10 Unjustly Forgotten Films By Famous Directors

8. Howard Hawks - El Dorado

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pS6NbxZYU9o Howard Hawks is the most distinctly American of all the great directors. It's ironic, therefore, that Hawks was never appreciated in his home country until the French critics of Cahiers Du Cinema began analyzing his work, giving it the kind of attention and treatment that American critics gave such directors as Truffaut and Kurosawa. Andrew Sarris was the first American critic to take Hawks seriously, and the rest of the American cinema elite followed suit. Hawks, like his friend John Ford, always found this veneration amusing; he always considered a good director's job to be to get out of the way and let the story carry the film. However, one cannot remove oneself entirely from one's work, and when one analyzes Hawks' work, one can see stylistic touches that are distinctly Hawksian. Hawks' films carry a consistent theme of friendship and camaraderie and an equally consistent structure: a group of tough, professional, ethical men and women band together to do a job and/or fight off an imposing threat. Hawks used these themes and structures to make definitive films in a wide array of genres, including war films, screwball comedies, gangster flicks, film noir, and westerns. Most of Hawks' work has been heavily analyzed, but there are some films that have gotten little attention. In most cases (such as Rio Lobo), that lack of esteem is justified. There is, however, one Hawks film that has long been unjustly overlooked: his 1967 western El Dorado. Perhaps the reason for El Dorado's being overlooked is the fact that the film is a virtual remake of one of Hawks' earlier films, 1959's Rio Bravo. I won't try to deny the fact that El Dorado's plot is almost exactly the same as Rio Bravo's; I will, however, argue that El Dorado is one of the rarest of Hollywood rarities: a remake that surpasses the original. Where Rio Bravo is stiff and overlong, El Dorado is loose, fast-moving and entertaining. Much of the praise for El Dorado belongs to the fine performances of the three lead actors. While John Wayne, as Cole Thornton, does what he usually did; namely, play himself, his presence is so imposing and iconic that it overcomes the fact that the role is really a cookie-cutter western role (the Duke would go on to deliver far better performances in such films as True Grit, The Cowboys and The Shootist). Robert Mitchum, one of the most talented actors to ever work in Hollywood, delivers a fine performances as a once-great but now alcoholic sheriff who must re-gain his self-respect before he can defend his town from the ruthless cattle barons and gunfighters descending on it. It's also fun to see a VERY young, pre-stardom James Caan, playing the young, idealistic knife-fighter who learns a lot from the older professionals. Add to these performances a first-rate screenplay by legendary screenwriter Leigh Brackett and Hawks' confident direction, and you have a highly entertaining, underrated film.