there is iron in your words of death

[travisezell]

My DVD copy of The Outlaw Josey Wales begins with Clint Eastwood, considerably older and obviously well into his respectable phase (that is to say, very old and still kickin, both physically and artistically) speaking to the camera. He tells you that he was fortunate to get into the western genre, and that he considers Josey Wales one of the high points of his time there. And then he tells you that he chose this particular story because it is a story of people who've grown soulsick from war. He says it's clearly not a direct parallel to anything that had been currently going on in Vietnam, but that the general mood was there.

I have to wonder if my reading of the film might have differed if he hadn't delivered that nugget to me on a platter. Nonetheless, he did, and so it is easy to see The Outlaw Josey Wales as a story about what lingers in the souls of men even after war, a story about scars and healing (if and when healing is possible). And in that regard -- and pretty much every other one I can think of -- it's a damn good piece of filmmaking. Maybe, scriptwise, my favorite Eastwood western yet.

The script is tight, compacting so many American genres into one -- it is a revisionist western, it is a revenge movie, it is a war movie of sorts, and it is above all a road movie. Wales begins the story by losing his family when Union soldiers rape his wife and murder her and his son. He joins up with Rebels, his entire troop is betrayed by their leader, and he lashes back full-force, killing forty men with a machine gun. That's all in the first twelve minutes -- and none of it feels like exploitation or sensationalism. It feels pitch perfect, spot on. This isn't Corbucci's Django or, worse, Miike's Sukiyaki Western Django (both of those films are great fun, but they are undeniably less than straight-faced westerns).

Throughout his long journey (as he is chased) Josey Wales picks up other victims and stragglers, people surviving on the fringe of the war's aftermath, until he has formed a new family to replace what he's lost. Not just a family, in fact, but a small community that comes together and seems more likely to thrive thanks to him. In one of the best scenes in the film, and certainly its best speech, Wales meets with the Comanche chief Ten Bears who is the most immediate threat to his family (the larger, loomier threat of the Union soldiers who've chased him across three states are still some ways off). Behold, your commentary on Vietnam, on the Civil War, on politics and family and morals and of course, (being an American movie; being a western) on the nature of being a man:

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At the time, the above scene had a kind of all-encompassing closure to it that I felt like maybe the movie was wrapping up, but of course the trouble's not over yet. When Josey Wales begins to fall for the cutie country girl (part of his little tribe) and finally settles into the group, he suffers the return of his nightmares, reliving the horrors that opened the film so long ago -- it's over two hours long and, like most 70s films and westerns, it moves at its own pace, not sluggish but also not in any hurry. The return of these dreams tells us instantly that his solution of peace isn't going to be enough. Josey Wales -- in fact, all of southwestern America -- has been scarred by what he (it) has been through. He may be the solid center for this ragtag group, but he knows he doesn't fit in with them. (I hate to be so tacky as this, but) I am reminded of a certain well-known Nietzsche quote, about what happens when you stare into the abyss. The point is that, without lingering on it, without doing any of that 90s broody business, we are given a man who sees the good life and knows it's not for him. Some damage is too deep to undo, and Josey leaves it for the scrappier, happier survivors to rebuild, promising to return in Spring. The end is somewhat open, as it is clear that those closest to him (the aged Navajo Lone Watie and his seeming nemesis Fletcher) don't expect Wales to return as he rides out into the desert, away from the community he's helped strengthen.

But then, it wouldn't be a western -- and it wouldn't be an Eastwood directed one to be sure -- if it didn't end with the lone hero riding away into the desert, would it?