Dr. Jack Rhodes will present Western films at 1:30 p.m. every Thursday in February at the Waupaca Area Public Library.
The films are free and open to the public. Free popcorn, soft drinks and theater treats are provided.
Rhodes will introduce each of the films, providing insights into the making, the cast and the context of the movie. After the film is shown on a big screen, Rhodes will lead a question-and-answer session,
• Feb. 2 – “Dark Command” Raoul Walsh directed this 1940 film starring John Wayne, Roy Rogers and Claire Trevor. Set in Kansas just prior to the Civil War, “Dark Command” focuses on the violent politics of a divided nation.
• Feb. 9 – “Rio Grande” John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara star in this 1950 John Ford classic about the U.S. Calvary, the Apache wars, and how one family and a nation that had been divided by the Civil War were later reconciled.
• Feb. 16 – “Shane” The story of a family struggling to keep their farm, a merciless killer, and a lone stranger riding into town culminates in one of the most memorable closing scenes in cinema history. Shane was released in 1953, directed by George Stevens and starred Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin and Jack Palance.
• Feb. 23 – “Ride the High Country” Director Sam Peckinpah would redefine the Western with his 1969 film, “The Wild Bunch.” In “Ride the High Country,” made seven years earlier, Peckinpah creates a moving elegy for the genre. Two actors who had been Western stars during the 1930s through 1950s, Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea, play aging ex-lawmen trying to survive and maintain their sense of honor in a changing world.