When the kids have the gravestone engraver make Mr. Andersen's headstone, they tell him his name. They say "Will Andersen". They do not spell it, and the engraver does not ask how it is spelled. How does the engraver know it is spelled ANDERSEN and not ANDERSON ??
shareWhen I saw this when I was younger, I seem to recall a more graphic encounter with the prostitutes and a more graphic death for Long Hair. Am I mistaken?
sharea more graphic encounter with the prostitutes
I recall hearing that Wayne suggested the loss of virginity scene not be included. I doubt it would have been acceptable in that time period (the 1970s, that is).
The public, particularly with a John Wayne Western, would not be ready for children to have sex. Two boys, as I recall, were about 15; the rest were younger.
It's one thing to read the scene; it's quite another to have it in a film.
(W)hat are we without our dreams?
Making sure our fantasies
Do not overpower our realities. ~ RC
In the context of a John Wayne Western and its audience, I concur that a sexual encounter would not have fit smoothly (as I indicated earlier), although had there been some discreetly handled sex initiation scene with one of the oldest boys, I do not feel that anything would have fallen apart.
But there was a fairly graphic sex scene involving a child (a young Mario Van Peebles) in 1971's Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song—an X-rated independent film intended primarily for urban black audiences, to be sure, but one that emerged as quite a big hit. And in The Beguiled (Don Siegel, 1971), Clint Eastwood's Union corporeal kisses a prepubescent girl on the lips and has a sex scene—tits-and-ass nudity included—with a character identified as seventeen years old—older and more sexually mature than the oldest boys in The Cowboys, yes, but not discreetly handled, either. The Beguiled flopped at the box-office (Eastwood's only non-hit prior to 1982 and one of only two box-office flops before the late eighties), but it was also about as esoteric and macabre of a film as a Hollywood studio has ever produced with a major male star.
http://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2012/11/27/exploring-the-obsessive-nature-of-don-siegel-and-clint-eastwoods-the-beguiled
So, yes, the 'safe' context of a Wayne Western would not have been the right vehicle, even if The Cowboys also challenges expectations in certain ways. On the other hand, an adolescent boy receiving his sexual initiation in a whorehouse (or a wagon) during a cross-country journey in a period piece is fairly conventional, so long as the encounter is filmed discreetly.
People didn't start thinking 15 year olds were "children" until the 21st century.
shareThe scene ends before they leave the engraver so I assumed they could have taken the time to check with him on the spelling. Otherwise perhaps that spelling was common for Andersen.
shareI had a similar question, but with respect to his first name. Isn't "Will" the common spelling, not "Wil"? And isn't Will a nick name? Shouldn't the engraver put his full name, presumably William, on his tombstone? But it's a minor point, and these were kids who were being educated by listening to other kids read from the Sears and Roebuck catalog.
shareMaybe it was the stone mason's spelling-- probably flawed-- that became the spelling by which the man was known. Then we can think of the book as an account of things having been told by The Cowboys later.
shareXsen is the Danish spelling, Xson is used by all other Scandinavian countries. Perhaps a stone carver who's business was to engrave people's names would have known about the two common spellings and asked which one to use.
The screenwriters were nice enough to help the engraver out with that one!
I. Drink. Your. Milkshake! [slurp!] I DRINK IT UP! - Daniel Plainview - There Will Be Blood
jmillerdp says > The screenwriters were nice enough to help the engraver out with that one!1. That's what I was going to say. The spelling is not one way or another, it's however the filmmakers decided to spell it in the movie.