John Ford was the first to see the potential in John Wayne and helped shape his image in a series of a classic westerns, including Stagecoach, Fort Apache, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, and The Searchers. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, is the most subtle treatment of Wayne's character, and represents one of his most fully realized roles, approaching the tragic in its depth. The film deals with the passing of the American West's values of freedom and independence. In many ways it is a summation and re-examination of the whole notion of the West as promulgated by Wayne and Ford. The story begins at the turn of the 19th century. Senator Ransom Stoddard (Jimmy Stewart), is traveling by train to Shinbone, the town of his youth, for the funeral of Tom Doniphon (John Wayne). Stoddard is a senior senator with presidential aspirations. Doniphon is an unknown. Stoddard and his wife, Hallie (Vera Miles) go to the undertaker and stand before the plain box that holds Doniphon. Enter the local press. They must know why the Senator has gone out his way to attend the funeral of an unknown cowhand. There is an old stagecoach on blocks at the undertaker'sa reference to the stagecoach that marked Wayne's breakthrough role. Stewart hems and haws, dusts off the old stage. It looks like the one that brought him to Shinbone decades before. And so the retelling begins. It is the 1870's. Stoddard is a young lawyer journeying by stage to make his fortune out west. Bandits waylay the stage and Stoddard is beaten by the eponymous Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin). Stoddard is the symbol of eastern civilization, impotent in the face of Valance's lawlessness. In the next scene we see Doniphon entering Shinbone with the beaten Stoddard thrown into the back of his buckboard. Between the impotent Stoddard and the lawless Valance is the figure of Doniphon, the only man whom Valance fears, and pillar of the town, friend to the newspaper editor, beau to Hallie, and foil to the inept marshal (Andy Devine). Shinbone is a dysfunctional town. Legal authority, as embodied by Devine, is cowardly, gluttonous and corrupt. Stoddard, the man with the intellectual ability to bring law to the town, is devoid of authority. Doniphon, the man who has the physical power and respect of the town to give force to the law and bring order to Shinbone hews to a code of individualism that keeps him from committing to the notion of a civil society. The political climate is fertile; statehood is being discussed and will change everything, bringing the rule of law and threatening the open range. At the local meeting to elect representatives, Valance tries to disrupt the proceedings but is held in place by Doniphon. Stoddard nominates Doniphon as a man uniquely qualified to represent the region. If he accepts the nomination, he unites physical and legal authority, bringing order to Shinbone and relegates Valance to the periphery. But he refuses. Accepting such a role is incongruent with his notions of individuality. Stoddard and the newspaper editor are instead elected. Valance vows revenge. Instead of supporting Stoddard, Doniphon counsels flight. He arranges a buckboard to take Stoddard out of town before Valance arrives that night to have it out with him. Doniphon's abdication leaves Stoddard with the decision: leave the town in the clutches of Valance, or stand and challenge him. Stoddard calls Valance out. Valance toys with him, shooting the gun out of his hand. Stoddard picks up the gun. Valance takes aim. Stoddard fires. Valance falls dead. Miraculously, Stoddard has liberated the town, also winning the heart of Hallie. Wayne goes on a bender, drinking himself into a stupor, then burns down his home, symbolically burning his own hopes for the future. He has lost everything. But the depth of his loss only becomes apparent later. Stoddard goes to the state convention, heralded as "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance." On this wave of popularity, he is elected to represent the state in Washington, launching his career. As he is elected, Doniphon enters the hall. He is drunk and haggard. He calls Stoddard into a back room and confronts him. "You didn't shoot Valance, Pilgrim," he tells Stoddard, "Think back, Pilgrim." We dissolve to the gunfight in the street, this time from Doniphon's POV. He stands in an alley. As Valance makes his final shot, Doniphon shoots him, the shot simultaneous with Stoddard's, killing Valence, but in a manner without honor. In doing so, he loses his self- respect and violates the code by which he has lived. This illuminates his raging drunk. All is lost. Wayne approaches the tragic in this role. He was the best, but because of the limitations of his code, he defers acting against Valance and defers again. When leadership comes his way, he refuses. When events force him to act, he must do so in a manner that is dishonorable. Doniphon's only sin is that of pridehe will not stoop to the needs of the group and holds himself aloof. For this alone, he fails and ultimately transgresses against all he stands for. When Stoddard and his wife return to Shinbone for the funeral, their solemnity springs guilt. Stoddard has traded on the Valance shooting his entire career and he knows that he has lived a lie. Ironically, the reporter tears up the story at the end, saying "When the legend becomes the truth, print the legend." John Ford made the western what it is today. Here he gives us movie that is a complex and, at times sardonic, critique of the genre, while at the same time giving Wayne his deepest, most tragic role. There was not to be another western of equivalent depth until Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven. It rewards repeated viewing and is a capstone to the career of Mr. Wayne.
