Shane

459 Words1 Page

Shane

Shane is a movie about a group of small town farmers who are being picked on by some cowboys. Then Shane mysteriously comes into view and tries to do the right thing by helping the farmers. Jack Schaefer wrote the script and the film was produced by George Stevens. Paramount Pictures released the movie in 1952.

The characters in the movie were as follows. The main character in the film was (you guessed it) Shane, “the outsider” in this movie. Shane eventually stays with Joe Starret, his wife Marian and their son Joey. The man whom the farmers were against was Rufe Ryker, an older cowboy who seemed to be fairly mad at the entire world. Once Ryker found out about Shane, he brought in a hired gun from Cheyenne, who went by the name Wilson.

The plot of this movie is about the struggle between the farmers and the cowboys. The farmers all want to start up crops, but the cowboys want to run their cattle through the open space so they can feed. Obviously, the two sides don’t agree. The cowboys end up attempting to use strong-arm tactics to get their way. They even try to scare the farmers off the land by burning down one of the homes of the farmers. Eventually, Shane, a former gunfight, realizes what he must do. He rides into town and kills all of the cowboys, including Wilson, the hired gun.

Shane is by all means a western because it contains all the conventions of one. Open space, bad guys (the cowboys), and lots of guns, lawless land, and a whole bunch of horses.

There were a couple of conflicts in this movie. The biggest conflict was that between the farmers and the cowboys. A sub-conflict was the beef between Wilson and Shane. Narration of this film was done in third person. I think the only characters that added to the film were Shane, Mrs. Starrett and Wilson. The kid was a pretty miserable actor and was only good for his wide-eyed facial expressions when gunshots rang out. Everyone else was pretty much weak. The film was set in the Wyoming. The time frame was over a couple of weeks, I’d say less than a month.

Show More
Related

  • John Grady's Journey in All the Pretty Horses

    1123 Words  | 3 Pages

    The times are changing and he's unwilling to give up the past. The world is becoming modernized and people like him, cowboys and ranchers, are slowly disappearing. He runs away from home because he desires to find peace within himself as well as a place where he can feel he belongs. Here begins the adventure of John Grady and his best friend Lacey Rawlins. It is important to note here the means of travel. The story is taking place after World War II, a time when cars are fairly common, yet these boys decide to go on horseback, like in the fading old days. This is just another concept of how they are unwilling to give up a fading past. When they first begin their journey, the boys are having a good time. In a sense they?re two buddies on a road trip with no real motive. Rawlins even mentions, ?You know what?I could get used to this life.? Then they meet Blevins, the foil in the plot that veers the two boys of their course and also has plays a role in the lasting change of their personality. Their meeting with him gives an insight into Grady?s character. Rawlins is against letting Blevins come along with them, but because of John?s kind nature he ends up allowing Blevins to come. It?s because of this kindness and sense of morality, he gets into trouble later on.

    Read More

  • The Satire of Blazing Saddles

    900 Words  | 2 Pages

    Many westerns contain some of the same elements. For instance, almost every western ever made involves a sheriff. He is usually the peace-keeper of a small town overrun by outlaws and cowboys, which he eventually chases out of town or kills. Another element of westerns is a gunslinger. A gunslinger is usually a young man who makes his living shooting other men in showdowns, a classic example is Billy the Kid. Railroads are also a recurring image in westerns. Since the railroad was the major mode of transportation in the old west, it is always present in westerns. Finally, westerns always have a villain. The villain, usually a man, dresses very slick and will stop at nothing in his quest for power. In addition, the villain usually has a gang to carry out his dastardly deeds. The gang is usually full of incompetent, but loyal thugs, who would love to destroy a small town just for the pleasure of wanton destruction. The elements of a western are very simple, but easily manipulated into a very interesting plot.

    Read More

  • isual Style and Western Theme of Shane

    1558 Words  | 4 Pages

    ‘Shane' focuses on the Starret family, the father in the film, is defiant throughout, insisting the Rykers will not drive him out. The western themes evident in ‘Shane' are obviously the typical western setting. There is the dusty border town inhabited by the Rykers. It is not your usual western town, compared to Tonto in ‘ Stagecoach'. The town in ‘Shane' is in comparison desolate and not many buildings have been erected, whereas in ‘Stagecoach' they have. The emptiness represents an eerie and unsafe location. Even though the town is so deserted it still has the main wooden buildings visual in most western films. There is the saloon, mostly occupied by Ryker and his men, The Grayston general store which is bordered off only by the saloon doors, the blacksmiths, where Tory is visiting (before he gets murdered by gun-slinging Wilson) and finally a hotel.

    Read More

  • The Gunslinger Hero

    2224 Words  | 5 Pages

    ...uggles between the savagery and civility, he and Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin), are men threatening, as well as standing, in the way of the progress and later the stability of the soon to be established “recognized territory.” There are two very different characteristics of these men though, Tom is full aware what is happing to in the New West and eventually succumbs. Meanwhile Liberty knows this is happing too, but he will do, as he must to keep the frontier open, for purely selfish reasons. This is the swan song of the boots, the gun belt and the spurs, the inevitable end of freedom that was once known since its inception at the establishment of the United States of America, but the Western was and still is today, a vast frontier of compelling stories, classic American narratives and themes that will continue to capture the imagination of all freedom loving people.

    Read More

  • Flannery O Connor's A Good Man Is Hard To Find

    1103 Words  | 3 Pages

    They ended up driving in the woods; through the dirt road and suddenly the grandmother remembers that the plantation exists in Tennessee. The grandmother moved her feet because of fear, the cat randomly came out of the basket and jumped to Bailey’s neck. Bailey lost control of driving and the car flipped, the family was alright but Bailey’s wife had a broke her shoulder. The grandmother decides not to tell anyone that the plantation was in Tennessee and not Georgia because Bailey was extremely angry. After a while of waiting, a car stops and three men come out of it. The grandmother starts scream out loud because she figures out that it’s The Misfit and his two helpers; Bobby Lee and

    Read More

  • Hidden Messages in Easy Rider

    1242 Words  | 3 Pages

    Billy and Wyatt of them go through a series of adventures, first stopping off at a motel where they're rejected, regardless of the glowing vacancy sign. This shows that their culture is not accepted in the rest of the world. They leave the motel and camp out in the wilderness. At a point, Wyatt's bike gets a flat, and they stop at a farm to fix it. It is at this point that the film makes a comparison of the bikers to cowboys. As Wyatt is fixing his tire a man in the background is shoeing his horse. This is making the point that Wyatt is the new version of the cowboy and his chopper is the new cowboy’s horse. During this scene there is an exchange between Wyatt and the farmer where Wyatt tells the farmer how much he admires his farm because he built it with his own hands. This is the first time that you get an idea of Wyatt’s values.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Cowboys

    1919 Words  | 4 Pages

    What is a cowboy? Who are they? Elmer Kelton’s novel The Day the Cowboys Quit and The Old Chisholm Trail depict cowboys as workers who round-up cattle and relocate them from one place to another as needed. Like everyday workers, cowboys have their own unique personalities. Ranging from hot temper to calm and understanding. For the most part, cowboys have their own issues just as any workplace would. When this occurs there needs to be a leader to take charge in order to fix or control a situation. The way that cowboys respond in times of trouble is when they demonstrate how qualified they are to be a leader. According to Elmer Kelton’s novel The Day the Cowboys Quit and the film The Old Chisholm Trail, there are cowboys that set themselves apart by showing strong leadership skills such as dependability, loyalty, respect, and open-mindedness.

    Read More

  • Research Paper On No Country For Old Men

    1042 Words  | 3 Pages

    The film opens with an establishing shot of the Texas landscape of the wide open emptiness and the vast plains. A narration breaks the silence by informing you about the way things used to be. Tommy Lee Jones’ character, an experienced lawman, named Sheriff Ed Tom Bell. The sheriff pontificates on the easy, breezy times of lawfulness in the past, while

    Read More

  • All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy - Individualism vs. Society

    1676 Words  | 4 Pages

    McCarthy’s plot is built around a teenage boy, John Grady, who has great passion for a cowboy life. At the age of seventeen he begins to depict himself as a unique individual who is ambitious to fulfill his dream life – the life of free will, under the sun and starlit nights. Unfortunately, his ambition is at odds with the societal etiquettes. He initiates his adventurous life in his homeland when he futilely endeavors to seize his grandfather’s legacy - the ranch. John Grady fails to appreciate a naked truth that, society plays a big role in his life than he could have possibly imagined. His own mother is the first one to strive to dictate his life. “Anyway you’re sixteen years old, you can’t run the ranch…you are being ridiculers. You have to go to school” she said, wiping out any hopes of him owning the ranch (p.15). Undoubtedly Grady is being restrained to explore his dreams, as the world around him intuitively assumes that he ought to tag along the c...

    Read More

  • Characteristics of a Typical Western

    506 Words  | 2 Pages

    The storyline is normally about a hero who comes to a town to bring peace and drive the villains out. A hero is usually seen as a vigilante as he is not told to come to help but does anyway. The hero often appears as a quiet, secretive, mysterious person who may make the audience admire him one minute and dislike him the next, he is also a very smart, cunning and adaptable which are all good values in a hero. The villain is usually fixed to one idea he thinks it is a smart cunning person but in the end is always defeated. Many scenes are set around the Saloon (bar) and there is quite often a romance involved with the hero and a local girl, the villain competing for her affections! There are two different types of villains in typical westerns Native Americans and white villains (cowboys).

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast All The Pretty Horses Book And Book

    1255 Words  | 3 Pages

    “All the Pretty Horses”, a novel written by Cormac McCarthy tells the tale about a man and his friend travelling the plains of Mexico after leaving their homes in Texas. As the novel’s name alludes to, horses are a central theme in the story as they represent manhood and freedom when John Grady, the protagonist, and his friend Rawlins get thrown in jail. McCarthy’s novel became critically-acclaimed which gained him more recognition, as well as a movie adaptation directed by Billy Bob Thornton. Even though Thornton’s adaption has the basics of the novel’s story it does not appropriately grasps its depth. While Thornton’s version stays faithful to the dialogue from the book’s included scenes it does fall short by having an erratic pace, having

    Read More

  • The Virginian, by Owen Wister

    945 Words  | 2 Pages

    The cowboy hero, The Virginian, as portrayed in Owen Wister’s novel was the first of his kind and today is known as the stereotypical mythic cowboy figure which our view of the western frontier are based from. The Virginian was the first full length western novel apart from the short dime novels which marked the final stage in the evolution of the cowboy hero to a national icon. The Virginian was published in 1902 and at that time was wildly popular because of the settlement of the west. The story of the cowboy who had the skill and courage to take control of the untamed frontier enthralled people. The cowboy hero had a few distinguished qualities, he was a self-appointed vigilante, he had a very strict moral code, he had exceptional perception skills and he had the ability to adapt. Owen Wister’s The Virginian was the first to portray these qualities and really created a deeper cowboy character.

    Read More

  • Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk Analysis

    287 Words  | 1 Pages

    One of the most interesting scenes in the movie is when Billy and Dime meet with the owner of the Cowboys, Oglesby, who cut their deal for the movie adaptation of the story for 5,500 from the originally agreed upon 100,000. This was a huge setback but it truly did portray how America’s institutions of power function, in a way, against these war heroes. In this scene, Oglesby really does come off as a villain in this movie, among others too. The interesting thing about this is also that this is a movie (isn’t based on a true story but on a deeply

    Read More

  • Little Big Man Essay

    655 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the beginning of the story Jack and his sister are the two survivors of an Native American attack. Amidst all the chaos, a native american from the Cheyenne tribe adopts him(his sister runs away) and treats Jack as one of their own. A very important part in the plot was when Jack saved the his peer and was given the name Little Big man in a traditional ceremony. After this trouble

    Read More

  • wilderness vs. civilization

    1487 Words  | 3 Pages

    The main character is a boy who runs away from society, he escapes from his family, thus he does not show any feelings for them, and also he does not want to obey any rule. Huck is isolated, as well as the other characters who live along the Mississippi river, so he rejects society and he is more acquainted with the wilderness that surrounds him.

    Read More

More about Shane

Open Document