JP "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance"

In Sue Matheson’s article, “The West-Hardboiled: Adaptations of Film Noir Elements, Existentialism and Ethics in John Wayne’s Westerns”, she describes the alpha male as a “romantic figure, the lone rider, achieves epic stature by accomplishing superhuman deeds and saving “civilized” settlers. When using Matheson’s arguments portrayed throughout her article, readers can easily connect John Wayne’s character Tom Doniphon from the film, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, to her descriptions of an alpha male cowboy. John Wayne does a stellar job while performing in the role of a “hero of disillusionment”. Tom Doniphon is the hero with a past; his moral history isn’t so “shiny” and his drive is simply motivated by his responsibility to the town of Shinbone.

Rance Stoddard ends up in the town of Shinbone, after being brutally attacked by Liberty Valance, a cruel western antagonist, on his journey out west. He was told after graduating from law school, “go west, go west…seek fame, seek fortune…” however, that fame or fortune didn’t come so easy to the highly educated Mr. Stoddard. Luckily, Tom Doniphon finds him and brings him back to the town where Miss Hallie and company get Rance back on his feet. Doniphon tries to show Rance how to adjust to western life; “In the west, a man who settles his own problems is indeed the sum of his actions,” (897). Rance is a man who has lived his life by the book, where in the west they live by the law of duty. Rance doesn’t understand and even questions the type of town he has gotten himself involved in. Luckily, He learns to listen to Doniphon rather quickly and starts to look up to him as a mentor; he buys a hand gun and eventually reaches the community with his brilliant ideas of how to govern their state and maintains the role of Senator.

Liberty Valance plays the antihero role in the movie, he is an antagonist who everyone in town dislikes and quivers to even a mumble of his name. He is a man of violence who is out to kill anyone in his way. In no way is he doing these awful acts out of duty; he is just a careless psychopath who is out to promote only himself. An interesting analysis done by Matheson is where she suggests that Stoddard may just be right about there being no difference between Doniphon and Valance, “both men settle their problems in the same fashion. In Shinbone, the individual does not enforce the law; he is the law,” (896). Both alpha male cowboys express law as being equal to a gun; it is just the western mentality. However, I see the difference between the two by the benefits that are coming out of their actions. Valance has no one in mind other than himself, while Doniphon is simply adhering to his responsibilities to the community of Shinbone. “When one considers the Wayne canon, it becomes obvious that the Duke specialized in playing destabilized, alienated figures, socially marginalized men caught in double binds- in short, the modern existential antihero,” (897) Matheson is simply describing the explanation of why Doniphon lives his life the way he does; every action and decision he makes is what he believes is best for everyone involved. He may want to decide one way, however realizes his judgment doesn’t just affect himself but an entire community.

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, depicts the exact classic western film Sue Matheson opinionates through her article, “The Western-Hardboiled: Adaptations of Film Noir Elements, Existentialism and Ethics in John Wayne’s Westerns”, in which one has to get rid of Savage America to reach Garden America (891). For example, in the movie they must get rid of the cruelty that Liberty Valance has put on the town of Shinbone for so long, in order for Rance Stoddard to be able to influence the western community the way he was sent out of the East to do. The influence of the alpha male cowboys around him teaches him how to reach his audience of the western community.