Johnny Guitar: A Pop-Culture Madhouse
Last night I watched Johnny Guitar , expecting yer basic Western with perhaps better production values than most. That's Joan's actual size as she appears in the film, during which she swallows several horses, whole. They go well with scenery. That is not what Johnny Guitar is. It's hard to say WHAT Johnny Guitar is. Hard not just for me, but apparently for almost every critic and commenter who's ever reviewed the film. “It's a film that's many things to many people, from camp spectacular to revisionist genre epic, and nearly every reading seems viable.” “A pop-culture madhouse dressed up in spurs and a cowboy hat" “Quite possibly the weirdest Western ever made by a mainstream studio in the 1950s." “This 1954 Freudian Western is one of the all-time left-field wonders of the studio system, a film so subversive it's a wonder it ever got made.” “Compared to other Westerns, Johnny Guitar is high art--richly atmospheric and with noir elements that ...