The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Release date: April 11, 1962, 123 minutes

Director: John Ford

Cast Includes:

Synopsis:

Senator Ranse Stoddard (James Stewart) and his wife, Hallie (Vera Miles), return to the small Western town of Shinbone for the funeral of an old friend - one Tom Doniphon (John Wayne). They arrive un-announced except to a few of their old friends still alive, including Link Appleyard (Andy Devine) and Pompey (Woody Strode). An excited reporter presses the senator to explain why he travelled all the way from Washington to attend the funeral of a nobody,. After a questioning look at Hallie, Ranse takes the man aside and tells the complete story, flashing back to the time, he, Tom , the others - and Shinbone - were young.

Arriving in Shinbone when it was a territorial town, Ranse is robbed and beaten by Liberty Valance (Lee Marvin), brutal gunman employed by a clique of powerful cattlemen who oppose statehood got the Territory. Ranse is found by Tom Doniphon, a quiet, respected rancher and the only person with whom Valance is afraid to tangle. He and his faithful employee, Pompey, get Ranse to a cafe operated by a kindly Swedish couple, Peter (John Qualen) and Nora (Jeanette Nolan), who take care of the injured underfoot and give him a job in their kitchen. There he meets Hallie, a pretty waitress linked romantically with Tom.

Determined to bring law, order and statehood to the Territory, Ranse hangs out his lawyer's shingle at the office of Dutton Peabody (Edmond O'Brien), newspaper editor, despite Tom's warning that Liberty Valance will return to Shinbone and kill him. The pot begins to boil when Ranse and Peabody win out over Valance as delegates to the Territorial Convention to fight for statehood.

Enraged, Valance retaliates after the meeting by brutally beating Peabody and wrecking his office. Ranse gets a pistol, which he doesn't know how to use, and starts out after Valance. The terrified Hallie, now in love with the young lawyer, appeals to Tom to save him. Liberty and Ranse meet in the street at night; there is a burst of gun fire and Valance falls dead.

During an emotional after math Tom learns of Hallie's feeling for Ranse. Bitterly disappointed, he burns down the addition to his ranch house he has been building for her.

On the strength of being "the man who shot Liberty Valance", a reputation he detests, Ranse Stoddard is nominated at the Territorial Convention to run for congress against the cattlemen's candidate. When, unable to face a career built on a killing, he leaves the convention hall. Tom tells him the truth: that it was he who shot Liberty Valance, in the darkness of the street, and he did it only for Hallie. And for Hallie, Ranse must continue to take the credit for the killing and accept the nomination. This Ranse does.

He wins the election, goes to Washington to lead the successful fight for statehood and is nominated for governor. Again he is going to refuse and again Tom suddenly appears and urges him to accept, for Hallie's sake. And thus Tom becomes Rane's conscience, the force which drives him to the US Senate and a brilliant career in Washington.

At the conclusion of Ranse's story, the reporter slowly tears up his notes. Ranse, asks, "You're not going to use the story?" The reporter answers, "No, sir. As our late and great editor, Dutton Peabody, used to say: "It ain't news. This is the West! When the legend becomes a fact, print the legend."

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