Frontiersman Vern Haskell (Arthur Kennedy) wanders the West obsessed with finding the culprits responsible for murdering his fiancee. His quest leads him to Chuck-a-Luck - the film's original title - a combination horse ranch and criminal hideout overseen by saloon chanteuse Altar Keane (Marlene Dietrich). Posing as an escaped criminal Haskell falls in with murderous gunslinger Frenchy Fairmont (Mel Ferrer) and gradually becomes indistinguishable from the men he is hunting. find out more...

'Ride In The Whirlwind' was a cheapie shot back-to-back with 'The Shooting' and scripted by Jack Nicholson telling the story of three cowboys mistaken for outlaws and hunted by a band of vigilantes until two are dead and the third becomes a killer in self-defence. A gritty, stylised cult western. find out more...

An ex-lawman agrees to escort a shipment of gold cross-country, but runs into trouble when the men hired to help him turn out to lack the same moral backbone as their boss, and plot to steal the gold. A typically classy and visceral western from the master of the genre. Sam Peckinpah. find out more...

One of the all-time great westerns with John Wayne as the small town marshall struggling to hang on to a murderer, whilst holding off a posse of villains determined to rescue him, until the state magistrate arrives. Refusing offers of assistance from sympathetic townsfolk due to their age/sex/infirmity, the tension builds as the Duke is forced to swallow his pride, realising he needs all the help he can get. Excellently acted, with some superb set pieces and even a couple of songs from Ricky Nel find out more...

The third of Ford's ‘cavalry' films with Wayne as,the now Lieutenant Colonel, Kirby Yorke, a soldier in charge of putting down the rebellious Apaches, whose land the white man has recently half-inched. Unfortunately this involves crossing over into Mexico, in effect invading a foreign country, something which doesn't give the old imperialist half as many problems as his rather tortured home life. find out more...

Saloon singer Monroe, violence prone farmer Mitchum and the young son he hardly knows, drift down-river by raft from both immediate dangers and their immediate pasts. They must try the impossible, to restart their broken lives and return to being an ideal family. Mitchum's performance is excellent, but the film holds most interest as an early Monroe performance. There really is no return. A tale of betrayal, revenge and love in the wild Wild West. find out more...

An archetypal classic Western, since remade countless times, with Alan Ladd superb as the world-weary gunslinger who rides into town and finds himself as the 'good guy' protecting the innocent from powerful malevolent forces. In this case the innocent are squatters determined to fight for their rights against a rancher and his gunmen; in one way this is the evolution of the west from lawlessness to settlement, in another the battle between big and small business. For Shane the options are clear, find out more...

Jimmy Ringo is still revered and feared as the deadliest draw in the West, but as Ringo's blood lust subsides so those eager to take his place escalates, and what better way to prove your metal than face off against the man himself? The Gunfighter is a classic example of the ‘your actions have consequences' moral fable, as so many of the very best westerns are. A tense and thoughtful picture of a man whose past will never allow him a future. find out more...

John Ford's 50th and most celebrated silent film demonstrates the ideals of expansion, enterprise and achievement, but condones racism and exploitation. The scale of this film surpassed all of the other silent westerns and put Ford in the history books. Double-dealing, vengeance and romance are all covered with a poetic sense of history as we see the country united by a trans-continental railroad, realized by a great man and brought about through the sweat of the working man. A classic, black an find out more...

One of the finest of the genre, this classic western follows two men whose initial contempt for each other's methods, one a hard man rancher, the other a naively honest lawyer, develops into respect when faced with the the town's local hoodlum. Tense, absorbing and not without wit. Superb. find out more...