John Ford’s “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” is the story of the old and the new, it’s about transition, nostalgia, the necessity of progress, but a lament to the past. This was a pinnacle film for Ford, it was one of his last westerns, the final one to be filmed in black and white. It was also the final film he did with his constant star John Wayne, a man he made a star, and whom he made an entire film history with, but “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” also showed a darker and sadder version of the west than Ford was used to up to that point.
The film begins in the western town of Shinbone, times have changed, the town is now modern, the place of homesteaders, railroads, and phone lines. The town’s most famous citizen Senator Ransom Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart) comes off the train one day, the local news gets word of this, and since the Senator coming to town is news, they must find out what for. The Senator is rather cryptic as for his reasons to come, but soon the truth comes out, he’s here to come to a funeral, to bury a man by the name of Tom Doniphon. The newspaper editor has never heard of Tom Doniphon before and demands for Ransom to tell the story of who he was. Ransom then becomes the narrator, as we flashback to when he first came to Shinbone as a young lawyer. Ransom comes in by stagecoach which is then held up by the infamous Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin), a nasty gunslinger with a bad temperament. During the hold up, Ransom is badly injured from a whipping by Valance, but he is rescued by Tom Doniphon who we find out is played by John Wayne.
Tom brings Ransom into town where he is cared for by the local restaurant owners and Tom’s girlfriend Hallie (Vera Miles). Being a lawyer, Ransom’s first instinct is to put Liberty in jail and to act within the law. Tom on the other hand feels the only way to get Valance is by force, and using a gun, this is something Ransom refuses to do, he’s come to Shinbone to start a law office and to bring a little civilization to the region. While to subject of Liberty Valance stays at the for- front of the film, an even bigger debate is happening throughout the territory. A political movement is happening where farmers are demanding statehood, which would later mean more roads and settlements, and the taming of the west in essence. Ransom soon becomes the spokesmen of this movement, and he calls upon the town of Shinbone to vote for Statehood which would mean more opportunities for the people, and less violence in the streets by people like Liberty Valance.
I think it’s important to put a film like “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” in context at the time it was made. John Ford was a man who made a career in westerns, it was what he was known for. Most of his westerns were sort of celebrations of the past, he loved his characters in these films and what they stood for, they were about an American ideal, and his films actually created an American myth. At times Ford would celebrate this myth, but other times he would condemn it, but either way he looked at it, there was a connection to this past that fit with his sensibilities. “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” was made in 1962, and Ford himself was in his sixties, and times were changing. Ford and his films were no longer thought of as popular entertainment, the youth were seeing other types of films, and although its stars Wayne and Stewart still held box office appeal, they were mostly for the older folks, and didn’t have much relevance anymore. However Ford still had something to say about the west, in a way this was the beginning of the end, he was intelligent and he knew things couldn’t stay the same. “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” was one of the few westerns Ford filmed on a studio and not on his famous Monument Valley landscape that you could see in a number of his films. This film seems domesticated in comparison, it’s about the people who changed the west from that open, romantic atmosphere that Ford celebrated into the safe haven for future generations.
For change, there had to be bloodshed, Liberty Valance represents a past that had to be defeated before anything else could happen, and the two ideals represented by Wayne and Stewart’s characters are essential to the story of modern times. Stewart represents the future, but Wayne is the past, and just like his character he portrayed in “The Searchers”, he sees no place for himself among the homesteaders, he’s a loner, and it is in his character Ford seems to relate to. Tom is a relic of the old west, there’s no place for him in the future, he has to step aside for the new order. In the film’s most despairing scene, a drunken Tom steps into a cottage he has been building for him and Hallie, and coming to a realization that his future is gone forever, he throws a lantern to the cottage setting it on fire, so it’s lost forever.
The ending of “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance”, is a sad but essential one, Ford knew this, I’m sure if it were up to him, there would be no need for progress and change, but in order for civilization to keep going, he knew it was needed. The film is more than just good guys against the bad guys, it’s about the turning of the tide, out with the old and in with the new, but Ford always gave the past the dignity it deserved, there was no shame in that, it was Ford’s life and so many others, without the heroes of the past, there would be no future.
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