John Ford made many a masterpiece, particularly in the western genre. Stagecoach was the first of many. The film is full of great, well rounded characters who all have their own personal journeys. The cinematography is breathtaking for its time and the action is suspenseful and exciting. The story is full of great moments and I only wish it was longer so we could learn more about the characters. I've seen this story redone several times, most notably in "The Hateful Eight". That's a good film, and adds a nice mystery element, but it pales in comparison to "Stagecoach" Granted, the depictions of native Americans in the film leave something to be desired, and some of the less important characters lack character development (even though all the characters have their fair share of it). This does not deter the movie though. The acting is excellent. John Wayne, John Carradine, Claire Trevor and Thomas Mitchell are deserving of much praise. This movie is a top notch western still after all these years and is up there with the best of the genre. It also lives up to Ford's other masterpieces like "The Searchers" and "The Grapes of Wrath" 1939 is called by many historians and critics as the greatest year for film. This film is a great starter for people who want to watch westerns and get into classic movies. A timeless, must see classic.

The American West, late-1800s. A stagecoach sets off across the untamed wilderness carrying a mixed assortment of characters: an infamous outlaw, a drunk doctor, a prostitute, a whiskey salesman, the wife of an Army officer, a gambler, a bank manager, the local Marshall and the driver. Animosities and petty differences, and unexpected friendships, surface. Their fortunes take a turn for the worse when they learn that an Apache raiding party, lead by Geronimo, is in their vicinity. A masterpiece that is the most important Western ever made. Great plot, well directed by the legendary John Ford. Not just a conventional cowboys-vs-Indians / gunfight sort of Western (though there a large element of that) but a character drama too. There is great character depth and development on display and this is used well in developing the story.Some great themes running through the movie too, especially one of anti-prejudice.Good performances all round. John Wayne is great as the Ringo Kid and shows a softer side that wasn't always apparent in his later films. Thomas Mitchell deservedly won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance as Doctor Boone.More than just a brilliant movie, a movie that created the blueprint for Westerns, and pretty much defined the genre. It also made John Wayne a star. He had acted in plenty of movies before this without much impact but Stagecoach is what truly launched his career as we know it.John Ford had already won a directing Oscar before directing Stagecoach, so this movie wasn't as career-enhancing to him as it was to John Wayne. However, it did set him up as the foremost director of Westerns. Moreover, it was to be the first of many collaborations with John Wayne, a series of collaborations that would see them make movies like The Searchers, Rio Grande, The Quiet Man, They Were Expendable, Fort Apache and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.A brilliant and historic movie.

John Ford created a Western that has every element you can have. It has a bank robber, a pregnant lady, a man falsely accused, some bad guys that accused him, a prostitute with a heart of gold, gunfire, Indians, the cavalry coming in at the last minute, John Wayne who, of course, never did anything wrong. These people are all travelling on a stagecoach so it becomes ensemble acting as they try to keep alive and get where they're going. Ford was a master director with a great eye for the camera. In addition to some really good plot elements and characterization, we see camera angles, close-ups, a wide shots that give the uninitiated an excellent interpretation of the Old West. This is worth seeing if only because it is a benchmark film, not merely a Western.

. . . STAGECOACH 2010 Criterion DVD commentator Jim Kitses seems to say, is for all the would-be Navy SEAL types to marry hookers and move to Mexico. (If you borrow a disc from someone to watch a movie you've heard things about, it's probably a good idea to make sure that the audio is not stuck in an alternate Yak Track.) Kitses says that there's little dialog in STAGECOACH (this is more than made up for by his continual droning on and on during the soundtrack to which I had access). Kitses says that Senator Joe "Sig Heil!" McCarthy's infamous 1950s Witch Hunt Hollywood Supersnitchers--STAGECOACH director John Ford and "actor" John "Ringo Kid" Wayne--were liberal dues-paying Communists a decade earlier, in their STAGECOACH days. I find this assertion pretty tough to swallow, since Kitses also reveals that Mr. Ford rode with the Ku Klux Klan even before that. While Kitses no doubt is correct in saying that STAGECOACH is hardly a "John Wayne movie," but rather a Chick Flick with a desert chase scene thrown in, it probably would have been nice to hear a few more lines of its original dialog (rather than Kitses opining "Claire Trevor Blah Blah Madonna Blah Blah Cleansed, Redeemed, and Saved Blah Blah Prolonged Soulful Gaze").