Howard Hawks

Red River

Red River

No matter what genre he worked in, Howard Hawks played by his own rules, and never was this more evident than in his first western, the rowdy and whip-smart Red River. In it, John Wayne found one of his greatest roles, as an embittered, tyrannical Texas rancher whose tensions with his independent-minded adopted son—played by Montgomery Clift, in a breakout performance—reach epic proportions during a cattle drive to Missouri. The film is based on a novel that dramatizes the real-life late nineteenth-century expeditions along the Chisholm Trail, but Hawks is less interested in historical accuracy than in tweaking the codes of masculinity that propel the myths of the American West. The unerringly macho Wayne and the neurotic, boyish Clift make for an improbably perfect pair, held aloft by a quick-witted, multilayered screenplay and Hawks’s formidable direction.

Film Info

  • United States
  • 1948
  • 127 minutes
  • Black & White
  • 1.37:1
  • English
  • Spine #709

Blu-ray Special Edition Features

  • 2K digital restoration of the rarely presented original theatrical release version, the preferred cut of director Howard Hawks, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • 2K digital restoration of the longer, prerelease version, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • Interview with filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich
  • Interview with critic Molly Haskell about Hawks and Red River
  • Interview with film scholar Lee Clark Mitchell about the western genre
  • Audio excerpts from a conversation between Hawks and Bogdanovich
  • Audio excerpts from an interview with novelist and screenwriter Borden Chase
  • Lux Radio Theatre adaptation of Red River from 1949, featuring John Wayne, Joanne Dru, and Walter Brennan
  • Trailer
  • PLUS: An essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien and a 1991 interview with Hawks’s frequent editor Christian Nyby

    Cover by Eric Skillman

Purchase Options

Blu-ray Special Edition Features

  • 2K digital restoration of the rarely presented original theatrical release version, the preferred cut of director Howard Hawks, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • 2K digital restoration of the longer, prerelease version, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • Interview with filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich
  • Interview with critic Molly Haskell about Hawks and Red River
  • Interview with film scholar Lee Clark Mitchell about the western genre
  • Audio excerpts from a conversation between Hawks and Bogdanovich
  • Audio excerpts from an interview with novelist and screenwriter Borden Chase
  • Lux Radio Theatre adaptation of Red River from 1949, featuring John Wayne, Joanne Dru, and Walter Brennan
  • Trailer
  • PLUS: An essay by critic Geoffrey O’Brien and a 1991 interview with Hawks’s frequent editor Christian Nyby

    Cover by Eric Skillman
Red River
Cast
John Wayne
Thomas Dunson
Montgomery Clift
Matthew Garth
Joanne Dru
Tess Millay
Walter Brennan
Nadine Groot
Coleen Gray
Fen
Harry Carey Sr.
Mr. Melville
John Ireland
Cherry Valance
Noah Beery Jr.
Buster McGee
Harry Carey Jr.
Dan Latimer
Chief Yowlachie
Quo
Paul Fix
Teeler Yacey
Hank Worden
Simms Reeves
Mickey Kuhn
Young Matthew Garth
Ray Hyke
Walt Jergens
Hal Taliaferro
Old Leather
Ivan Parry
Bunk Kenneally
Credits
Director
Howard Hawks
Produced by
Howard Hawks
Screenplay
Borden Chase
Screenplay
Charles Schnee
From the Saturday Evening Post story by
Borden Chase
Codirector
Arthur Rosson
Photographed by
Russell Harlan
Film editor
Christian Nyby
Art director
John Datu Arensma
Sound
Richard Deweese
Music composed and directed by
Dimitri Tiomkin
The song “Settle Down” by
Dimitri Tiomkin
Music recorder
Vinton Vernon
Makeup
Lee Greenway
Special effects
Donald Steward
Special photographic effects
Allan Thompson
Assistant director
William McCarrey
Production manager
Norman Cook

Current

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Red River: An Interview with Christian Nyby
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