You don’t have to define a Western necessarily, because you kind of know one when you see it. If a movie’s got an Old West setting, characters on opposite sides of the law, themes surrounding justice and masculinity, and impressive landscapes, then it might well be a Western. Of course, not all Westerns have all these things, because neo-Westerns (like Hell or High Water) don’t take place during Old West times, and revisionist Westerns (like The Wild Bunch and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly) are willing to get a little more complex thematically and/or narratively. The main thing is that quite a few movies can be broadly considered Westerns, which might make it surprising that only four in the nearly 100-year history of the Academy Awards have ever won the top prize: Best Picture. That’s more than there are fantasy or sci-fi movies that have won Best Picture, and there’s never been an animated movie that’s won Best Picture (if you want to count animation as a genre), but still… four’s not a ton, when there are 97 Best Picture winners and counting.
It’s also surprising that none of these four winners were from what might well be the golden age of the Western, roughly in the 1950s and into some of the 1960s, as classics like High Noon, The Searchers, and Shane did not get that top prize at the Oscars, with The Searchers not even being nominated for any Academy Awards. The first winning Western came near the start of the history of the Academy Awards, back in 1931, while two other winners came from the early 1990s, and then, finally, a neo-Western (that admittedly belongs to some other genres) won in the 2000s. So, there aren’t too many to rank, and it’s pretty easy to single out what the weakest of the bunch is, but what follows anyway is a ranking of all Best Picture-winning movies that were Westerns, either wholly or in part/alongside some other genres.
4
‘Cimarron’ (1931)
Oh, Cimarron. There’s so little to say about you. This one has been kind of forgotten over time, and would be to an even greater extent if it didn’t have the distinction of being the fourth winner of the Best Picture Oscar. At least it’s ambitious, for a film of its time, not so much being an epic in runtime (its 124 minutes do feel longer, it has to be said), but it dips into epic territory because its narrative spans decades. Things kick off with the Oklahoma land rush of 1889, and the sequence depicting that is genuinely impressive, and the high point of the film. Things slow down from that point onwards, even if the whole thing does eventually span a few decades, taking it arguably out of Old West times nearer to the film’s end. Time jumps forward, but while watching Cimarron, much of it feels static.
Cimarron seemed to impress voters back in the early 1930s, but nowadays, it’s hard to find too many passionate supporters of it.
And that’s not just criticizing a movie that’s nearly 100 years old for being slow, since there are movies as old as Cimarron that still move quite well and remain genuinely engaging when watched today (see Fritz Lang’s M and Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights, both also released in 1931). Cimarron seemed to impress voters back in the early 1930s, but nowadays, it’s hard to find too many passionate supporters of it. If you feel compelled to watch every movie that was significant throughout the history of the Academy Awards, then you might well feel obligated to watch this, but it’s otherwise hard to recommend. It’s also admittedly a little easy to mix up with the similarly titled next Best Picture winner, Cavalcade, since that one is also something of a family drama that spans decades, and neither hold up particularly well when watched today… not like 1930’s All Quiet on the Western Front, at least, which is another very early Best Picture winner, but that one still retains a surprising amount of power all these decades later.
3
‘Dances with Wolves’ (1990)
Before anyone gets too displeased with the placement here, it should be stressed that Dances with Wolves is a much better movie than Cimarron, even if the nature of this ranking means it’s “only” one spot ahead of that aforementioned early Best Picture winner. It broke a nearly 60-year streak of Westerns just not winning Best Picture, and it also established Kevin Costner as someone rather heavily associated with the Western genre. He directed Dances with Wolves while also starring in it, and he went on to do the same with Open Range and Horizon: An American Saga. Also, off the big screen, Yellowstone was a show that featured Costner in the lead role for much of its run, and that was a popular Western TV series, so that counts for something. Costner just has the right look and energy for playing characters in stories that belong to this genre.
With Dances with Wolves, the film is also something of an adventure movie and a war one, considering it takes place during the American Civil War. Kevin Costner is a soldier who ends up befriending the members of a Sioux tribe, ultimately fighting for them and their plight once he comes to understand who they are, and how they’re being mistreated. Dances with Wolves is broad and aiming to be a crowd-pleaser, sure, but it’s got spectacle to offer and is undeniably well-made on both a technical front and when it comes to the acting. It’s a notable Western that’s also a true epic, and though some might argue Goodfellas was a better pick for Best Picture at the Oscars that year, Dances with Wolves is still significantly better than some of the weakest and/or most questionable Best Picture winners out there.
2
‘No Country for Old Men’ (2007)
No Country for Old Men is that previously alluded to winner that isn’t a Western in the traditional sense, and instead counts more as a neo-Western. It does go back in time to tell its story, but not as far back as the 1800s, instead having its story take place at the start of the 1980s. But there’s nothing glitzy or neon-soaked about the depiction of the decade here, with No Country for Old Men instead feeling sparse, grim, and sweaty. And those are good emotions to be evoked here, because No Country for Old Men is up there among the most suspenseful movies in recent memory, and it does indeed aim to be as tense as possible with its narrative about the aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong.
Said drug deal leaves a whole lot of cash lying out in the desert, with one man finding the cash, another trying to track it down, and a third being a sheriff who has to investigate the whole violent matter, always tragically being multiple steps behind. No Country for Old Men works as both a great Western and a unique one, functioning just as well as a crime/thriller/neo-noir movie, too, in effect. It’s not exactly fun or a good time in the traditional sense, but it’s undoubtedly involving and likely to leave a mark on those who watch it. It’s the most success a Coen Brothers movie has had at the Academy Awards to date, and you can kind of see why.
1
‘Unforgiven’ (1992)
Like Kevin Costner, Clint Eastwood’s someone who’s always had pretty close ties to the Western genre, with Eastwood’s first big role being on a Western TV series: Rawhide. By the 1960s, he’d established himself in the genre further thanks to the spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone, and then from the 1970s onwards, Eastwood also excelled as a director. Unforgiven ended up being the best Western he directed, and is pretty much neck and neck with The Good, the Bad and the Ugly when it comes to crowning which is the best Western he ever starred in. Unforgiven is a good deal darker, though, taking Western conventions and exploring them in ways that highlight a greater sense of moral complexity than can be found in many Westerns of old. Here, the protagonist is someone with a violent past, and the antagonist is someone who is technically on the right side of the law, even though he abuses his power and ends up being more destructive and dangerous than the ex-outlaw Eastwood plays.
That corrupted lawman is played by Gene Hackman in what could well be the greatest performance the legendary actor ever gave, and considering the strength of his filmography, that’s saying quite a lot. Morgan Freeman and Richard Harris are also excellent in Unforgiven, and the simple story at the film’s core is used to explore complex ideas, meaning there’s a ton to be mined from this movie on a thematic front. Everything in Unforgiven just works seamlessly together, and it feels like one of those rare movies that are pretty much perfect, as trying to find faults here will likely turn up nitpicks at best (and very few of them at that). If you don’t like Westerns, you should still watch Unforgiven, since it’s not just a great Western, but it’s a masterful deconstruction of the genre, and a showcase of Eastwood at his absolute best as both a filmmaker and actor.
Unforgiven
- Release Date
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August 7, 1992
- Runtime
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130 Mins
