MovieChat Forums > The Shootist (1976) Discussion > I can't figure the ages of the character...

I can't figure the ages of the characters.

posted 15 years ago by hightp
15 replies | jump to latest

When the tombstone is delivered, and I don't remember the exact dates, Books age calculates out to be late 50s. (The summary say's he's 58.) Yet, John Wayne was in his late 60s when he played the role.

When Books is talking to Bond, she says she's been a widow for a year, and her husband was only 41 when he died. While it's possible she was much older than her husband, it would have been more believable just to state her husband was 50 when he died. (Lauren Bacall was in her early 50s at the time.)

I guess you could say the actors look the ages they do because of the hard living the characters had gone through, but wouldn't it have been more believable to make the characters were just a little bit older then they originaly said?

He who fights and runs away, lives to run away again!

[–] johntatem62 9 years ago

They got the ages from the novel. In the novel Books is only 51. Opie is 18-not 22 as he was in real life during the filming. In my experience when a novel is adapted to the screen the characters are usually played by actors who are older than their book counterparts. Actually actors usually play characters than are younger them themselves regardless of the screenplay source. The age differentials in this movie is more obvious than usual.

The movie was a big disappointment. I just read the novel and was very impressed by it. I knew that the movie softened the book's edges but I didn't realize it was by this much. Plus the movie itself, the soundtrack, and titles looked like a 1976 TV movie of the week or a very special episode of Little House on the Prairie.

[–] snickerdoodle68 9 years ago

How old was Ron Howard's character supposed to be? Wasn't Howard already in his 20s at this time?

[–] jeryll0722 8 years ago

This is all nothing new. Character casting in movies has always been notorious for mismatching the ages of actors. Yes...it can be annoying and often takes away from the viewing experience. Also I'm often surprised how young some of these actors are in real life while looking much older on the screen.