It’s ironic that this film was made in 1939, because it occurred to me that it is to Native Americans as Gone with the Wind is to African-Americans; both were made in that year by talented filmmakers; both told dramatic stories with high production value; both were racist and amplified the whitewashing of the original sins of America, genocide in the former case, slavery in the latter. The parallels run deeper in the gentlemen/scoundrels (John Wayne and Clark Gable) and the division of women into sinners (Claire Trevor and Vivien Leigh) and saints (Louise Platt and Olivia de Havilland). In one case “civilization” is trying to be forged, in another, preserved, where civilization is defined to be that of white European-Americans, and in both, the implied stench of what it means to non-whites being brutalized can’t be ignored.

Jesse Wente, an Ojibway film critic had this to say: “Stagecoach is the iconic Western. It's the Western that all others were really modeled after and it's one of the most damaging movies for native people in history. You have white society inside a stagecoach and they are besieged on all sides by native people, by the wild of America. Those that are stopping progress, those that are backwards, those that are vicious and blood thirsty. Stagecoach summed up and gave the opinion of Native people for decades, to the populace in the U.S. That's how they thought of us and it’s because of John Ford that they thought of us like that and that Native people may have even thought that themselves.”

He’s right. In the town and inside the stagecoach, there is civilization, culture, and most of all whiteness; outside the stagecoach, hidden ominously in the rugged landscape, there is barbarism and cruelty. Over and over again we’re reminded of the violence committed by Indians: scalping, burning farmhouses down, and sneaking up and picking off strays. When we see their faces on the screen, they are devoid of all emotion, stone-faced – not even human – and that’s the intention. They could be replaced by wild animals or a menacing ‘other’ presence, because they are devoid of humanity. Even the Native wife of the Mexican guy is easily replaceable and less valuable to him than his horse. It pervades the script.

Meanwhile, we do not hear a single word uttered about the much more significant violence committed by whites, cruelty that Native Americans themselves considered barbaric. The reality is the vast majority of white people coming west were unharmed or in fact aided by Natives – credible historical estimates are that of the 250,000 white settlers in the Plains between 1840 and 1860, 362 were killed. In the case of the Apaches shown in this film, the reality is that even after taking vast tracts of land, white people were still inciting them to violence so that they could react punitively, and inventing all sorts of stories demonizing Geronimo so that he could be killed or imprisoned. In telling this story, Ford amplifies the lies and is on the wrong side of history, no matter how good a filmmaker he was. He’s essentially glorifying manifest destiny and genocide as the backdrop to the love story, much in the same way Gone With the Wind glorifies the old South and the Lost Cause as the backdrop to its.

It all leads up to a prototypical, iconic, old school attack of the stagecoach, a band of Indians riding hard after the stagecoach in a wide open space, “good guys vs. bad guys”, with the former casually picking off the latter with their shooting prowess, Wayne casually reclining back on top of the stagecoach as he does so, while the Indians are shooting at helpless women and a newborn. It must have been great in the theatre for action fans in 1939, but it’s just tired, tired stuff to me today, impressive stuntwork notwithstanding (e.g. Yakima Canutt, Wayne’s stunt double jumping from horse, and the guy killed who is then almost trampled on by the full length of the stagecoach when he falls underneath it.) I mean, that shot of the cavalry riding hard, flag whipping in the wind is great technically, but it’s hard to get excited over given the historical and moral problems the film has.

It’s too bad, because John Ford knew how to tell a story, and the scenery is extraordinary. That panning shot early on of the stagecoach and cavalry riding sinuously through the stunning landscape, seen from a nearby height and with dramatic mesas looming in the background, is beyond amazing. One of the film’s best aspects is how he took the time to develop the characters over the movie, starting with Thomas Mitchell (who I’ve never seen better) as the drunken physician, and the various others. I chuckled at the little poke at bankers after America had endured the 1930’s, when the banker says that the last thing he needs are bank examiners because bankers know how to run their own banks, and what’s needed is less government, less taxes, and “a businessman for President.” Ha! The weak whiskey salesman is a bit much though, put in there to further contrast the rugged masculine hero, standing in for America’s favorite image of itself.

That brings me to John Wayne, who plays the criminal who’s really a sweethearted gentleman, acting so chivalrously to the downtrodden woman. He’s less insufferable here than elsewhere, probably because it wasn’t until this film that established him and he began overly playing on his trademark image, but I still have trouble liking him (the role, the actor, his acting all included, though I guess he rides a horse well). Still, the growing attraction between Wayne and Trevor’s characters is pretty nice, and that shot where he watches her walk down the narrow hallway and then follows her, leading to a touching scene outside, is brilliant.

Ford put all these morally conflicted characters into a little world where they have to arrive at difficult, life or death decisions together, and manages to weave a romance into it as well, a fantastic framework. While he has zero realism in the big picture of the old west and the clashing of the cultures, he has fantastic realism in the details in this film. The old homes/outposts have large interior spaces with minimal furnishing where we actual see the low ceilings, a wonderful touch, and at one point coffee is made using an old manual crank grinder. His influence over the genre and the American mindset can’t be understated, which I suppose is a positive and a negative, and this is a film that probably should be seen and then discussed afterwards.