter (Henry King; 1950)
23. Silverado (Lawrence Kasdan; 1985)
24. Little Big Man (Arthur Penn; 1970)
25. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (John Huston; 1948)

I have some real problems with this list. But then I expect that anyone who reads such a list will find things they disagree with part of the list and agree with part.

Instead here is my llst of all time best westerns. What do I base this list on? Simple these are the westerns that I like to watch, over and over again. These are the westerns that when they are on TV I stop flipping channels and leave this movie on. Finally these are all Westerns that I liked well enough to own the DVD.

I have put no numbers on my list, because the order of these movies as my favorites would change from day to day. Maybe even hour to hour.

Quigley Down Under
High Noon
The Magnificent Seven
Rio Bravo
My Darling Clementine
The Naked Spur
Silverado
McLintock!
She Wore A Yellow Ribbon
The Fastest Gun Alive
Winchester '73
The Man from Snowy River
Support Your Local Sheriff
Chisum
How the West was Won
Stagecoach
Destry Rides Again
Dodge City
Destry
North to Alaska

OK, two of these movies are set in Australia and one of them in Alaska, but they are westerns in my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

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