‘TURQUOISE FEVER’ PREMIERE, PLUS ‘MORRICONE IN HIS OWN WORDS’, LONE RANGER 75TH ANNI., NEW FOX WESTERN SERIES, ‘OLD TOWN ROAD’, AND MORE!

TURQUOISE FEVER premiered on the INSP network this past Wednesday. The weekly reality series follows the fortunes and follies of the Nevada-based turquoise-mining Otteson clan. The first show was about trying to satisfy the blue-stone needs of a big-time buyer and jewelry designer from Japan, who is very influential in the jewelry markets throughout Asia.  If you missed this one, don’t worry, because there will be other chances. Besides, in a way, episode 2, which airs this Wednesday night, August 21^st, is just as good a place to start, as it really focuses on the family, and how the Ottesons became a ‘Blue Gold’ powerhouse.

It all started in 1958, when the family moved en masse from Colorado to Nevada, and patriarch Lynn Otteson staked his first claim. His sons Dean, Danny and Tommy worked with him, and soon there were wives and sons and in-laws in the mix.  Dean would become the patriarch, and during this show’s six-year gestation period, he would pass away, pledging his brothers not only to continue mining, but to take care of his widow, and family matriarch, Donna.

Last week I had the opportunity to discuss the show with one of the younger members of the Otteson turquoise-mining family, Danny’s 22-year-old son, and already a veteran miner, Tristan. He’s both the historian and scientist of the family, and he started out by giving me a verbal sketch of the history of turquoise mining, and the Otteson’s involvement with it.

Tristan: Turquoise in the southwestern United States has been mined since way before any white people got here. The Native American mines in the New Mexico region of Cerrillos are some of the oldest turquoise mines in the entire world. But as for the Ottesons, we got into the mining business about three generations before me. Grandpa Lynn's father, Christian Vern Otteson, had worked a little bit at the Lick Skillet Mine in, Manassa, Colorado in the very early 20th Century. He fought in World War I, and passed away when my grandpa was only three years old. With their father gone, my grandpa would work all sorts of jobs to support his family. His uncle Pete King owned Lick Skillet Mine and (Lynn), worked there. Then, when he was about 18, Pete told him to come out and mine one of his claims in Nevada, the Cloverdale, Nevada Blue Gem Mine; it's now called the Easter Blue Mine, and we mine it still. This was around the mid-1940s, and he really started to fall in love with turquoise.  So he moved his very young family from Colorado straight out to Nevada. I think it was 1958 that they moved out to Nevada permanently. They lived in Haybag Johnson's chicken coop, and from there my grandpa was able to work various mines around Cloverdale. Finally my grandpa was able to put a four-year lease on Lone Mountain Turquoise Mine, which is one of the most famous turquoise mines in the entire world today.

They barely scraped up enough money to get a little tiny mixer, that he would haul all the way out to that mine. They’d bring water in big metal milk containers, and they had this little tub that was about three-foot-wide, that the family would bathe in, and they’d run the dumps that the other miners had mined out. And when they could fill the bottom of that tub full of turquoise nuggets, they’d load everybody up, drive down to New Mexico to sell it to the Zunis. And not only for money. They would trade it for clothes, groceries, saddles, guns, blankets, anything they could get of value. My grandma would always tell my grandpa, “You can't eat a saddle. Come back with money or food.’ Sometimes they were able to sell a whole bunch of nuggets, and put $3000 or $4,000 in their pocket.  Sometimes they only came back with a saddle or two or a blanket.”

From there, my grandpa was able to build up his own operation. He got in with a whole lot of different people over the years where they would front equipment, and he had the mining knowledge. It never seemed like my grandpa got a fair shake out of those deals, but eventually he traded a silver claim he had in eastern Nevada for the Pilot Mountain Turquoise Mines.

Tristan Otteson

.

Henry: Have you ever considered a profession other than turquoise mining?

Tristan:  Personally? I really haven't. In high school, we all dream of being a different thing. But when it came down to it, I had gone out to the turquoise mines with my dad, my older brothers, since I was real little and I couldn't really imagine doing anything else.

Henry: Except for the DeBeers diamond family in South Africa, I can't think of another family that has so dominated the mining of a single mineral.

Tristan:  You can see them literally everywhere. The Royston Turquoise, that's one of the world-famous mines that we mined. Just recently there was a story on Jason Mamoa, Aquaman. He came out with a big Indian squash necklace, and said he felt like the native American, Mr. T. That was Royston Turquoise in that squash.

Fire in the hole!

Henry: I know there're many different grades and types of turquoise.  Can you give me a sense of the range of value?

Tristan:  We generally sell our turquoise by carat weight.  To put it in perspective, gold's at $1400 per ounce, right around eight or $9 a carat. Our turquoise ranges anywhere from one to $2 a carat for the not as rare stuff, all the way up to $80 to $100 per carat for really special stuff. So turquoise it can be worth 10 times its weight in gold.

Henry: Do you ever have trouble with claim jumpers?

Tristan:  Yuh. Over the years, there's been a lot of times when people come out on our claims, and try to scoop up the vein you're digging on. And with the way the turquoise is, if you don't know how to get it out of the ground, if you see a vein sticking out of the wall and try to go at it with a hammer, you're just going to destroy it. We've had it where you show up to work the next day and your vein is just a whole bunch of chips on the ground.

Henry: Of course, it's not like gold; you can't reform it. It's just gone.

Tristan:  Exactly it. They could have just destroyed a $40,000 pocket of Turquoise and not even know it.

Henry:  I was fascinated to learn how popular turquoise is in Asia. How much of the turquoise business is outside of the U.S., and what other countries are involved?

Donna shows a buyer from Japan their best stones.

Tristan:  In the United States, they want the unique stone. But in other countries, that hasn't caught on except for Japan, that romanticizes Native American jewelry. In other countries, straight blue stones is what they look for. So there's huge turquoise mines in China, over in Egypt, and in Iran. It's kind of a pattern; the high desert places around the world all have turquoise mines. They call it Persian turquoise and Egyptian turquoise; it's really beautiful stuff, along with the Chinese. And they more or less dominate the markets outside of the United States, except for those like the Japanese market that focuses on Native American jewelry.

Henry: When you're prospecting for gold, you look for quartz because they're found together. What sort of indicators do you have when you're looking for Turquoise?

Tristan:  There's two different kinds of formations. What you’re looking for is mineralized ground with iron outcroppings or a black chert (note: chert is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of quartz crystals).  And there’s a kind of a tan rock, dominated mostly by quartz, but not the kind of crystal quartz that you think of. My dad has walked literally thousands of miles, prospecting for turquoise, and tried to teach me and Lane how to read the differences in the minerals.

Henry: What is the process that makes turquoise form?

Lonely out there!

Tristan:  Well, this is still largely up for debate. Pretty much the only thing people can really agree on is it's an aluminum copper phosphate. Water goes through the ground, through the cracks, and where the right kind of phosphates are. There's debate on whether the water was going down through the rocks or up through the rocks.

Henry: Do we know how long it takes for turquoise to form?

Tristan:  They tested some turquoise down in Arizona and dated it to over 10 million years old. And other people have theories that puts it clear back to the Mesozoic era.

Henry: I get the impression that turquoise is getting harder to find. Do you have any sense of when turquoise will be mined out?

Tristan:  That's speculation, but the huge producing mines don't exist anymore. I would put a shelf life on the southwest and American turquoise to maybe 150, 200 years until it could literally be all dug up. Turquoise forms in two different ways;  it's either in veins, through the rocks, or it can get into a clay and actually make nuggets of turquoise where it formed and bubbled up.

Don't drop it!

Henry: I know your son is just a baby, but when he grows up, would you want your son to follow in your footsteps in the turquoise mining business?

Tristan:   If he wants to mine turquoise, he should. The thing is, it's hard. It's not easy if you weren't brought up in mining turquoise. Honestly, the biggest future in our business are the children that we have that come out to the mines with us, that are constantly learning from us. So I would kind of expect them to mine turquoise. But if they don't want to, that's cool too.

Henry: What is the most important thing to know about turquoise mining?

Tristan: The most important thing about a turquoise mining is appreciating the stones that you're digging up, and appreciating the ground that they come from, and having a good reason to dig them up, which is for your family.

A BOOK REVIEW:

ENNIO MORRICONE IN HIS OWN WORDS – IN CONVERSATION WITH ALESSANDRO DE ROSA, Translated from the Italian by MAURIZIO CORBELLA

Oxford University Press – Hardcover -- $34.95

First let me go on record as saying that I am not a musician, and I have three years of guitar lessons to prove it.  But I love music, and I love movie soundtracks. The first soundtrack I ever owned was Monty Norman’s score to DR. NO. I was eight years old, and I begged for it, not because of the music, but because there was a photo of a nearly nude Ursula Andress on the back of the cover. But I listened to the music while I stared at the picture, and I became fascinated.

At NYU Film School I got turned on to Ennio Morricone by fellow student and later screenwriter, the late Ric Menello (TWO LOVERS, THE IMMIGRANT). He made me buy an Italian import album, I, WESTERN, a collection of music from a fistful of Morricone Westerns, and I was hooked.

So, I love film music, I know a fair bit about it, but like the guy who doesn’t want the magic trick ruined by being told how it was done, I am an audience member, not an insider.  All of this is my roundabout way of saying that I absolutely loved reading ENNIO MORRICONE IN HIS OWN WORDS, and I probably understood about 10% of it.

The book represents a year of discussions between fellow-composers De Rosa and Morricone, and De Rosa’s encyclopedic knowledge of the maestro’s work makes him a perfect interviewer. If you aren’t signed up for Spotify yet, you’ll want to be, because there is an official cut list, and there are frequent music cues throughout the book, to give voice to the music they are discussing.

You’ll learn about the start of Morricone’s musical career, as a trumpet sideman filling in for his father during World War II.  You’ll learn about his classical education, ‘paying his dues’ in radio, and his early scores, including a pair of Spaghetti Westerns he scored before being approached by Sergio Leone for THE MAGNIFICENT STRANGER (later FISTFUL OF DOLLARS).  Much space is appropriately devoted to the Morricone/Leone collaborations, and Morricone describes both the inspirations and the frustrations – as when Leone used a piece from Dimitri Tiomkin’s RIO BRAVO score on a temporary music track, then fell in love with it and didn’t want to part with it. He did eventually – he had to part with the recording, or with Ennio.  

His other Euro-Western collaborations are not dealt with in similar depth – directors Sergio Sollima (three Westerns together) and Sergio Corbucci (seven Westerns together), each receive just a single reference, but as Corbucci’s was in a list of directors who did not get involved with the scoring, that may be why.

Morricone has much more to say about his work with Brian De Palma, Dario Argento, Bernardo Bertolucci, John Carpenter, Terence Malick, and many others. As an audience member, I was thrilled at the insights, and surprised at how much I learned. I can only imagine how much more I would have learned, had I been a musician.

‘LONE RANGER’ 70^TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION SEPT. 17 – WORD ON WESTERNS AT THE AUTRY!

It was on September 15^th, 1949, that Clayton Moore first tied on the black mask, mounted the great horse Silver, and thundered into TV history as THE LONE RANGER!  On Tuesday, September 17^th, join us at 11 a.m. at the Wells Fargo Theatre at The Autry to celebrate the 70^th anniversary of television’s first Western series, and one of the most beloved.  It’s too early to post a guest attendee list just yet, but Clayton’s daughter, Dawn Moore, is taking part, and Rob Word always gets wonderful guests for his events.  I’ll have more details as the event gets closer.  In the meantime, here’s a link to my interview with Dawn Moore: http://henryswesternroundup.blogspot.com/2014/09/daughter-remembers-clayton-lone-ranger.html

Dawn and Clayton Moore

FOX BUYS ‘GO WEST’ FROM ‘WESTWORLD’ PRODUCER BRIDGET CARPENTER

GO WEST, a pre-Civil War Western that follows the trek of a diverse group of adventurers heading to California for gold and freedom, has been given a script commitment, as a co-production of Fox Entertainment and CBS.  Writer/Producer Bridget Carpenter shared an Emmy nomination for her work on FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS, as well as WGA nominations for her work on LIGHTS, and for season one of WESTWORLD. She was also Exec Producer on 2014’s dark contempo American Indian series RED ROAD.

ACTOR/SCREENWRITER/DIRECTOR PETER FONDA DIES AT 79

“Westerns are our way of exploring our own mythology.”

                                                                                    Peter Fonda

The movies’ counter-culture Captain America has died of lung cancer at age 79.  Nominated for an Oscar for ULEE’S GOLD, the son of Oscar-winning screen legend Henry Fonda, and kid brother of double Oscar-winner Jane Fonda, Peter charted his own path. Not always pleased with his mainstream Hollywood films – in a Playboy interview he referred to his 1963 film TAMMY AND THE DOCTOR as TAMMY AND THE SHMUCKFACE – he starred for edgier independent filmmakers like Roger Corman in films like THE WILD ANGELS. Working both in front of and behind the camera, he not only co-starred in 1969’s earth-shaking EASY RIDER, he also wrote and produced it.

Although he didn’t star in a lot of Westerns – his earliest appearances include a WAGON TRAIN and an unsold HIGH NOON pilot where he played Will Kane Jr. – two of the three films he directed were Westerns.  In 1971’s poetic tragedy, THE HIRED HAND, Fonda and frequent collaborator Warren Oates play cowboy drifters who split up when Fonda goes back to abandoned wife Verna Bloom. But obligations force them back together. With strong performances, a wise script by Alan Sharp, stunning photography by Vilmos Zsigmond, and very creative visuals, editing and score, HIRED HAND was an artistic triumph for Fonda.

In his second, 1979’s much more light-hearted WANDA NEVADA, Fonda is a modern-day gold prospector who wins 13-year-old Brooke Shields in a poker game.  For Fonda, who described his relationship with his father as, “fraught,” one of the great thrills of that production was the chance to direct Henry Fonda, and to afterwards receive a letter from him about the experience. “It was a five-page letter.  And at the end, ‘In my forty-one years of making motion pictures, I have never seen a crew so devoted to the director.  You are a very good director.  And please remember me for your company.’  Now a company is a word we normally use in stage.  But in John Ford’s time, he carried a (stock) company of actors with him from one film to the next.  Ward Bond was one of them.  John Carradine was another.  Great characters that he would have as his company.  And the fact that my dad wanted to be part of my company… How cool is that?”

Fonda’s later acting career would get a considerable boost after his strong supporting role in 2007’s 3:10 TO YUMA. Fred Olen Ray, who was making AMERICAN BANDITS: FRANK AND JESSE JAMES, told me, “He was somebody we were really looking forward to having, because he’s very iconic. We had made the deal, I had spoken to him in France, and coming back on the plane, he fell on the jet-way. He busted his jaw open, and he had to have stitches. And (his people) were saying, he can’t be there on this day, and he could probably be ready in a week.

And that’s a week after the movie shoot had ended. So we thought, let’s not get ourselves caught in a tough spot here. Let’s go ahead and film these scenes anyway with a different actor. And a few days later, after the movie had wrapped, we heard, ‘Okay, Peter Fonda’s ready!’ So we shot the scenes over again with (Peter Fonda), and those are what we used in the movie.” 

Ron Maxwell enjoyed directing Fonda in the Civil War home-front drama COPPERHEAD. “Oh, he’s a lot of fun; he’s an icon.  There’s one scene where he meets Abner, and they speak about the issues that are dividing the town.  And that first shot, when you first see him, is an exact replica, to every detail, to his father playing YOUNG MISTER LINCOLN in John Ford’s 1939 film.   The only difference is that film was in black and white, and ours is color.  After we finished filming that scene, Peter looked up in the sky and said, ‘Dad, I hope you’re proud of me.’”  There is little doubt about that.

OLD TOWN ROAD BOOSTS WRANGLER JEANS SALES!

When, in the song-of-the-summer, OLD TOWN ROAD, Lil Nas X intoned that timeless lyric, “Wrangler on my booty,” the sales of the long-time denim favorite sky-rocketed. It’s kind of the reverse of when the 1934 equivalent of Lil Nas X, Clark Gable, in IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT, removed his shirt to reveal no undershirt: sales of the undergarment plummeted. Scott Baxter, honcho of Wrangler’s parent company, Kontoor Brands, says they didn’t see it coming.  "We knew nothing about it, and then it just took off.  It's introduced Wrangler to a more diverse group of folks, and that's where we want to be as a brand." Which is why Wrangler is partnering with Lil Nas X on a line of t-shirts (apparently not learning the Clark Gable lesson).

I don’t quite get the popularity of OLD TOWN ROAD myself. I have nothing against it – I love the opening western stuff, I love Chris Rock in anything, and the contemporary stuff is at worst innocuous, and sometimes amusing, but the song just seems repetitive; it doesn’t grow after the first few bars, and just peters out.

Actually, the big fashion-effect I was expecting this summer is related to ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD, and the swoon heard ‘round the world when Brad Pitt took off his shirt. If only they could sell that like they can sell a pair of Wranglers. But then, they couldn’t figure out how to sell it in Gable’s day either.

AND THAT’S A WRAP!

Please check out the September TRUE WEST MAGAZINE, on newsstands now, featuring my article, STAGECOACH – THE LEGEND AT 80!

Speaking of which, I was amazed recently to look at Henry’s Western Round-up – I write it, but I don’t read it that often – and realize that I hadn’t put up links to any of my True West articles in about a year! There are about twenty new ones now, and I’ll update the links to my movie reviews very soon.  I don’t understand why the size of the type on these links keeps changing – the Rifleman one is huge, and others are tiny – but at least they work!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Content Copyright August 2019 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved

NEW SPAGHETTI WESTERN – ‘BOUNTY KILLER’ – PLUS ‘HOW TV WEST IS WRITTEN’, AUTRY EVENTS, DVD REVIEWS AND MORE!

THIS JUST IN! STARTING TUESDAY, JANUARY 15^TH, THE AUTRY WILL EXTEND FREE ADMISSION TO LAUSD STUDENTS AND THEIR CHAPERONES DURING THE LAUSD TEACHERS’ STRIKE!

‘BOUNTY KILLER’ OPENS JAN. 25^TH IN L.A.!

‘BOUNTY KILLER’, the new Spaghetti Western from Chip Baker Films, opens Friday, January 25^th, at the Arena Cinelounge, 6464 Sunset Boulevard, Hollywood, CA 90028. When a young woman, played by Naila Mansour, is abducted during her wedding, her father, Eurowestern stalwart Antonio Mayans (MORE DOLLARS FOR THE MACGREGORS, A TOWN CALLED HELL) hires bounty hunter Crispian Belfrage to rescue the woman, and kill the men. Also in the cast are Aaron Stielstra (THE SCARLET WORM, 6 BULLETS TO HELL) and Lenore Andriel (YELLOW ROCK). Directed by Chip Baker, written by Baker and Danny Garcia, Jose Villanueva and Nick Reynolds, many of the folks who made the fine 6 BULLETS TO HELL are also part of BOUNTY KILLER. Cinematographer of both films Olivier Merckx may be the first to use a drone in a Western, and did so to striking effect.

It’s filmed in classic sets and locations in Tabernas, Almeria, and Andalucia, Spain, much of it on the McBain Ranch from ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST. The film will be playing from Friday the 25 through Thursday the 31, and since the times vary from day to day, visit the Cinelounge website HERE for details.

‘HOW TV WEST IS WRITTEN’ AND MORE EVENTS AT THE AUTRY

TUESDAY JAN. 15 – A WORD ON WESTERNS SALUTES BURT LANCASTER

Detail from Thomas Hart Benton's 'The Kentuckian' poster 

Tuesday, at 11 a.m., join Western authority Rob Word and his merry band at the Wells Fargo Theatre for another delightful ‘Word on Westerns’. The topic will be Burt Lancaster, whose Westerns include GUNFIGHT AT THE O.K. CORRAL, VERA CRUZ, APACHE, and THE KENTUCKIAN. Word notes, “Lancaster cared greatly about quality and, when he directed and starred in THE KENTUCKIAN (1955), hired Bernard Herrmann for the music and Thomas Hart Benton to do the movie poster!” Among the guests joining Rob will be Burt’s stunt double from ULZANA’S RAID and POSSE, Billy Burton, and from Burt’s last Western, CATTLE ANNIE AND LITTLE BRITCHES, producer Rupert Hitzig and actors William Russ and Kenny Call. Did I mention this event is free with your Autry admission?  Doors open at 10:30.

WEDNESDAY JAN. 16 – HOW THE WEST IS WRITTEN: INSIDE MODERN TV WESTERNS

A must-attend for any would-be Western screenwriters, Wednesday night at 7 p.m., writers and producers from the latest crop of TV Westerns share insight into the creation of their series, how they’re reimagining the genre, and why stories out of the American West continue to inspire. Panelists include LONGMIRE writer and exec producer Hunt Baldwin, THE SON writer and exec producer Kevin Murphy, and HELL ON WHEELS and BRISCO COUNTY, JR. writer and exec producer John Wirth. This one costs $20 for members & students, $25 for non-members, and reservations are advised.

SATURDAY JAN. 26 – SILENT TREATMENT – ‘CLASH OF THE WOLVES’

The Silent Treatment is the Autry’s new series of silent Westerns with live musical accompaniment. 1925’s CLASH OF THE WOLVES stars Rin-Tin-Tin, his sweetheart Nanette, 7^TH HEAVEN star Charles Farrell, and original Keystone Kop Heinie Conklin, in a tale of Borax miners and claim-jumpers. Presented at 2 p.m. in 35mm, with piano by Cliff Retallick.  It’s free with admission.

SUNDAY, JAN. 27^TH -- THE MUSIC OF ENNIO MORRICONE!

Morricone conducting the Hateful 8 score recording --

and no, he won't be there.

At 1 p.m. – the 5 p.m. performance is sold out -- a concert of music from film scores by the maestro of the Spaghetti Western, performed by a special ensemble of world-class musicians and singers. It’s $10 for members, $20 for non-members, and you’d better make your reservations now.

COWBOYS AND INDIANS AND VIKINGS! – A DVD REVIEW

Wild East Productions presents Volume 60 of their Spaghetti Western Collection, a Giuliano Gemma double feature, DAYS OF VENGEANCE and ERIK THE VIKING. In VENGEANCE (1967), Gemma stars as man framed and imprisoned not for just any crime, but the murder of his own father! His old girlfriend, Nieves Navarro, is now with the lawman who set him up, and Gemma teams up with a traveling charlatan (Manuel Muniz as his comic character Pajarito) and his granddaughter (gorgeous Grabriella Giorgelli) to get justice, and uncover a startlingly baroque conspiracy. It’s elegantly made and highly enjoyable.

The second film, ERIK THE VIKING (1965) is goofy, exuberant fun. Gemma is Erik, nephew of Viking King Thorwald, and when the old man is on his deathbed, he says he wants his power to pass to his nephew, not his own son Erloff (Lucio De Santis). It’s a tough time for Vikings, who get no end of abuse from the more militarily organized Danes. Erik convinces several Vikings that they should find a new land far away from the Danes, and sails off in search of it. They arrive in – you guessed it – the New World, where they make friends with some Indians and enemies with others.

This action-packed daffy little history lesson is surprisingly entertaining, capturing the spirit of the Warner Brothers swashbucklers of the 1930s and ‘40s, and borrowing plot elements from them as well. Yes, there is a beautiful Indian princess (Elisa Montes), and evil plotters working for Erloff, including the indispensable muscleman Gordon Mitchell.

Among the special features is an excellent interview with actress Nieves Navarro conducted by Western screenwriter Danny Garcia (6 BULLETS TO HELL, THE BOUNTY KILLER). The double feature sells for $21.72, and can be purchased HERE. 

A NEW SOURCE FOR TV WESTERNS – JEWISH LIFE TV!

Gail Davis and Jimmy Hawkins

Next time you’re spinning the dial – remember when TVs had dials? – looking for a Western, you might just find one in an unexpected location: JLTV, aka Jewish Life Television, has added oaters to the line-up! Episodes of BONANZA, ANNIE OAKLEY, and the 1954 Western anthology series STORIES OF THE CENTURY have joined THE JACK BENNY SHOW and YOU BET YOUR LIFE, with Groucho Marx, as reasons to watch. Lorne Green, Michael Landon, and BONANZA-creator David Dortort were all Jewish, so perhaps that’s the connection, but whatever the reason, thanks JLTV!  

‘UNSPOOLED’ LOOKS AT ‘THE SEARCHERS’

Paul Scheer and Amy Nicholson, the film critics who are re-examining all of the films on the  AFI 100 Best Movies of All-Time list, with 100 individual podcasts, are up to #34, THE SEARCHERS. They are knowledgeable, but not big Western fans – it’s the first John Wayne Western Scheer has seen (!)  – so their takes on it are by turns fascinating and infuriating. Well worth a listen. And I must give them credit on one point in particular: it NEVER occurred to me that John Wayne might be searching not for his brother’s daughter, but his own!  THE SEARCHERS is #34. The episode about HIGH NOON, where I was guest, is #19. You can hear them all HERE. 

I HAVE 5 ARTICLES IN THE FEBRUARY ‘TRUE WEST’!

It’s a personal record for one issue! If you’d like to read ‘em…

p.19 – ‘Cowboy Pens Best Rodeo Movie Ever Made’

p. 26 – ‘Remembering Jeb Rosebrook’

p. 52 – ‘Max Evans in Hollywood’

p. 54 – ‘Ballad of Buster Scruggs’ review

p. 55 – ‘Fire Engulfs Paramount Western Ranch’

ONE MORE THING…

Every spring there are two events in the Los Angeles area that movie nuts, western nuts, and especially western movie nuts dream about all year. One is the Santa Clarita Cowboy Festival, a great get-together of all things cowboyish, at the estate of the great movie cowboy William S. Hart. The other is the annual TCM Classic Film Festival, one of the great and rare chances to see classic movies, and especially westerns, the way they should be seen, on a big screen. Well, after years of having them one weekend after another, the Cowboy Festival has been moved up, so they will both be on the weekend of April 13 and 14. TCM is actually the 11^th through the 14^th, and before you say, “Then just go to TCM on Thursday and Friday,” it doesn’t work that way, since the movies you want to see are generally scattered through the four days. They’ve just started to announce films, and included are BUTCH CASSIDY, a new restoration of WINCHESTER ’73, and a Tom Mix double bill with live music, THE GREAT K & A TRAIN ROBBERY and OUTLAWS OF RED RIVER. Cowboy Festival hasn’t started announcing their events yet, but it should be noted that for the second year, the Cowboy Festival will be free, while TCM costs a fortune, and even individual movies are $20 a pop.  I’ll keep you informed as I learn more!

AND THAT’S A WRAP!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Material Copyright January 2019 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY-JANE-GOT-A-GUN? PLUS LA/ITALIA FEST HONORS MORRICONE, ‘WESTERN RELIGION’ ON DVD, AND MORE!

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY-JANE-GOT-A-GUN?

Did you miss it?  The Natalie Portman, Joel Edgerton, Ewan Macgregor opus that went through Hell to reach the screen came and went in about two weeks.  It’s damned good – you’ll find out when it makes its way to home video.  And you’ll probably join me in wondering why it was dumped by the Weinstein Company like week-old fish. 

This project was Natalie Portman’s baby from the start.  She knows from Westerns – see 2003’s COLD MOUNTAIN.  She snapped up the much-talked-about Black List script by Brian Duffield (Hollywood’s changed so much that The Black List is now where you want to be), pulled together financing, got director Lynne Ramsay (2011’s WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN), a cast…  And on the day shooting was to commence, Ramsay quit.  When she walked so did a lot of the cast, including Jude Law.  That would have killed most small films, but somehow they held it together, director Gavin O’Connor (2011’s WARRIOR) stepped in – dove in is more like it – and grabbed the reins.  On the eve of the film’s release, its distributor, RELATIVITY MEDIA, went bankrupt, and almost took JANE with them.  But The Weinstein Company saved it.  Then they released it with no press screenings, no publicity, and the only TV promotion I saw was Ewan Macgregor’s appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live.   In this business, that’s the way you release a film that reviews can only hurt.  A stinker.  When I caught the movie at the Sherman Oaks Arclight, it was a kick to see three Westerns in the marquee – THE REVENANT, THE HATEFUL 8 – another Weinstein release, and JANE.  There were four other people in the theatre.  We all loved it.  I just don’t get it.

L.A./ITALIA FEST HONORS MAESTRO MORRICONE!

Franco Nero & Joan Collins on the Red Carpet

From Sunday, February 21^st through Saturday, February 27^th, the Chinese 6 Theatres in Hollywood will once again be the home of the 11^th edition of the annual L.A./Italia Film Festival.  Sponsored by the Italian government and various Italian businesses, this week-long celebration of Italian films, fashion and culture features both new and classic Italian films, and films made by Italian-Americans, and all of the screenings are free!  It’s done on a first-come, first-seated basis, and in four years of attending, I’ve never been shut out of a screening.

They’re honoring composer Ennio Morricone, and several films that he’s scored – the current THE HATEFUL 8, THE UNTOUCHABLES, THE MISSION, BUGSY, and DAYS OF HEAVEN.  My only complaint is that HATEFUL 8 is the only Western they’re showing this year.  You can learn all about the event, and find out when the screenings are, by checking out the official website HERE.

Just one word of warning: this event ends the day before the Oscars, which are held right next door at the Dolby Theatre.  In the day before the Oscars, more and more streets get closed off, so when you come to the L.A./Italia screenings, give yourself extra time to find parking.

‘WESTERN RELIGION’ ON DVD MARCH 1^ST!

If you’re a Round-up regular, you’ve been following the progress of WESTERN RELIGION since it first rolled camera in October of 2013, through their screening at Cannes and their L.A. Premiere a few months ago.  You may have read my interview with directorJames O’Brien, or learned about my adventures as a poker-playing extra in the film. 

The story of a sinister mix of gamblers who descend upon a tent city in Arizona to compete in a high-stakes poker tournament, it’s just been released on video-on-demand through iTunes, Amazon, Vudu, Google Play, Youtube, and on March 1^st it comes out on DVD from Screen Media. 

GET-TV ADDS ‘CIMARRON CITY’ TO SATURDAYS FEB. 20^TH!

GET-TV is one of the new antenna digital channels, and it’s also available on some cable and satellite systems.  It’s a SONY channel, with lots of good old movies, and Saturdays they feature their Saturday Showdown Block (read my interview with Get-TV senior programming veep Jeff Meier HERE. Instead of playing often too-familiar Western series, they’ve specialized in quality shows that only ran for a season or two, and have rarely been shown again.  They’re adding CIMARRON CITY, which ran in 1958, a Gunsmoke-style series starring George Montgomery, John Smith who’d go on to fame in LARAMIE, and Dan Blocker who didn’t do too badly on BONANZA.  They continue to show MAN CALLED SHENANDOAH starring Robert Horton, HONDO starring Ralph Taeger, NICHOLS starring James Garner, WHISPERING SMITH staring Audie Murphy, THE TALL MAN starring Clu Gulager and Barry Sullivan, and LAREDO starring Neville Brand, Peter Brown, William Smith and Robert Wolders.  Incidentally, one of my most popular Round-up features is my interview with Robert Wolders.  You can read it HERE.

‘RANGER IN TIME – RESCUE ON THE OREGON TRAIL’ – A Book Review

I got some ribbing after the last Round-up for writing a book-review of a coloring book.  I may get more ribbing for reviewing RANGER IN TIME – RESCUE ON THE OREGON TRAIL, not because it’s a kid’s book, but because it’s about a time-traveling Golden Retriever.      The novel by prolific and talented kid’s author Kate Messner is the first in as series of four thus far.  Ranger is a 21^st century disappointment, a dog flunked from a search-and-rescue program because he was too easily distracted by squirrels.  He’s living with a modern family when he digs up an old first-aid kit in the back yard that somehow zaps him back to 1850 and the Abbotts, a family heading out on the Oregon Trail.  And wouldn’t you know it, that search-and-rescue training comes in mighty handy.

Don’t get bogged down in the science of time travel – maybe it’ll make more sense in the next book, about ancient Rome, but it’s just a MacGuffin to get a modern-day sensibility into a historical tale.   The fact is, it’s hard to get school-kids interested in reading history, and this story, with its nod to Jack London and his brilliant dog’s point-of-view novels, CALL OF THE WILD and WHITE FANG, is exciting, involving, and frank.  I was a little surprised that when other fuel became scarce, the kids had to collect buffalo turds, or chips, to make a fire.  I was startled that, after several family members die along the trail, their graves were purposely driven over by the wagons, to compact the earth, and make it harder for scavenging wolves to dig up.  It’s the kind of creepy but clearly authentic detail that would make a kid want to learn more. 

The book, aimed at 2^nd to 4^th grade readers, ends with an extensive chapter on the historical research behind the story, and suggestions for further reading. 

THAT’S A WRAP!

LAST WEEK THE ROUND-UP PASSED 250,000 HITS!

Thanks to all of my loyal readers, from more than 100 countries, who keep coming back to the Round-up!  I thought I’d have my interview with Crispian Belfrage about the making of THE PRICE OF DEATH, but I ran out of time, so that will be in the next issue.  Hope your Valentine’s Day was romantic, and your Presidents Day was…presidential!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents  Copyright February 2016 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved!