The 13 Best Western Movies To Watch Right Now

Based on the Akira Kurosawa classic Seven Samurai, director John Sturges’ original version of The Magnificent Seven was a huge hit in 1960, thanks to its star-studded cast of Steve McQueen, Yul Brenner, and Charles Bronson, to name a few. When a Mexican village is terrorized by bandit Calvera and his gun-slinging cronies, seven American mercenaries are hired to protect the townspeople and teach them how to fight back. It’s an ultimate hero story with plenty of shootouts to please fans of the genre’s more violent scenes. But it’s also a moving tale of friendship that stretches beyond borders. It’s also a film that depicts non-white characters in a positive light, something that many westerns around this time miserably failed to do.

When diving into the western genre for the first time, most people gravitate towards The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. But you’d be remiss not to start with A Fistful of Dollars, the first film in Sergio Leone’s Man With No Name trilogy and an unofficial remake of Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo. It introduced Americans to low-budget Italian-made westerns — later dubbed spaghetti westerns — and was a breakout role for a young Clint Eastwood. In the film, Eastwood plays a double-crossing gunfighter who outwits two rival gangs by offering his services to both. His scruffy cowboy persona is only enhanced by the evocative soundtrack, composed by the late, great Ennio Morricone.

This movie has everything for everybody — sweeping desert landscapes, dramatic gunfights, train robberies, and a villainous Henry Fonda. Director Serio Leone took learnings from some of his smaller films and decided to write a masterpiece that captivates with a solid story and great characters. You’re sucked in from the very first scene when Charles Bronson’s mysterious Harmonica character faces off against three cowboys across the railroad tracks while playing a tune on his namesake instrument, which creates a thread through the remainder of the film. To get his hands on prime land in Sweetwater, railroad baron Morton hires killers (led by Fonda’s character Frank) to off property owner Brett McBain and his family. But when McBain’s new wife arrives to find them all dead, she inherits the land. Outlaws Cheyenne and Harmonica take it upon themselves to look after her, but it’s soon clear that some ulterior motives against Frank are involved in the do-good task.

If you look at this list, there’s a big gap between Butch Cassidy and Unforgiven. And that’s not a mistake, as the American western experienced somewhat of a drought in the 70s and 80s. But then Unforgiven came along and reinvigorated the genre. Clint Eastwood returned to the wild west as the star and director of the film, which he dedicated to Sergio Leone and Don Siegel, who he considered mentors who helped catapult his career. Unforgiven is a classic story for modern times, a tale that, like many other westerns, obscures the oftentimes thin line between justice and revenge. It was a seamless transition for Eastwood to dive head first back into the genre, and it paid off when he picked up Oscars for best picture and best director that year.

In 3:10 to Yuma, modern cinematic visuals tell an authentic western tale of the moral struggle between doing what is right versus maintaining the status quo. Both Russell Crowe and Christian Bale deliver engaging portrayals of their characters — a bandit and the local sheriff who takes him into custody, respectively — and the distinctive relationship that ultimately develops between them. The prisoner train, aptly named Yuma, is a nod to the railroad industry that is an ever-present character in the westerns of yore, and one that reminds us of the business on which the United States was built. 3:10 to Yuma is just a damn exciting movie that is deserving of your time and attention.