Anyone else prefer High Plains Drifter to Josey Wales?

[Ken Dodd]

HPD is probably my favourite Clint western. I simply love it!  I find Josey Wales to be unengaging and totally overrated.

Do you prefer High Plains Drifter? I consider it his masterwork.

[KC]

It's certainly edgier, and yes, in many ways I prefer it. Don't we have a thread around here somewhere where people took sides?

[Christopher]

That's a good question. They are certainly different movies, and I like both a lot.

[Rawhide7]

Yeah this is a great fun question. I love questions like this. Comparing Eastwood movies to other Eastwood movies. I often ask questions like this myself. It's tough to say. Both are truly great. I enjoy both very much. Josey Wales is a tough gritty outlaw. And what he did to that town of Laredo in high plains was pretty enjoyable too. Honestly for me these two are just to close for me to say which one I like more than the other. Really there's only three Eastwood western movies that I would put ahead of high plains drifter and Josey Wales. And those three in order are unforgiven, GBU, and for a few dollars more.

[KC]

(Lago. )

(No poor cowboys wrapped in white linen as cold as the clay in Lago.

[Rawhide7]

Thanks for correcting me KC. I remember saying Lago as I was typing but for whatever reason I typed Laredo. Not sure how I did that. I was watching tv so I guess I'll use that as my excuse. Anyways thanks

[Jed Cooper]

Both are great.  For me, High Plains Drifter has the edge because The Stranger closely resembles the The Man With No Name.  The Leone westerns Eastwood starred in are my favorites. 

Perhaps it's the mystery.  While the viewer is on their own with regards to the back story of The Stranger, such is not the case with Josey Wales.  We see he's a happy family man at the outset before tragedy strikes.  We see the reason for his bitterness and anger.  On his revenge seeking journey, we witness him unwittingly amass a new "family" and, depending on the viewer, possibly comes full circle and settles down on a new farm at the end of the film.

The Outlaw Josey Wales is one of Eastwood's best moments as actor/director and possibly even a better movie, but I still prefer High Plains Drifter.   I love the introduction of the character as he rides into Lago and watching the story unfold from there.

Great topic... I just may have to view these as a double feature sometime soon. 😎

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[KC]

Thanks for correcting me KC. I remember saying Lago as I was typing but for whatever reason I typed Laredo. Not sure how I did that. I was watching tv so I guess I'll use that as my excuse. Anyways thanks

I hope you don't take offense because I corrected you! I couldn't resist making a joke about the song "The Streets of Laredo."

[Rawhide7]

Both are great.  For me, High Plains Drifter has the edge because The Stranger closely resembles the The Man With No Name.  The Leone westerns Eastwood starred in are my favorites. 

Perhaps it's the mystery.  While the viewer is on their own with regards to the back story of The Stranger, such is not the case with Josey Wales.  We see he's a happy family man at the outset before tragedy strikes.  We see the reason for his bitterness and anger.  On his revenge seeking journey, we witness him unwittingly amass a new "family" and, depending on the viewer, possibly comes full circle and settles down on a new farm at the end of the film.

The Outlaw Josey Wales is one of Eastwood's best moments as actor/director and possibly even a better movie, but I still prefer High Plains Drifter.   I love the introduction of the character as he rides into Lago and watching the story unfold from there.

Great topic... I just may have to view these as a double feature sometime soon. 😎

Very well put B.C.  It really is too close to call for me. What he does to that town is pretty amazing. Josey Wales is tough and gritty. Very rough tough type of movie. Really too close to call for me. Like U stated I think I'll have to watch them back to back and maybe decide then.

[Rawhide7]

I hope you don't take offense because I corrected you! I couldn't resist making a joke about the song "The Streets of Laredo."

No I'm not offended at all. I needed to have that corrected. I still can't believe I did that. 😅

[Richard Earl]

As much as I like High Plains Drifter, I love Josey Wales. The one liners from Clint and the performance of Chief Dan George were great!

[Perry]

I prefer Marianna Hill over Sondra Locke, so @ the moment I prefer HPD

[Moorman]

Count me in on that and its not even close.  High Plains Drifter is a vastly underrated western...

[Perry]

 

          I prefer TOJW, but since HPD upset the overrated John Wayne it can get a close vote by me. The only thing HPD beats TOJW is Marianna Hill is beyond better than Sondra Locke in every conceivable way.

[The Highlander]

As much as I like High Plains Drifter, I love Josey Wales. The one liners from Clint and the performance of Chief Dan George were great!

You made me think of one of the greatest, and funniest, exchanges I've ever seen on film as Clint and the Chief have escaped from a town with the help of the Indian woman who they befriended.  In paraphrase, Clint says "I suppose that's the last we'll see of that Indian woman.  But then it's always been that way."

Chief asks, "What way?"  Clint replies, "Every time I get to liking someone, they ain't around for long." 

As they continue riding side by side, Chief retorts, "I've noticed that when you get to DISLIKING someone, they ain't around for long either."

What a great exchange!  LOL

[AKA23]

That was a great exchange. Chief Dan George was such an effortless, natural actor, even though he had little to no experience when he did that movie!

[Perry]

          The Outlaw Josey Wales is overrated???........lol......

[Hocine]

HPD is probably my favourite Clint western. I simply love it!  I find Josey Wales to be unengaging and totally overrated.

Do you prefer High Plains Drifter? I consider it his masterwork.

High Plains Drifter and The Outlaw Josey Wales are probably two of the best American westerns of the 70’s.
I like them both. They are different. If we asked Clint which is his favourite one, he would probably answer The Outlaw Josey Wales. He said that he considered The Outlaw Josey Wales as good as Unforgiven. I think he also said that if he had to make High Plains Drifter again, he would remove the rape scene.
High Plains Drifter is important because this is his first western as a director.
He learned a lot from Sergio Leone, Don Siegel and many others.
So, he wanted to make his own pictures.
In High Plains Drifter, he seemed to say that he considered the Man With No Name as a fantasy.
Lago maybe symbolized America in the Nixon era. John Wayne disliked High Plains Drifter because it didn’t represent the American experience like he meant it. People of Lago were a bunch of cowards with the exceptions of Mrs Belding and Mordecai. I like the atmosphere and Dee Barton’s music.
High Plains Drifter started with this idea: what would have happened if High Noon’s Marshal had been killed ?
In my opinion, The Outlaw Josey Wales is important too because it shaped the cinema of Clint Eastwood.
From Bronco Billy to Gran Torino, we can see the influence of the Outlaw Josey Wales.
A lonely man builds a family whose members are not necessarily from the same blood but share the same idea of community and the same idea of America. The Outlaw Josey Wales has an anti-war statement.
We can see that in American Sniper too. Honestly, The Outlaw Josey Wales can stand as the best Clint Eastwood film.
Like Unforgiven, Million Dollar Baby, Mystic River, Bird, A Perfect World, The Bridges of Madison County or Letters From Iwo Jima. Objectively, The Outlaw Josey Wales is better than High Plains Drifter.
Josey Wales is one of the best performances of Clint.
But once again I really like them both.

[KC]

Another great post, Hocine. This is so true:

From Bronco Billy to Gran Torino, we can see the influence of the Outlaw Josey Wales.
A lonely man builds a family whose members are not necessarily from the same blood but share the same idea of community and the same idea of America.

As at least one critic pointed out, we can see that influence even in the much-maligned The 15:17 to Paris. In this case the "lonely man" is multiplied by three, three young kids who are outsiders at school, but find a sense of family in each other's company, even though one is from a very different background than the other two. Against the odds, they remain friends into adulthood, and even decide to take a European vacation together ... The rest is, as they say, history.

[bdc28]

I honestly think both of these westerns can stand individually, without having to run them against each other. Although both are westerns, they tell completely different stories.

HPD peels away the veneer of "humanity" and shows what really lies behind the polite faces...people at their worst. Taking advantage whenever they see fit, cowardly and having to be forced to do the right thing. It was definitely an essay on the human character, or at least the writers perspective of it.

OJW is different commentary, it was the bastardization of the US because of the Civil war. What people were turned into and what values were sacrificed in the name of survival. It also gave an introspective into the Native American as 'not the enemy", which at that time most western movies were prone to make them the easy enemy and savages, without actually explaining their story.

Both movies are masterpieces, they shouldn't be put against each other....they don't tell similar stories and where one will excel because of its story arc, the other will fail because it didn't follow.