GladiatordirectorRidley Scottwas first inspired to pick up a camera and become a filmmaker when he saw John Wayne’s greatest western as a child. Although he’s been nominated for Best Picture once and Best Director three times,Scott has never won an Academy Award. Along with Alfred Hitchcock and Paul Thomas Anderson, Scott is one of the glaring omissions that questions the Oscars’ credibility. FromAlientoBlade Runner, Scott is responsible for some of the greatest and most influential films ever made, yet his career would have looked very different were it not for one John Wayne Western.
Scott has redefined the science fiction genre, reinvented the swords-and-sandals epic, and perfected the large-scale battle sequence. At the age of 86, Scott is still going strong, helming big-budget epics likeNapoleonandGladiator IIwith as steady a hand as he had in the early days of his career. But Scott might have never been inspired to make a single movie if he hadn’t seena seminal Western masterpieceas an impressionable young cinephile – John Wayne’sThe Searchers.
John Wayne’s The Searchers Inspired Ridley Scott To Become A Director
Scott Was “Blown Away” By The Searchers
In a 2000 interview withVenice Magazine(viaThe Hollywood Interview), Scott was asked if there was a single film from his childhood that he could point to as the movie that made him want to become a director. Scott named John Ford’s 1956 western masterpieceThe Searchersas the movie that inspired that decision. Scott said, “I remember just being blown away by that film.”He’s a huge fan of the Western genre and didn’t feel that anyone had captured the Old West quite as powerfully as Ford did inThe Searchersand his other groundbreaking Westerns.
John Wayne’s Most Horrifying Act In The Searchers Foreshadows His Character’s Fate
Western classic The Searchers features a scene where John Wayne’s anti-hero commits a needless act of violence, which only foreshadows his own ending.
The Searchersstars John Wayneas a Civil War veteran who struggles to settle into post-war civilian life. When his niece is kidnapped, he embarks on a years-long journey across the frontier to find her. Whereas Wayne typically played clear-cut heroes with black-and-white morality,The Searcherswas noteworthy for its darker storyline and Wayne’s more ethically dubious antihero.Scott also named Carol Reed’s classic noirThe Third Manand Stanley Kubrick’s seminal sci-fi epic2001: A Space Odysseyas films that had a profound influence on him, butThe Searcherswas the first movie that awakened his passion for filmmaking.
How The Searchers' Influence Can Be Seen In Ridley Scott Movies
Scott’s Films Share The Searchers' Antiheroes & Moral Ambiguity
Theinfluence ofThe Searcherscan be seen all across Scott’s films. The influence of Ford’s stunning landscape photography can be seen in Scott’s gorgeous wide-angle lensing of Ancient Rome inGladiatorand Mars inThe Martian.The moral ambiguity of Wayne’s Ethan Edwards can be seen in many of Scott’s antiheroes; much like Ethan,Blade Runner’s Rick Deckard is difficult to root for, because he does bad things in the pursuit of his own skewed vision of justice, and he’s not necessarily on the right side of that quest.
The Searcherswas named the greatest American western ever made by the American Film Institute in 2008.
The Last Duel’sRashomon-esque notion that there’s more than one side to every story can be traced back toThe Searchers’ rescue storyline about a young woman who doesn’t even want to be rescued.The Searchersalso explores the corruptibility of violence and the difficulty of breaking out of the cycle of violence. Ethan was more comfortable on the battlefields of the American Civil War than he was sitting around a dinner table with his brother’s family.Gladiator’s Maximus is similarly doomed to a violent existence, having proven his prowess in battle and been forced to kill for entertainment.
Will Ridley Scott Ever Make A Western Of His Own?
Scott Has Developed A Couple Of Western Projects, But None Have Come To Fruition
In the same interview, while praisingThe Searchers,Scott said, “I want to do a Western some day.”But more than two decades after giving that interview, Scott still hasn’t made a Western. Scott’s films have often dealt with the Western genre’s tropes.Thelma & Louiseis about a pair of outlaws riding through the desert.The Counseloris an ultraviolent Cormac McCarthy-penned neo-Western exploring the Mexican drug trade.Robin Hoodis essentially a Western set in medieval England, andThe Last Dueldeals with the Western themes of honor and revenge. But none of these are a traditional example of the genre.
10 Best Ridley Scott Action Sequences From His 47-Year Movie Career
Ridley Scott is promising his biggest action sequence ever in Gladiator II, which is saying a lot because he’s directed some great ones.
Scott had been developing a snow Western calledFreewalkers, but it was canceled recentlybecause pre-production overran and the snow cleared in their chosen filming location. The director was also attached to directan adaptation ofWraiths of the Broken Land, but that project got delayed so that Scott could focus on other projects, and it seems unlikely to ever come to fruition.Ridley Scottis currently working on a Bee Gees biopic, but after that, he might finally get around to putting his stamp on the Western genre – honoring his original movie-making inspiration.
The Searchers
Cast
The Searchers, released in 1956, stars John Wayne as a Civil War veteran who embarks on a years-long quest to rescue his kidnapped niece. Directed by John Ford, the film delves into themes of obsession and racial tension as the protagonist’s motivations become increasingly complex.
