The Searchers - Opening Scene

Many believe the final shot of The Searchers with John Wayne framed by the doorway is one of cinema's most iconic but John Ford's opening shot is equally impressive.

• Category

  Film & Animation

[263Adder]

Can you imagine that being the view from your front door?

[333whippet]

Love John Ford movies ... great scenery from the western country ... And most of all I love John Wayne Western ....

Need to keep this part alive and not forgotten ...

[ichimonjiguy]

That song is The Bonnie Blue Flag. It is in Gods and Generals.

[elvisl971]

Martha loves Ethan.What a great movie.

[NeoTRP]

the brick wall represents the idiots who fought for the confederacy. 

[shannon7190]

Does anyone know the the Civil War snippet that's heard after the opening of Lorena as Ethan approaches the ranch?

[ichimonjiguy]

I always love this beautiful opening music. Now I know why. It's a song called Lorena. Thanks.

[Ken Macri]

The film was a commercial success, although it received no major Academy Award nominations. It was named the Greatest American Western of all time by the American Film Institute in 2008, and it placed 12th on the American Film Institute's 2007 list of the 100 greatest American movies of all time Entertainment Weekly named it the best Western of all time.The British Film Institute's Sight & Sound magazine ranked it as the seventh best movie of all time in a 2012 survey.

[Ken Macri]

The Searchers is a 1956 American Western film directed by John Ford, based on the 1954 novel by Alan Le May, and set during the Texas–Indian Wars. The film stars John Wayne as a middle-aged Civil War veteran who spends years looking for his abducted niece (Natalie Wood), along with Jeffrey Hunter as his adoptive nephew, who accompanies him.

[Ken Macri]

The Searchers is a 1956 American Western film directed by John Ford, based on the 1954 novel by Alan Le May, and set during the Texas–Indian Wars. The film stars John Wayne as a middle-aged Civil War veteran who spends years looking for his abducted niece (Natalie Wood), along with Jeffrey Hunter as his adoptive nephew, who accompanies him.

The film was a commercial success, although it received no major Academy Award nominations. It was named the Greatest American Western of all time.

[foreverinyourarms]

I think it represents him not being a part of the proper, typical community, he is just part of the landscape which we see in this opening shot, and also a wall that hides emotions but through the movie you see that developing and that wall coming down. Just a thought :)