Das war der wilde Westen

Originaltitel: How the West Was Won

1962
12
2 Std. 44 Min.

IMDb-BEWERTUNG

7,1/10

24.006

IHRE BEWERTUNG

trailer wiedergeben3:03

2 Videos

99+ Fotos

Classical Western Western Epic Adventure War Western

Eine Familiensaga, die mehrere Jahrzehnte des Aufbruchs in den Westen der USA im 19. Jahrhundert abdeckt - einschließlich Goldrausch, Bürgerkrieg und Bau der ersten Eisenbahnstrecken.Eine Familiensaga, die mehrere Jahrzehnte des Aufbruchs in den Westen der USA im 19. Jahrhundert abdeckt - einschließlich Goldrausch, Bürgerkrieg und Bau der ersten Eisenbahnstrecken.Eine Familiensaga, die mehrere Jahrzehnte des Aufbruchs in den Westen der USA im 19. Jahrhundert abdeckt - einschließlich Goldrausch, Bürgerkrieg und Bau der ersten Eisenbahnstrecken.

Siehe Produktionsinformationen bei IMDbPro

3 Oscars gewonnen
- 10 Gewinne & 5 Nominierungen insgesamt

Wissenswertes
During filming in June 1961, Karl Malden had to be rushed to hospital to have an emergency appendectomy.

Patzer
There is no explanation of why Sheriff Ramsey is fine in one scene and wearing a bandage on his forehead in the next, immediately following. (There was a deleted or unfilmed scene where Zeb knocked Ramsey out when the Sheriff tried to stop him from going after the train robbers.)

Zitate
Narrator: The west was won by its pioneers, settlers, adventurers is long gone now. Yet it is theirs forever, for they left tracks in history that will never be eroded by wind or rain - never plowed under by tractors, never buried in compost of events. Out of the hard simplicity of their lives, out of their vitality, of their hopes and sorrows grew legends of courage and pride to inspire their children and their children's children. From soil enriched by their blood, out of their fever to explore and be, came lakes where once there were burning deserts - came the goods of the earth; mine and wheat fields, orchards and great lumber mills. All the sinews of a growing country. Out of their rude settlements, their trading posts came cities to rank among the great ones of the world. All the heritage of a people free to dream, free to act, free to mold their own destiny.
[final narrative from the film "How The West Was Won"1962 - narrated by Spencer Tracy]

Crazy Credits
Opening credits: Except for historical events and characters, the events and characters depicted in this photoplay are fictitious and any similarity to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.

Alternative Versionen
Some prints (like the Swedish pan&scan video release) leave out the final modern travelogue scenes.

Verbindungen
Edited from Das ist Cinerama (1952)

Soundtracks
How the West Was Won
(1962)
Music by Alfred Newman
Lyrics by Ken Darby
Performed by Ken Darby (uncredited)

Benutzerrezensionen213

Rezension

Ausgewählte Rezension

8/10

After nearly 50 years the movie still works

I have loved this movie since I saw its original theatrical release. The new (2009) DVD release finally does it justice. Digital stitching technology has made the 3-part Cinerama image almost literally seamless. In fact there is less distortion where the frames meet than there was in the original theatrical screening. And for the first time in a video release the full width of the Cinerama screen has been captured. About a third of each of the two side images was missing in previous video versions. This version is so wide that a wide-screen HDTV still requires black bars at top and bottom to fit the image on the screen.

Yes, there are moments we wish we could re-write, such as the narrator's reference to "primitive" people. This is balanced, however, by an unusually fair (for the time) treatment of the plight of the plains Indians. The movie holds up remarkably well, thanks to a well- written script and strong performances by a large A-list cast. With the exception of a scene in which Debbie Reynolds breaks into a song-and- dance number in a wagon-train encampment (the excuse being that her character is a singer) there is almost nothing that betrays the era when the film was made. Well, there is the fact that most of the cast members are long dead.

As a professional historian, I have to say that the almost complete absence of reference to specific historical events (except the battle of Shiloh) is part of the secret of the film's success. This is a movie that captures the myth of the American west, a myth that is still alive and powerful.

This movie was made for the biggest screen ever, prior to the Imax era. The absence of true close-up shots (a limitation of the Cinerama process) is more noticeable on a smaller screen. It deserves to be seen on the biggest wide-screen TV you can find. And it does deserve to be seen.