Anybody seen the 1966 remake?
It's not that bad actually, just unneccessary. Some of the casting is actually superior to the original (Bing Crosby, Ann-Margret, Slim Pickens). Anybody seen it?
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MovieChat Forums > Stagecoach (1939) Discussion > Anybody seen the 1966 remake?
The 66 Remake is a piece of Crap.
shareThe remake is a fine enough picture on its own, if a tad too long. Bing Crosby is outstanding as Doc Boone.
"It's as red as The Daily Worker and just as sore."
I didn't know that a remake existed, so I just checked the credits for that movie. And I have to questions:
1. Who is Gordon Douglas?
2. Who is Alex Cord?
Gordon Douglas is worth looking up here on imdb. His was a long and distinguished career mostly as a director.
Alex Cord is a waste of film. "Grayeagle" '77 being maybe the most egregious. He must have given good Lewinsky.
Stagecoach '66? Crosby's good the film like it was said earlier was unnecessary.
I'm not saying we won't get our hair mussed!share
Squeaky-clean Bob Cummings, ironically, was cast in the role of the absconding banker in the '66 remake. As far as I know, it's the only time he ever played a less-than-sympathetic character.
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I assume you're joking bigtime. And where'd you get the notion that the producers of the '66 film tried to get prints of the original destroyed?
shareAgreed, THAT has GOT to be a joke, bradford-1!!! Where would they ever obtain the right to do such a thing? John Ford was still years away from his grave and John Wayne, in 1966, could still pack a powerful punch to the nose, were anyone ever to attempt destroying THE picture that made him a Hollywood big-leaguer for the rest of his life!
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Actually, there was a time (mostly in the pre-cable / pre-home-video era) when the producers of remakes would do everything that they could to "bury" an original that they viewed as potential competition. They wouldn't spend the time and money to try to track down every privately owned print and destroy it (which they generally wouldn't have the right to do anyway), but they would make sure that there were no commercial / theatrical screenings of the original and (a bit later) that there were no TV airings of the original (and the "movie rights" that they had acquired to make their version often did give them the right to exercise that kind of power over the original).
One example of this behavior was Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. For many years it was virtually impossible to see the Frederick March version from the early 1930s because the producers of the 1940s Spencer Tracy had every intention of making their version the only version that anybody (in the English speaking world) could see.
Now, the people who controlled Bram Stoker's estate *did* do everything in their power to try to destroy every single print of the classic silent Nosferatu after they won a copyright infringement lawsuit against its producers. In that case, no movie rights to the original novel / story had ever been obtained by the movie producers.
In my early teens, being mad for Ann-Margret, I watched the remake several times on TV. I really liked it. Then, in my mid-twenties, I finally got to see the original. WOW!! The 1939 version was so much better. I'd still watch the '66 version, but I own the '39 version, and watch it several times a year.
"It ain't dying I'm talking about, it's living!!!"
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My description of the original "Stagecoach" is that it's "creaky." It looks suprisingly old despite that it was made in 1939. There were so many much better looking movies made by that time. John Wayne is very good in this -- in fact he's the best thing about this movie.
For some reason, even the best prints I've seen have an "old movie look" to them, and soundrack is somewhat muddled. The gunfight at the end is also a letdown.
Compared with another Western of it's day -- "Gone With the Wind," this looks absolutely ancient.
John Ford's "My Darling Clementine," Fort Apache," and "She Wore A Yellow Ribbon," all made about the same time cinematically superior to "Stagecoach."
The look of "The Three Godfathers" made 10 years later was much better.
Er, "Gone With the Wind" was NOT a Western! And does "Stagecoach" have an "old movie look" to you because it's in black-and-white? And maybe John Ford and his collaborators improved their skills as years went by.
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It looks suprisingly old despite that it was made in 1939. There were so many much better looking movies made by that time. John Wayne is very good in this -- in fact he's the best thing about this movie.
For some reason, even the best prints I've seen have an "old movie look" to them, and soundrack is somewhat muddled. The gunfight at the end is also a letdown.
Compared with another Western of it's day -- "Gone With the Wind," this looks absolutely ancient.
You can't compare old films like this. Unless you're old enough to have seen the both on the first release of course. Much depends on the surviving film elements.
IIRC, the best transfer of Stagecoach comes from a dupe negative and is not even fully cleaned of damage. Some films from similar element can look rather lovely but not all dupes are created equal of course. Also, not all video masters are created equal, unless the two films are worked upon by the same people on the same equipment.
GWTW looks better today in many ways than it did back in 1939 while Stagecoach looks probably considerably worse than it did originally. share