By Lee Pfeiffer
Twilight Time, the DVD label that specializes in releasing worthy films as limited editions of only 3,000 units, has brought out another long-neglected gem: the 1966 Fox version of John Ford's 1939 classic Stagecoach. The film was roundly blasted by critics in its day, perhaps out of reverence for Ford and John Wayne, who were still very much alive. There is no doubt that the original Stagecoach remains a milestone in cinematic history- the first "adult" Western, if you don't count Raoul Walsh's ambitious The Big Trail from a decade earlier.The film not only rescued Wayne from "B" Western hell but also encouraged other studios to revitalize the genre. Fox took the brunt of criticism from movie fans at the time of the remake's release for allegedly taking the original film off the art house and TV syndication markets for a period of years. The claim may not be true since the original movie was released by a different studio, United Artists, but whether it is an urban legend or not, the knives were out for the remake long before it opened. Audiences today are quite tolerant of remakes. They have to be since virtually every other movie in current release seems to be a remake. However, in 1966 the notion of remakes of classic movies seemed to rub audiences and critics the wrong way. There are those who still denounce the big budget re-dos of Mutiny on the Bounty and Cleopatra even though many film scholars now concede they are better than the originals. At the risk of being accused of being accused of blasphemy, I'd like to state categorically that if the remake of Stagecoach isn't as important or influential as its predecessor, it's every bit as entertaining.