SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL SHERIFF
US, 1968, 93 minutes, Colour.
James Garner, Joan Hackett, Walter Brennan, Harry Morgan, Jack Elam, Bruce Dern, Henry Jones.
Directed by Burt Kennedy.
Support Your Local Sheriff guarantees continual laughter. It is a hilarious spoof of the typical western. It takes the expected conventions and with some gentleness it shows commonsense winning out over rock-jawed toughness. Even the murderer stays in a cell without bars. James Garner is very much at home in this type of comedy. He is well supported by Joan Hackett and Walter Brennan in enjoyable roles. The film was made by Burt Kennedy who has specialised in a number of small-budgeted but enjoyable westerns. for example, The Rounders, The War Wagon, The Deserter, The Train Robbers.
1. Audience response to westerns and comedies? The basic response to this comedy-western? The title recapitulating the themes and their irony?
2. The critics were full of praise for this film. Why? Did it deserve the praise?
3. Comment on the conventions of the western that it used: the gunslinger, the sheriff, gold, the boom town, the landowning family, the shootout, romance. How enjoyably were these presented and parodied? An affectionate laugh at the western conventions?
4. How well did the film create an atmosphere at the beginning: the funeral, the sudden awareness of the gold, and then the riot? An indication of things to come? And indications of the types of character, including Prudy?
5. The film's comment on the growth of the town and its lawlessness, Madam Orr and her house, the so-called respectable citizens? How were these parodied?
6. The expected villainous family, the Danbys? How typical of westerns, their toughness in word and action?
7. How enjoyable and engaging a hero was Jason? James Garner and his personality and style, his capacity for deadpan comedy? Jason and his aims to go to Australia? The reasons for his accepting the role of sheriff? The humour in his methods, for example, hosing down those fighting, putting the prisoner in a prison without bars, painting a red spot for blood? His finger in Danby's gun? His capacity for wisecrack comment? The comment on the role of the sheriff in the west? The humour and irony of his making Jake his deputy? How comic a character was Jake?
8. How attractive a heroine was Prudy? Comment on her belonging to the town, her relationship with her father as Mayor? Her being caught in all kinds of strange situations for example in the mud, up the tree? Her helping of the sheriff, falling in love with him? How enjoyable a heroic character of the west?
9. The detailed portrayal of the leading citizens, the hypocrisy, especially with trying to get a sheriff and pay him? Their being caught in Madam Orr's house during the shootout?
10. The action sequences with the Danby roundup, the preparation for the shootout, the creation of atmosphere? Jason's handling of the situation with the cannon? The irony of its blowing up Madam Orr's house?
11. How expected and appropriate was the happy ending? Why?
12. How do westerns show the good and bad of the American heritage? How well was it portrayed here, highlighted by parody and the audience's ability to laugh?
