{"id":30243,"date":"2026-07-13T19:54:25","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T18:54:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=30243"},"modified":"2026-07-13T19:54:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T18:54:25","slug":"a-review-of-the-classic-1953-western-shane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/?p=30243","title":{"rendered":"A review of the classic 1953 western &#8220;Shane&#8221;\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This iconic western is based on a novel which, in turn, was inspired by the Johnson County War, a conflict between ranchers and homesteaders which took place in Northern Wyoming from 1889 to 1893. The film begins with the eponymous hero, clad in white buckskin, riding into view and it concludes with him riding into the distance. In between, we witness the efforts of Shane, played by Alan Ladd, to leave behind his days as a gunslinger, a forlorn hope when he finds himself siding with the homesteaders against the rancher gang who hire the sharp-shooting, black-clad Wilson (Jack Palance) to do their dirty work. As Shane declares, just before he departs:&nbsp;<em>&#8220;There&#8217;s no living with a killing.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ably directed by George Stevens, at one level, this is a relatively familiar story of two different efforts by white immigrants to make a living in the tough frontier. At an other level, this is a more psychological examination of how a charismatic newcomer interacts with one struggling, homesteader family, resulting in the father (Van Heflin), the mother (Jean Arthur) and most especially the son (nine year old Brandon De Wilde), in different ways each falling in love with him. As the hero disappears into the sunset, young Joey shouts out:\u00a0<em>&#8220;Shane. Shane! Come back! Bye, Shane.<\/em>\u00a0&#8211; one of the most moving scenes in any western. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shot in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, with the purple and white Grand Teton mountains in the background, the film only won one Academy Award (that for photography) but, over the years, it has achieved an enduring, almost fairy-tale, reputation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This iconic western is based on a novel which, in turn, was inspired by the Johnson County War, a conflict between ranchers and homesteaders which took place in Northern Wyoming from 1889 to 1893. The film begins with the eponymous hero, clad in white buckskin, riding into view and it concludes with him riding into [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30244,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30243\/revisions\/30244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}