Rio Bravo And Assault On Precinct 13 - Two Halves Of A Beautiful Whole

The ace old skool Western and the 1970s action movie it inspired.

Rio Bravo (1959)
”I don’t hate John Wayne because he’s a fascist,” said Orson Welles. “I hate him because he talks like a baby.”

Rio Bravo finds the Duke on fine rusk-munching form as Marshall John T Chance. Thankfully, the Jules Fuhrann/Leigh Brackett scripts gives both him and drunkard Dean martin lots of funny things to mumble.

Shot in sumptuous Technicolor, Rio Bravo was made back when movies were prepared to take their time, and the story makes frequent stops to let the stars and the director showcase their talents.

Howard Hawks would remake the film twice, as El Dorado (1966) and Rio Lobo (1970), but neither ever came close to matching the easy charm and strolling quality of the wonderful original.